Broken Wrists and 401(k)s

This week I finally became a man…by which I mean I am now an official Financial Adviser at Morgan Stanley (If anyone has $100,000 or more call me). Naturally, I am now completely lost. For the past 19 years all I have known is study. Now I have a real career. Which is totally unusual for me, but that all is not what I’m here to talk about (Seriously, you thought I was going to talk about emotions and junk? Do you even know me?) No, I’m here to talk about me first official week as a financial adviser.

It started on Sunday morning. I am a member of the local NABA, or National Adult Baseball Association. Before joining this league, my last time playing in an actual baseball game was little league. I was playing a double-header with my team. The first game went by and I noticed that my at-bats had improved tremendously over the previous weeks. Still, I was unable to contribute as I struck out looking and popped out. I know what you’re thinking, “only 2 at bats?” Yeah, well my team won by way of 10 run rule, so that cut the game short. After a 30 minute intermission, we were ready to start the second game.

The second game starts and the first inning goes by quickly, both teams score a run. I come up to bat in the second inning and strick out swinging (fucking sliders). The game continues. Once again, my team jumps out to a large lead. The bottom of the fourth arrives and I’m set to bat third. My team is up by 7. So, the pressure is somewhat on to score and end the game early. The first man up draws a walk. He immediately steals second and third and comes home on a wild pitch. Okay, one run down. The next batter ends up grounding out. So I come up to the plate with no one on, one run in, and one out. That’s when I start impressing myself. I lay off a couple of close pitches that were balls. Then a couple of bad pitches later, I’m on my way to first with my first walk of the season. Now I’m faced with a new anxiety, trying not to get picked off. I succeed and steal second base. Later in the same at bat, I advace to third on a passed ball. I’m now 90 feet away from glory. Man batter delivers and sends a liner into the outfield and I run home…even though I could have crawled it. We end the inning up by 12 runs. All we have to do is hold them and we’ve won. But of course they make a come back and play continues.

I’m come up to bat again in the next inning. This time they’ve brought in their ace closer…a 65 year old man. Needless to say, the pitches weren’t exactly popping the mitt so to speak. From the instant I got up to bat, I knew I had him beat. After a few bad pitches, I get the one I want and pull a grounder down the third base line. I end up on first with a single. Now I’m back to baserunning. I steal second with out a problem and play continues. I then attempt to take third. As I approach the bag, it becomes apparent to me that I need to slide. I throw my legs out in front of me and attempt a foot first slide. At the same time, I put my hand down to soften the impact on the way down.

I get called out and walk back to the bench. I start to notice my wrist is a little tight. I brush it off as minor sprain and go out to right field for defense. An inning comes and goes, nothing too exciting happens. Then I go back out to the outfield and start to warm up. I notice that my wrist is hurting a bit more than it did before, especially when catching throws. Through out that inning I pray that the ball doesn’t come to me (which is rather unusual for me, but I’m injured). Of course, the ball gets right to the center fielder and I get no action. Such ends the second game. I leave with my wrist in a low to moderate amount of pain.

As the night wears on, I notice my wrist start to hurt more. Then comes the time for bed. Through out the night I wake up and wince at pain due to my wrist.

Monday comes and my wrist is in terrible shape. I can’t flush the toilet with my left hand without the pain surging through out me. My morning shower was absolutely unbearable. I couldn’t wash anything with my left hand, so I did the bast I could with my right and moved on.

I am the first one to work again. This gives me time to find a doctor before I get bombarded with questions. I find the closest doctor that accepts my insurance plan and at 9 am, I’m on my way to see him.

[Feel free to take a break and get some concessions. I'm only up to Monday out of my week]

So, after driving up and down the road a couple of times, I notice a small sign saying “Urgent Care Center.” So, I decide to check it out and sure enough it’s the doctor’s office. After waiting a few minutes the doctor shows me in. I tell him the story about playing baseball and hurting my wrist and that I thought it was a sprain but wanted to make sure nothing was broken.

