Every once in awhile I am tempted to pull some money out of savings and buy a stock or two. My current savings account (ING) is at 3%. But my interest checking is at 5% (weird, I know - can’t bring myself to xfer from savings to checking though). Good, but maybe there’s more out there - some additional green that I am missing out on. The market is down - this should be the time to buy!

Then I start reading stuff (on the intarweb, of course, but also periodicals like Fortune). So there’s all this exampling and postulating and forecastifying. And then it makes me go check my IRAs and 401Ks. I try not to do this too much b/c it’s supposed to be long term, right? It’s all mixes of funds - risk spread across various equity classes. Last thing I had done, about 9 mos ago was move money (not all of it) out of REIT fund and into small cap int’l fund. My thinking was weak dollar and slagging real estate market. Oops. The REIT stayed relatively flat (down single digits), but the int’l fund tanked.

My other funds also tankered. Overall, in the last rolling 12mo period, I’m down 30%. Erk. Now I’m too fearful to check my other retirement accounts ( I have similar allocations at the other 2). I also have 30 shares of Dell that I kept from the bubble days as a reminder. I bought at $35. Oops. I have the actual shares sitting here in a drawer.

So, I guess I’ll be keeping my non-retirement shit in cash. Not b/c it makes sound financial sense, but b/c I’m a wuss. Also, seems like many of my company’s largest customers are having difficulties. If I get laid off, liquidity will be key.

Of course, yes, I realize that it’s this kind of group-think that creates this trends that escalate and cement and then take much more group-think in the opposite direction to undo. But I have a mortgage to pay, and soon some college tuition. When theory and practice thoe-down, practice kicks theory’s ass.