Just a look at the front page of cnnmoney today is enough to give even the strong of stomach the extreme willies. Next to a headline that says, “Wall Street Braces for Ugly Day,” and video featuring a scary dude warning about the dangers of inflation, is a deck of headlines. At this writing, here they are…

• Income, spending higher than expected
• Mortgage mess socks ex-Goldman stars
• MBIA says more writedowns ahead
• Wilbur Ross bets on bond insurer Assured
• Dollar sinks further/Oil hits $103
• The 10 best cars - Consumer Reports
• Toyota’s unknown business partners
• Banks could see $600B hit from credit crunch
• 3 steps for living well in retirement
• How Sony won the high-def DVD war
• Don’t panic: That IRS letter is good news
• Furniture company - or hedge fund?

Aside from the interesting tease that a letter from the IRS is good news, there’s not a lot to feel good about here, unless you’re Sony (SNE) and right now popping champagne corks over its victory in the high-def DVD wars.

Of course, winning the format battle for who will provide the DVDs of the future is very good news… unless you think that maybe in five or ten years nobody will be watching DVDs anymore.  I just upgraded my Apple TV (APPL) and up popped a huge menu of movies I might actually want to see, in both regular format and HD.

Wow, I thought. There goes Netflix (NFLX). There goes DVDs. There, in fact, goes everybody but Apple unless somebody hurries up and figures out an alternative to Planet Steve. My new MacBook Air is functioning really well, by the way. I can’t say what I’m really going to need it for, of course, but as King Lear said when questioned about the size of his staff, “Oh! Question not the need!”

Anyhow, just look at those headlines. And they were actually updated nine minutes before I copied them into this blog. When I woke up and looked at them, they were even worse.

I’m expecting to wake up sometime soon and see a headline in the stack that says, “World ends with both bang and whimper. Bernanke soothes investors with indications of additional rate cuts.”

When I was a whining schoolboy with his satchel and shining morning face, creeping like snail unwillingly to school, I used to love Fridays because I looked forward to freedom from the tedium of class, to watching cartoons over the weekend, to dressing the way I wanted to and not combing my hair. I got nervous on Sunday nights, knowing that I would have to put my game face on the next morning, and that always hurts.

Today Friday feels different. I like it, sure. The weekend will be fine, I have no doubt. But I yearn for this day, I dream of its arrival, because I know that when it is done there is probably no more that the week can do to us. Or at least that tomorrow we really don’t have to pay very close attention.

Not paying attention right now may be a key strategy for survival in the next 18 months or so. Or paying attention to something completely different. I’m thinking of getting serious about my bird-watching, how about you?

I read an interesting item in a trade publication this morning. It’s about Maxim Magazine, which many men read for the articles. The piece from the Hollywood Reporter runs in its entirety:

Painted Word

Maxim magazine has apologized for publishing in its March issue an unfavorable two and a half star review of the Black Crowes album “Warpaint” by a writer who hadn’t heard the entire album. “It is Maxim’s editorial policy to assign star ratings only to those albums that have been heard in their entirety,” editorial director James Kaminsky said Tuesday. “Unfortunately, that policy was not followed in the March 2008 issue, and we apologize to our readers.”

Okay, now what strikes you about this? Several things occur to me:

1. If Mr. Kaminsky had not apologized, I would not have been aware of his distress or the depredations his magazine had wrought on contemporary culture;
2. The apology did not make Maxim look any better, in fact created the impression that this happens all the time and that on this occasion they got caught;
3. It was probably better for the Black Crowes that nobody knew about it either. Now not only readers of Maxim know that the magazine’s reviewer thought the album was so boring he couldn’t even finish listening to it, but readers of the Hollywood Reporter do, too, and that includes a lot of people in the entertainment business, whereas readers of Maxim are not always in that psychographic.

I have given this a lot of thought over the last several years and come to the conclusion that it is almost never a good idea for anybody in our culture to apologize about anything, even when they are in the wrong. Apologies, for the most part, alert people to wrongdoing, perceived or actual, and merely whet the public’s appetite for retribution.

Some great non-apologies of the last 100 years or so:

• The Turks, who have yet to admit, let alone apologize, for the genocide of 1,000,000 Armenians. While this has rightly angered Armenians since the early 1900s, the rest of the world remains murky about what happened back then and the longer the Turks go without apologizing, the murkier and more forgotten those atrocities will be;
• George W. Bush, who at no time has ever indicated any public regret for the way facts were manipulated by his Administration in order to justify America’s entry in the war against Iraq. An apology would have led to a giant Aha! on the part of the American people and the media, and possibly led to his Impeachment. No apology, the debate rages, and history will decide. History is, as far as I can tell, a much kinder judge than the public.
• The big banking dudes who just raked in $100-million dollar paydays when they were fired. They helped to cause the horrible debt crisis that has plunged us all into the drink. If any of them have said they’re sorry, I haven’t caught it. So probably they didn’t really do anything wrong, right?
• My son, who didn’t get me a Christmas present this year. He doesn’t seem one bit contrite about it, and as a result I find I really don’t care about it any more.