So he does a couple of routine checks, blood pressure and what not and we move on to the x-ray. He tells me at this point that they currently don’t have an x-ray tech and that he’s going to do it himself. So he takes a first set of the x-rays and goes to develop them. He comes back in and tells me he’s going to retake a couple of them. So we get through it and goes to process them and I go back into the patient room. He then comes in with his colleague for a second opinion. In one of the x-rays, it appears as though there might be a hairline fracture. So, they spend a couple of seconds debating whether it’s a fracture or a sprain and come to the conculsion to send the x-rays to a radiologist for further processing. They give me a splint and tell me to come back in on Friday.

While we were discussing my health, I brought up the fact that I am a financial adviser at Morgan Stanley. As I leave, I have a very good vibe from the entire doctor’s office and I leave feeling confident.

I get back to work and I realize that I have no idea how to start building my business. Everyone tells me that seminars are the way to go. So, I go full force into setting up a seminar. As I’m doing this, I realize that although I am an FA, I don’t have a FA number. Which means that if someone did want to open an account with me, they couldn’t. I muster up all my assertiveness and tell my managers to get their shit together and set me up. And I realize that being assertive gets a lot of stuff done. But as the day passes, I realize I only have partial authority, not the full authority that I should have. I spend the day flipping between working on my seminar and getting aggravated of the lack of efficiency in the world.

Monday ends and Tuesday comes. I start to notice that the splint I got kind of hurts my hand. Not the part of the wrist that was injured, it hurts the opposite side a little. I brush it off and move on with my day. I’m impressed that I have regained the use of my left hand when washing myself off.

Tuesday comes and goes with out anything significant happening. Wednesday comes and I start to think that the splint is briusing me. I continually adjust it in attempt to find the least bit of comfort. I waste another day doing nothing. I get upset with myself and think about quitting my job and doing something else. Wednesday passes.

Thursday comes and I go back to work. Not really accomplishing anything, I am just there. I find out that another trainee fail his series 7 (the test you need to pass in order to deal securities). Failing the series 7 means that you no longer have a job with the company, but we all knew that coming into the business. His failing strikes me pretty hard. I think about what he must be going through now and wish I could console him in some way. The other trainees who have yet to take their series 7 really get sent into a panic attack, which is actually probably pretty good for them because I think I’ve told them to much and pushed their expectations down; giving them a false sense of security. I feel that this may result in them not studying as hard as they should…or maybe I’ve just forgotten what it was like when I was in their position.

Besides that, Thursday goes by as a normal day. 5 PM rolls around I’m packed and ready to go. One of the senior FAs asks me about my splint and the conversation leads to him telling me what I should do in order to be successful in this business. I end up leaving work at 8:30 PM. I get home and I realize tonight is Project Greenlight night. (For anyone who hasn’t seen the show, Bravo is airing a marathon this Sunday I believe, check your local listings). After PG, I go to bed ready to take on Friday.

I wake up and 6:15 and I get going just like any ordinary day. I arrive at work at 7 AM…the next person to get to the office arrives at 8. At 9:15 I head back to my doctor’s office to find out what the verdict is. I get there and go into the patient’s room.

The doc sits down across from me and says, “I’ve got bad news.”

I’m thinking to myself, “Dammit, I’ve got a fracture which means no baseball for approx. 8 weeks.”

The doc continues, “our radiologist is out of town until Tuesday. So, we can’t tell you about your wrist.”

We discuss what I should do until Tuesday and we walk back out towards the lobby.

While I’m paying my copay, the doc turns to me and says, “I know you’re a financial adviser, could you set up a 401(k) for me? Because we own a couple of business and we’ve been looking into setting it up.”

I give him my business card and tell him to give me a call to set up an appointment with me.

The rest of the day I’m going out of my head trying to figure out how to set up a 401(k) and all the regulation that comes with it.

I end up leaving work at 6:00…last one out.

That pretty much brings you up to speed on what I’ve done since my last blog. I’ve been contemplating getting other injuries in order to prospect…maybe I could take a pitch to the face. It could knock out a couple teeth and give me vision problems…so many possibilities.

