Monday, Monday -- March 4, 2024

Locator: 46670B.

Crawfish App: up and running; free. Crawfish now available in our area, running $9 to $12 / pound. 

Apple iPhone: simply amazing; every day it seems I find another incredible feature that makes my life so much easier.

Apple M3: announcements this morning. 

Somewhat of a surprise how early in March announcements made.M3 MacBook Air available for pre-order. A bit confusing but prices possibly slightly lower than previous models. With improvements (not best word) definitely much cheaper. Will fly off the shelves; will be #1 computer for college students this fall.

Breakeven: Saudi, Qatar:

Sports:

• basketball
• that Iowa - Ohio game was huge, yesterday; I'm hoping I can find it again, re-airing;
• average ticket price for yesterday's game: $546
  
• watching highlights now 
• Caitlin looking to sign with Indiana Fever; their season tickets already rising
  
• women's March Madness begins March 20, 2024
• Vanderbilt, SEC, on the bubble, as they say
  
• men's: begins March 19, 2024
  

• rain-delayed PGA tournament concluded this morning
• leader started on 8th hole
• incredible: aired on Golf Channel to which I don’t subscribe and aired on Hulu (via Amazon Fire Stick on Philips big screen bought years ago at Walmart). 
• Austin Eckroat, champion, by three strokes, first time winner at PGA tournament; automatic invite to Master’s later this year. Set all kind of records despite bogey on 14th; 50th start. Hadn’t won an event since 2019.
• elsewhere: $250,000 penalty for playing too slowly; article also explains why we didn’t see some big name players at this weekend’s PGA tournament.

Movies:

• lots of thoughts on Dune: Part 2; saw it last night; can't decide what to say about it
• Washington Post; over at RogerEbert.com; 
• quick notes:   
• huge for Dune fans; not my kind of movie
  
• while watching, flashed across my mind: Star Wars, Apocalypse Now -- both so much better than Dune. 
• while watching, flashed across my mind: Bloom's The Western Canon, the Bible, Shakespeare plays;
• first Star War movies much better; 
• minimal character development in Dune; can't warm-up / connect with Dune characters
• story line: dorky; not original at all
• too many scenes too dark (as in lighting, not story line)
• dialogue: not developed
• Christopher Walken: big disappointment; doesn't seem to fit; review here;
  
• $11.37 with tax; about the price of monthly subscription to Amazon Prime
  

Literature:

• Stuff Jeff Reads; looks like his last post was in 2022; Tristram Shandy; The Western Canon;
• Harold Bloom obit -- October 13, 2019; updated November 1, 2019; NYT; 

Personal investing: lots of dividend cash this month, but for now, holding; honestly can't decide

• after two years of re-balancing the portfolio, not sure what to do next
• will wait to see what Jim Cramer says this a.m.; panelists at "Half-Time Report" 

Dow 30 components, today, pre-market: link here.

Two tickers, I guess we'll start with the "A"s today: 

Ford monthly sales: F up 4% today.

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Back to the Bakken

WTI: it's Monday, WTI is down; trading at $79.43.

Tuesday, March 5, 2024: 91 for the month; 150 for the quarter, 150 for the year
None.

Monday, March 4, 2024: 91 for the month; 150 for the quarter, 150 for the year
36282, conf, Enerplus, Warthog 149-93-31D-30H-TF,

Sunday, March 3, 2024: 90 for the month; 149 for the quarter, 149 for the year
40006, conf, Slawson, Thor 2-31-30H,
36280, conf, Enerplus, Meerkat 149-93-31D-30H,

Saturday, March 2, 2024: 88 for the month; 147 for the quarter, 147 for the year
None.

RBN Energy: with brutally. bearish fundamentals, how low could natural gas prices go?

It’s been a devastating few weeks for the natural gas market. Sure, Shale Era abundance was supposed to keep gas prices from skyrocketing — and it generally has. But seriously? Henry Hub gas sinking below $2/MMBtu — and staying there, in the depths of the winter heating season? Prices have stabilized a little in recent days as a few E&Ps announced cutbacks in capex and gas-focused drilling, but gas-storage levels are abnormally high, coal-plant retirements have trimmed opportunities for coal-to-gas switching, and any significant gains in LNG exports aren’t going to happen until this time next year. With all that, you’ve gotta ask — as we do in today’s RBN blog — how low could natural gas prices go?