I promise this column isn't becoming Macke & Me; about a frustrated man's relationship with his dog. Marley and Me somehow both sucked and blew as a movie. Also, Beulah was a good dog. I trained her (an absence of which being my number-one annoyance with Marley).

I simply can't lie to you, folks - and I've got a bit of an obsession with my dog right now. That's what happens when you spend the better part of a week convincing a vet to kill your friend. The vet is convinced. Today at noon, I'm going to hold an animal who's been with me through 3 jobs, 4 houses, 2 kids and a 3,500 mile move on the bet that I could make a living doing television. She's seen me at my best and worst, and never once judged me. Later today, while I hold her, a veterinarian is going to inject her with a fatal poison which, I pray and he insists, won't hurt.

If I pretended I wasn't turning down the volume on CNBC and listening to variants of "To Lay Me Down" repeatedly, I wouldn't be telling you the truth. I'm a deeply flawed man, but I'm simply not a liar. That said, once this afternoon's horrible but humane piece of business is done, I promise to never discuss it with you again. Thank you for the kind notes. I'll be returning to character by tomorrow, at the latest.

Appreciated though they were and are, please refrain from dedicating any more posts in my columnist conversations to the topic of losing pets. I feel the love from those who chose to give it, and I return it in kind. From this day forward, I'm doing what we Minnesotans do with our pain; I'm stuffing it into a tiny box I keep just under my liver and I'm going to work like a coal miner until the hurt is gone.

Now let's make some money, shall we?
 

• Electronic Arts (ERTS) was just about as horrible as I expected it to be last night. A little worse, even. The reaction of the stock, however, suggests either a trading bottom or too many shorts. Or both. That's why I had Pete help me craft a call position to hedge my short. Glad I did, as I got out of the rather surprising (to me) jump higher relatively unscathed. Maybe there's something to this "hedging" thing after all.
  
  
• In addition to unwinding my carefully wound-up position in Electronic Arts, I covered the Ralph Lauren (RL) short discussed yesterday for a gain that was a wee bit superior to a poke in the eye with a sharp stick. Frankly, the quarter was a tick better than I expected. For RL, being an apparel seller means it managed its business well enough to completely implode. Kudos to the company.
  
  
• While we'll accentuate the positive in the next bullet point, first let's pay heed to Costco's (COST) warning today. Costco is a very, very good retailer. You can believe the few remaining propeller-heads who'll tell you the consumer is "just pulling back a bit" - or you can look at stocks like Wal-Mart (WMT), Target (TGT), Saks (SKS) et al., which are either near their 52-week lows or, at best, going nowhere. You can trade the stocks for bounces all you want, but, as the son of a merchant, I can tell you this with 100% confidence: We're in a recession, and not one of the stimulus programs I've heard so far or can think of myself is going to do one thing to change that fact.
  
  
• Turning my frown upside down, just as promised, Toyota (TM) trades like an absolute champion. Today's news: The company is looking for nice sales growth in Qatar. Is Qatar a big market? Obviously so; look at Toyota's stock! Also helping is this: Good news in Qatar, however insignificant the market, is better than US sales falling 34%, which was yesterday's news from Toyota (NB: Mentioning the 49% drop in General Motors (GM) sales violates the "happy faces" policy of this portion of my note).
  
  
• Also trading like a champion is Morgan Stanley (MS). The stock is up almost 10% today, suggesting it's on the Secret List of bank stocks the government doesn't plan to kill this weekend. Way to go, MS!
  
  Other stocks apparently not scheduled to die: Goldman Sachs (GS) (shocker!), Citigroup  (C) and JPMorgan (JPM). As for Bank of America (BAC), in lieu of flowers, please send lawyers and expensive office furniture. And, yes, as hard as it is to sell winners (and as much as I agree that Secret Plans are key to restoring confidence in markets), I am taking some gains in MS.
  
  
• I still can't type on my iPhone worth a dgmb, but Apple's (AAPL) stock called to tell me it was going to $100. Also that my Amazon (AMZN) call was a blunder. I'll be honest: It's a little hard to hear much on the phone. Regardless, Apple's stock is going to $100, recession or not, so I'm long a bit - and the haters are simply going to have to accept both facts.
  
  
• Concluding our happy-fest, Microsoft (MSFT) has done nothing but go higher since turning in an earnings release so horrific that I vomited both in my mouth and all over my shares. As I said yesterday, sometimes you gotta throw the virgin in the volcano to let a stock move higher. Mr. Softee is less virginal than the Rose of Tralee, but my selling the longtime hold seems to have done the trick for those of you who stayed long.
  
  You're welcome.