I’ve also realized that in my most recent jobs, I have found merrit in the opposition to what I’ve been selling. I’m currently in the money business, but I’ve caught myself thinking about what happiness could be with out any financial problems. The previous job I had was selling Home Theater equipment. Which I love home theater, but at the same time I saw the power it has over people. I kept thinking about how much more there is out there and how much of my life has been wasted in front of tv. I think the worst fact is that I’ve been stricken with a disease called laziness due to the television and I can now see that I could have accomplished a lot more if I had done things differently.

Well, I guess I’ll let you go now. This blog will teach you for trying to buzz the hell out of me. So, take that.

Greatest Dream Ever

I was just read some peeps’ blogs and I came across Kate from Chicago talking about night terrors. Her blog brought me back to the greatest dream anyone ever had…anyone being me. All my friends know this dream, but it’s a classic and everyone should hear it. So, here it is…

It all started like a normal summer day. The guys (Gerald, Russ, Dan, Chris, Corey, and Jeff) and myself had just picked up some gyros and brought them back to Dan’s house. We were all sitting around a folding table in Dan’s basement eating. In the middle of eating my gyro, I look up at the window well (my parent’s house had these. They’re little windows in basements near the ceiling) and something catches my eye. After looking down at my gyro, I look back over at the window well. There is a little girl sitting looking in through the window. Be the guy I am, I wave to the kid, and in usual little girl fashion, she flicks me off. So, I give the finger right back to her and she runs away. Yeah, I really showed her who’s boss.

So, having dealt with that problem, I go back to the gyro. Then, I notice something in the corner of my eye again. I look up and the little girl has came back. I get all ticked off. As I’m getting up to do something about it, I see her waving someone over to her. She’s bringing her dad into this. Now I’m standing up right to go with this kid’s dad when he gets to the window. I look at him and realize…it’s Lou Diamond Phillips.

Yes, the star of La Bamba is this kid’s father. Once I figure out that he is who he is, he breaks the window and crawls in. At this point I notice that Gerald is choking on his gyro. Now I’m put in a position…do I fight Lou Diamond Phillips or do I save Gerry.Being the quick thinker I am, I say, “Dan, go give Gerald the Heimlich. I’m going to beat up Lou Diamond Phillips.”

So, it’s now a fight between me and the Diamond. The table is positioned in between us. I’m racing to figure out a way to beat him quickly. Then I realize that I can throw cans of coke at him. I reach down and grab the first can and chuck it. As I’m throwing it, I notice that the can is empty. The Diamond brushes the blow off like it was…an empty can of coke and keeps coming at me. So, I quickly grab another can of coke and throw it. This time I grabbed a full can. The can flies throw the air and I know that I’ve got him this time. The can smashes right into his forehead and the Diamond falls backward to the ground.

I’ve done, I’ve knocked Lou Diamond Phillips out. Oh, and Gerald didn’t die, so I guess Dan did it to. And then I woke up.

That was by far the most memorable dream I’ve ever had. It had action, comedy, and gyros. To bad none of the other guys helped fight LDP.

Well, what did you all think?
Greatest dream ever or no?

How about that?

I’ve always been one to get nervous when it comes to traveling. It doesn’t matter if I’m driving into a large city or taking a flight. It always happens.

Over the past week my parents were visiting from Illinois (I’m in FL). We had a good time all week, but I did have to work each day. Then today it came time for them to go back home.

The morning started off fine. Slept in a bit and lost an hour. Then as the day progressed I started noticing something. I wasn’t feeling very well and I couldn’t explain why. I knew it wasn’t an illness. I just felt a little different. As the passed on I started noticing some familiar symptoms. My stomach started going crazy on me and what not. I realized that it was the same symptoms I get when I travel.

But I wasn’t traveling…but my parents were. At that moment I realized that I was get very nervous over my parents traveling. Which is completely awkward for me because it had always been the other way around.

Maybe this means that I am finally achieving adulthood. Maybe I actually care for others. Or maybe I get so nervous about travel, that it has seeped into when other people travel.

I guess it could be that over the years our parents are always worrying about us. They have concerns about all the things we participate in. But eventually, we grow up…and so do they. And as they age our roles get reversed. The kids get concerned about the health and well-being of their parents.