End of Day Journal (7-15-2010)

Summary:

Paper traded today and ended the day positive at +$368. 200 share lots and scaled up on the winners... and a few that didn't work out.

What a difference a day makes. I think I have been suffering the effects of cumulative sleep deprivation. My body is in some awful pattern of 4 to 5 hours a night, for something like the better part of the last 7 years. I hate it, but there doesn't seem to be much I can do about it (caffeine intake is down over 90% for the last 5 weeks with no results). I generally try to sneak a nap in during the afternoon, but I haven't scored very well on that front over the last several weeks. I came away with a 2.5 hour nap the other day and 7 hours of sleep last night. I woke up refreshed this morning for the first time in what has seemed like weeks. I felt right on the edge today - much better, but if I pushed it I could feel my body ready to fall back over into exhaustion.

Anyhoo - this made such a difference in the mental attitude. That and I wonder if I have reached the end: coming to grips with the idea that trading is a high performance art, requiring mental agility and a lot of screen time. I am willing to wait now, expecting it to take awhile, and content to paper trade until it just clicks. Stocks can only do a a few things: go up, go down, or go sideways; only so many ways for this to happen. I am planning on getting familiar with most of them before placing any more money on the line.

What's familiar? A consistent paper profit. A sense of comfort and confidence in what I am doing.

What's the plan? I am going to focus on the favorites, TI's high flyin' fast movin' screener, and the ETF's. Big basket -probably stick with the ETF's and favorites for the first few weeks. Entries when it looks like things are going to move, and exits when it looks like they stopped moving, after a big move, or when I would be crazy not to.

I expect to get better at this - meaning I will allow myself the freedom to not do as well as Scott does, yet keep his trades as the standard.... and daily inspiration.

I am still messing around with the TICKs and buy/sell volume; but I want to simplify as much as possible. I feel like the TICKs have been pretty helpful for market feel, but buy/sell volume shows no consistency yet at all. We shall see.

Also - I plan on watching real momo moves over and over again, e.g., today's EOD rally that I recorded. I want to burn these into my brain - distinguishing between noise and the big moves is what all this practice will be about. I want to get better and better at 'sensing' that things are about to change.

Silly me. What made me so special? Why did I think I could get this faster or easier than anyone else? Pfft.

That is the market - naive beginner's luck reeling the innocent in to suck them dry. Familiar to everyone who has tried trading. I plan on sticking around awhile...

Two years - if I don't have 'it' by then, then I will move onto something else. And still have my money.

Sweet tune. 

I am going to post the recorded charts for the record - I want to save the buy/sell volume for future reference.  Some of the charts will have trades, but I am not posting all the trades tonight; pretty much the same old thing I have been doing - seeing momo where there is momo - and unfortunately - where there is chop. I plan on processing/analyzing my trades more while I am in the moment, taken in the context of the entire market moment.

I am beginning to wonder about the value of static historical charts.

Details:

ABX:

BP:

BTU:

CLF:

EDZ:

GG:

LVS:

PCX:

QLD:

RIG:

TNA: