Why I Re-Post Data

Earlier this evening I received the following comment regarding my daily re-posting of the NDIC daily activity reports:

Guess what Bruce, Everyone who cares read this on the NDIC site

The grammar, punctuation, and the capitalization suggested ... I won't go there. I digress.

I responded to that comment by explaining why I re-post so much data. I won't repeat that here. You can read it at the original post. It was at today's posting of the NDIC daily activity report.

However, there is another reason I re-post so much data. It is amazing how much I "see" when I re-post the data. When I first started this blog, I did not re-post the monthly NDIC hearing dockets, but I found that I was often skimming through the information, and not really paying attention to what I was reading. If I was interrupted while reading the cases, I often failed to return to the dockets. But re-posting it forced me to really look at the data.

And by doing this, I often see things that I would otherwise miss.

This is my best example and one of which I am most proud. To the best of my knowledge I am the only one who has ever noticed it. I am the only one who has ever posted it.

It has to do with Virginia Woolf's masterpiece, Mrs Dalloway. The first time I read that book, I hated it. But critics said it was a masterpiece which made me think I was missing something. So, to force myself to really read this book, I re-typed the entire book. The entire book.

But I didn't simply re-type it as Ms Woolf posted it. I re-typed it in blank verse. And I didn't do that without a reason. While typing it initially, I noticed that it was a prose poem, again something I did not see until I started typing it.

And then, when I typed it in blank verse, I noted something else. Ms Woolf had incorporated a poem into her novel. I assume others have noticed that but I have seen no indication and googling has not confirmed that others have seen it.

But, and this is where I really got excited: by typing it out in blank verse, I discovered the source of the poem, and even provided a hypothesis as to where Ms Woolf found the poem. That, to the best of my knowledge, is something no one else has discovered, and if they have, they have not put it on the net.

The story is at one of my other blogs, my literature blog. Again, I consider that post one of the best things I ever did (for me, not for anyone else) and I never would have noted it had I not re-typed the entire novel. [It took me several months to re-type that novel, about two hours a night, every few nights.]

The same thing has happened numerous times while re-posting NDIC data, most of which I post when I discover it.

The other thing, and this is very, very minor in the big scheme of things, but important to note. My Bakken blog is not an investment site. No one should use my site to make investment decisions. But by re-posting every last NDIC daily activity report (I haven't missed one in two years) and posting a summary of every NDIC hearing docket, I feel I have developed a real feel for the Bakken, which has led me to make some very nice investment decisions. I have invested on my own starting back in 1984, if I remember correctly. The first investment I ever made was in Burlington Northern, one of my best investments, and I got the idea for that investment by watching coal train after coal train pass through Williston (actually, it was in a cafe in Grand Forks with my parents when I was stationed at Grand Forks AFB when I first had the idea -- the cafe was next to the railroad and while sitting there a coal train went by). The data was all there -- somewhere -- for investors but I had never found it; it was day after day of coal trains going through Williston that hit me like a "2 by 4." So, it's the same with re-posting the data.

Here's a Bakken example. The following is one of the best examples of thinkgs I noted regarding the Bakken, again because I re-posted so much data. Maybe everyone else in the world also noted it but to the best of my knowledge, I was the first to blog about it: the two operational centers for Whiting in North Dakota -- their northern ops and their southern ops. That was many, many months ago. To date, I am unaware of anyone else blogging about it. (Probably because it is/was obvious and everyone in the world knew except me.)

I was also the first to note on a blog that there was something different about Whiting's Lewis&Clark/Pronghorn Prospect. And guess what? In their most recent corporate presentation, Whiting now separates out the Pronghorn Prospect from their Lewis&Clark Prospect.

This observation -- which I came across only because I re-posted and re-posted so much data -- confirmed that an earlier investment was a good decision and one I should stick with. That investment decision is now "throwing" off free cash which I use for other investments.

Re-posting and re-posting data also convinced me to get out of one Bakken investment and move into another, a decision that turned out to be the correct one.

(Like gamblers who return from Las Vegas, I won't talk about all my losers. Smile.)

You know, it's sort of like practicing the piano. I could simply listen to the CD, but to really get a feeling for the piece, practicing the piece over and over and over makes a huge difference. My favorite is "Für Elise."

So, again, my blogging is not for investing or for investors. If you go back to my "welcome" and/or my "disclaimer" I mention that I never planned to talk about investments or the stock market with regard to the Bakken. But it soon became obvious that one could not understand the Bakken without following the investments that were being made. In fact, I wish I could eliminate all references to the stock market and to investing, but it's not gonna happen when talking about the Bakken.

Posting, re-posting, and re-posting all those stories about crew camps -- are you getting anything out of that? If not, your missing a huge story. If you look at all the stories I've posted and re-posted about the crew camps around Dickinson, one can only get the feeling that something big is happening in that part of the state.  The stories about the crew camps around the Dickinson area were being posted and re-posted and re-posted before the announcement of the Pronghorn Prospect.

Actually, the real reason I post and re-post and re-post is because I want to improve my typing skills.

Oh, I'm sorry. I can't quit. Again, by posting and re-posting data, I got into a pipeline investment very, very early. In fact, multiple pipeline plays.

But again, investing is a very minor piece for me. I post and re-post and re-post to help me see developing stories. That's the reward and the joy of blogging.

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It's 12:00 midnight on the east coast. After midnight I go to YouTube and pick a song I want to hear, and from there go randomly to the next song from the suggested YouTube list. As I say at the site:

After midnight I start with a random song on YouTube.com which leads me to another and then another. Later, sometimes hours later, I end up somewhere not knowing how I got there. Often I am in a fugue state. I am sure I am not alone.

So, tonight, at two minutes after midnight, I will start with:


California Blue, Roy OrbisonI've told this story many times. I think I've posted it before.  A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, I used to do a lot of hitchhiking, including three cross-country hitchhiking trips across the US. Later, I returned the favor by picking up hitchhikers.

The second time I ever visited California, and the first time I had a car while visiting California, I was "Sunday driving" down Highway 1, near Santa Cruz. I stopped to pick up a young couple. His name I forget; she called herself "something Blue." I think it was "California Blue," but I can't say for sure, but the second "part" was Blue. Easy to remember. The blue skies, the blue ocean. They wanted me to drive them about ten miles so he could start hitchhiking from a better spot. She was not hitchhiking any farther that day. So we dropped him off and continued in the same direction for awhile. I asked her what "we" would do, or what her boyfriend would do if he failed to catch a ride. That was never a consideration but she said we'll know when we turn around and drive back.

So, after some miles down the road we turned around and headed back in the direction from which we had come. And there he was -- in the front seat of a VW minivan. He had a huge smile on his face and he was on his way.

You know, it's a funny thing. I obviously dropped "California Blue" off where she wanted to be let off, but I don't remember that part of the story. All I remember she was an incredibly beautiful California daytripper. I remain, to this day, "amazed" that he would head off without her.

So, now back to YouTube Fugue to see where I end up tonight. Maybe some night I will tell you about my hitchhiking story in Switzerland, again, a long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.