This insight is totally counterintuitive with the prevailing wisdom on corporate crises, which always involve a swift apology, followed by a visit to the PR stockade. What’s the point?

Maybe business is like being in love… and means never having to say you’re sorry.

A little while back, I hit a nerve with some of you who, like me, had been chased to the ends of their patience by Chase Bank. Many of you commented at that time with your own stories of woe and your ideas on how to establish a future free from mindless, incessant solicitation.

Well, I have a piece of news for all of you, and for anybody similarly plagued by a swarm of snail mail from JP Morgan Chase offering you 0% financing and free credit cards until the day you croak and all that nonsense, on and on and on. Last night I dropped by my old apartment — the one that was on the Chase radar screen — and collected a stack of mail that the U.S. Postal Service keeps delivering to that mailbox in spite of my entreaties not to do so. But I digress.

In the mailbox was the following letter from the people at Chase:

Dear Mr. Bing,

As your credit card company, we value your business and want you to be completely satisfied with your credit card account. We are responding to your recent request to remove your name from certain types of solicitations and/or information sharing.

We are pleased to confirm that we have taken actions to remove your name from the solicitation and/or information-sharing type you requested. Please understand, however, that if offers were prepared for you before we fulfilled your request, you may still receive those offers until our actions take effect. After that time, however, you should receive offers related to those types of solicitations and/or information sharing. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you.

If you requested that we exclude you from mailings, your request will be honored until it automatically expires five years from the date of your request. If you move or otherwise change your mailing address, you will need to update your request to include your new address information.

If you requested that we exclude you from telephone solicitations, your request will be honored for the telephone number you provided. If that number changes, you will need to update your request to include your new telephone number.

If, in the future, you would like to change your choice, please call us for reinstatement details. If you have any questions, please call us at the toll-free number noted above. For your convenience, we are here 24 hours a day to assist you.

Sincerely,

Cardmember Services

I like that after five years they will assume that my distaste for their onslaught will abate, presumably with greater maturity, and they may begin again. That’s a nice touch.

Oh, by the way: Along with this letter in my mailbox were six catalogs from Frontgate, a confusing array of ads, entreaties and threatening notices from Chrysler about a leased car I gave back a few months ago, and six letters offering me a superb deal on a new credit card from Chase. Uh-huh.

I just had what I believe to be a very satisfactory discussion with a nice woman who has not yet gone postal at the Postal Service. I truly believe that in the near future the Government will begin forwarding this valuable mail to me at my new address.

I think I know what I will find therein when it finally does come through, and you know what? I can hardly wait.

Some poor goofy fellow writes me to ask about whether, in the current economic environment, I prefer an investment in stocks or in bonds. This raises several interesting questions. First, what kind of reader, after spending any time on this site, would ask this kind of information from me? And second, how can I live up to his expectations. I believe, after an appropriate amount of thought, I offer a cogent piece of advice for this individual. See if you agree.

There’s also another guy who works for a boss who acts like he’s running a mob instead of a corporate function. Anything he can do about it? What do you think?

It was a rollicking good time last night for Stanley Bing as he once again celebrated Oscar night in his traditional fashion.

Bing began the evening by not attending the Vanity Fair Oscar shindig for the 15th straight year.  ”I’m sure if I were invited,” said Bing, “I would be tempted to make an appearance, which would throw the rest of my evening off.” Bing expressed surprise that event had in fact been cancelled this year. “I had no idea my absence would be so devastating,” he added.

Instead, Bing dined on his favorite Oscar-night tidbits — tiny eggrolls, followed by a dinner of brown rice and pork chops, with an array of mixed vegetables on the side.

It was then time to prepare for the red carpet! Bing suited up in his customary festive garb, including boxer shorts from Joe Boxer and Fruit of the Loom white tee shirt, harmonized by a bathrobe from Restoration Hardware. “People appreciate comfort and those with the guts enough to let their personas determine their style, rather than the other way around,” Bing observed to nobody in particular.

This year, as sometimes happens, Bing was not nominated for anything, so he sat in the extreme right back of the audience, some 3000 miles away from the action.

