196 Chapter 17 – The weight loss‘ book club’ When we don’ t have time to read the book we just go watch the movie; when we can’ t be bothered to watch the movie we just go to dinner and talk, mostly about sex. My wife( trying to justify to me why it’ s called a‘ book club’) Some years ago top Wall Street stockbrokers were embarrassed by groups of housewives around America who had formed groups that met regularly to pick stocks. Reports demonstrated that not only were these women as good as the high paid, high flying professionals, they were usually better! What did the women do differently? They bought stocks that they researched at two levels. First, with less resources, so less sophistication, they analyzed a prospect company from a traditional financial perspective to ensure that it was sound. Then they qualified the company from the perspective of the consumer. So, if the company sold hair products they went and tried them. If the company was a retail business, they shopped there. If it made clothing for teenagers, they looked at what their teenagers were buying and asked them what they thought of the brand. In short, they assessed something that the boffins in their ivory towers did not – whether the products or service were basically any good! The other thing these women did that I think probably made as big a difference is that they supported each other in the process and had fun. Picking the stock market is a deadly boring exercise. It is only fun when your stocks are going up and very painful when they are going down. To stick at it long-term it has to be fun along the way. Sound familiar? And