And more bits.

I have started watching the CACB stock on Fridays. Yesterday, for instance, the stock took a straight dive down to .55 for most of the day, and then, around 3:30 a big push up, an immediate drop back down, another big push up, another drop, and finally a push that puts it slightly above the previous day. All in the last half hour.

Have no idea what's going on. Just find it weird.

It looks to me like someone is trying awfully hard not to let the stock drop below a certain level-- especially on Fridays.

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You suppose John Doe is just enjoying flummoxing the authorities with his identity?

I mean, if he knew he was going to end up in jail anyway?

Thing is, eventually, he might spend more time in jail not revealing who he is than he would have if he did reveal who he is -- unless the crime was dire. Interesting in this day and age that someone can still be invisible.

Maybe he just never lived in the U.S. until 1996? Does the strong "street Spanish" reveal anything? Maybe he just doesn't want to be deported?

Is it all a big game to him?

Alternate theory. There is nothing there. He just wants to seem more important than he is. He's a nobody. Even the choice of his high school, "one of the best public high schools in the district," may be an indication that he's just a wannabe.

Seems like a stiff price to pay -- staying in jail. But, hey, he's got us all wondering and talking about him, and maybe -- to him -- that's worth the price. Pretending that he's "in danger" is more fun than admitting he's a pathetic phoney.

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Going to be doing two things today that I always enjoy doing -- once I start doing it. Comic reading and gardening. I just need to get off my duff today. One more day of doing nothing at all and I lose all self-respect....

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I came up with a what I thought was a neat nickname for one of my employees.

But he asked me -- nicely -- not to use it.

And I decided many years ago if someone asks you nicely not to do something, it was only polite to comply.

Damn.

My rule of thumb; if I ask nicely three times for you stop doing something, and it doesn't matter to you and yet you still keep doing it? That's not polite.

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I got into manga with the idea that it might be a fad. That the pre-pubescent girls who were scooping it up would drop it a few years later. Seemed likely.

As long as I was growing the category, I seemed to be selling a lot. (This isn't the same thing as making money -- most of the profits went back into buying more product.) About the time I realized that manga and anime were on the verge of taking over the store space, the publishers started offering deals, so I kept going.

Eventually, I just didn't have any more space. I settled back to replace the best-sellers and buy the new significant series.

And sales dropped like a rock.

At what point does it become throwing good money after bad?

Anyway, I stopped ordering 'all' the series a few years ago, stopped reordering a couple years ago, and stopped ordering anything at all in the last year. For about a year, I've been offering more or less a buy 2 get a 3rd one free offer.

In the last month or so, I dropped it to 3 for 10.00 on manga, and 10.00 for every anime. In effect, I'm losing money. But I've also winnowed the inventory by about 40%, mostly without losing money. Throw in what I'll get with what's left, and I will probably break even overall.

I'm hoping to winnow it down another 25%, leaving only the back wall to Japanese material. And then just ordering the top ten in every category.

Shrug. It's one of those things that you can only know if it works if you go whole hog, and while you're building inventory, sales are great so you think you've got something. But it proves to be a "I'll buy this from you if you stock so much inventory you lose money" type things.