Poison Oak

Wednesday 9:30 a.m. - 11:00 p.m.

So I just re-read my blog and I have to say I make a lot of typos! Almost to the point that its really distracting. I am going to do better at that.

I have poison oak. Or, at least that is what I think I have and I am not going to see an actual doctor. My insurance doesn't cover CA. It would cost out of pocket $200. I'll pass. So for the past week I have had this rash/blisters develop on my upper right arm, now it has spread to my legs and other arm. I asked around and showed some people and the verdict is poison oak. I guess it is pretty common in Silicon Valley. What is weird is that I have been to 2 parks since I have been here, but wasn't near anything but grass. I bring it up because its kind of distracting at work for me. Distracting because I itch, so if anyone has a secret remedy for this stuff let me know. I guess the oils can easily spread, and that I have to decontaminate everything. I have washed all my clothes and still it spreads. I mean, as I understand even brushing up against a desk (like the one I sit at all day) could have the oils from the plant and it can start all over. Oh well, trials make us better.

Today was a very slow, in fact somewhat wasteful day. I came in and finished up those profiles finally! Cool part? Despite the fact that the analyst I worked with sent me through the wringer, no hard feelings at all and we were able to joke around. That is one of the cool parts about banking, yeah you get yelled at, but in a couple minutes--they're over it and you are straight. I can imagine that if you are a repeated failure that you get a negative reputation and people won't want to work with you, so the goal is for me not to make the same mistakes twice!

After finishing up the profiles I was done--that was at noon. I did my rounds to all my projects. Some of the analysts were like, "shhhhhhh, don't mention that project and we won't have to work on it." So the question is why did I stay until 11:00? One of the live deals I am on just had a presentation and the associate was coming back to the office with comments tonight at 8:00. Well he never showed, and the analyst on the deal left, and told me to go home too. In my down time I read research reports (keep this on the DL, but the reports I read were for companies I held stock in) I looked at some comps to see how they were set up and I read a really cool letter. It was a highly confidential letter to a target that a PE firm was interested in an LBO. We are advising the target. I soaked it up. You know its one thing to read about this stuff on the outside like in the Wall Street Journal, its another thing to think, "Wow this it the real deal and I am on it."

So the office was pretty slow for most everyone. Tomorrow there is a bakeoff. A bakeoff is where a company in this case wants to go public and they need to choose a bank to do the underwriting. All the banks show up in their Sunday best and pitch why the firm should choose them. It would be neat if we could go watch, but we can't not even analysts are going.