It was a long evening, with many commercial breaks, during which Bing had time to avoid the photographers and shun several of the celebrities who had gotten on his nerves during that past 12 months. He enjoyed John Stewart, as he always does, but admits to being old enough to sort of miss Johnny Carson. By midnight, when it was clear that many of the awards were being given to Europeans whose movies nobody with a pulse will ever see, Bing decided to call it a night, avoid the traffic and head for bed. It was a short trip.

“Like I’m going to see some film about Edith Piaf,” he said when pressed on the matter by nobody. “This is probably why the euro is doing so well against the dollar.”

Today at Ask Bing, I answer a letter from one of my pals. Actually, I don’t know the guy. But he could certainly be one of my scotch-swilling, cigar-chomping, joke telling buddies around the table at my now all-too-infrequent poker games. He wants to know if he should take a raise and accept a new job, the caveat being that he would have to work for a woman, and be surrounded by a female version of the Ole Boy’s Club. This is not an easy question. Can a person in mid-career profoundly change his act? Take a peek and see.

Beyond that, it only remains to say have a nice weekend… and to get that started, don’t read the business news today. What you don’t know can’t bum you out.

1. They don’t sleep. I know quite a few people who have received phone calls full of ideas, dyspepsia and wind, from their mogul who is at that moment on an exercise bicycle… at 3:00 AM. The mogul never acts like it’s weird to be calling at that hour. They  just get lit up about something and because their personal boundary mechanism is out-of-whack, they don’t realize it’s inappropriate for them to do anything at all, let alone put on their headsets and get cracking in the middle of the night. Many claim they get some of their best ideas at that hour. This remains to be seen. Many things look either too good or too bad in the small hours before dawn. Since moguls have NO bad ideas, they default to the former.
2. They therefore come in very early and are often the last to leave. Many is the corporation where the boss’s car is the first in the parking lot in the morning and the final one to go through the security gate at night. This is not necessarily because they are the hardest working person in the company, although sometimes they are. It’s because the silence in their home is so profound that it can’t be faced while sober, and it’s not acceptable to start drinking at dawn. The office, jammed to the brim with people who will listen to the mogul’s noise and respond with some of their own, is far more congenial.
3. They eat blueberries. A few years ago it became mandatory for all moguls to become interested in anti-oxidants and proficient in their use. Now you can’t sit with a bona-fide mogul without engaging in extensive conversation on the issue. The good news is that holding up your end of the conversation won’t be a problem, because the mogul is doing it for both of you.
4. They are in 24/7 electronic communications. I saw a mogul in the shallow end of the Four Seasons swimming pool in Beverly Hills last month, talking into thin air on his Bluetooth headset. That’s what I’m talking about.
5. They yell. Actually, I should add to that. He was YELLING into his Bluetooth headset. Moguls love to yell the way babies love to cry. It’s one of their ways of expressing frustration, hunger, pique or rage when words fail them. It gets results faster than calm discussion or even a crusty memo. Also, the same way nobody civilized will yell back at a baby, nobody in their right minds yells back at a mogul, either.
6. They love their hobby. Warren Buffett recently told CBS News that he is so passionate about bridge that he would prefer it to the sight of a naked woman. The exact quote was, “You know, if I’m playing bridge and a naked woman walks by, I don’t even see her.” In short, they play as hard as they do other things.
7. They are only comfortable around other moguls… even ones they do not like. Which explains Davos.

So last weekend I was out on the west coast doing whatever it is I do on the weekends, and I noticed something interesting.

There’s this little bungalow around the corner from where we live out there. Two bedrooms, but just. One bathroom. It rests on about a quarter of an acre. Most of the front yard is scrub and driveway. Up until last week it’s been selling for $1.35 million. That’s right. You read it correctly. One point three five. Every time I passed it during the last few months I got acid reflux. How dare they?, I asked myself. And the answer came back immediately via that little, cynical inner voice that is my constant companion. “Because they think they can get it,” he said.

He’s a pain in the butt, that guy, but I generally listen to him. He’s often right.

In the last few weeks or so, I’ve noticed that the sign, which was all eager and bright and bushy tailed up until then (if a sign can be bushy-tailed), had lost one of its hooks and was now hanging askew. Also, the brochures that had trumpeted why $1.35 million was a great deal for a 500 square-foot abode were depleted, the little bin that held them gathering cobwebs.

Last weekend the sign was gone altogether. So was another one around the corner, which had been offering a slightly bigger cottage for $1.85 million.

I guess my bitter little inner man was wrong this time. Or working on old information.

I’m keeping my eye on that tiny house around the corner.  The headlines are once again a repulsive stew of doom and gloom, recession battling with inflation, thunderclouds obscuring the sun, that kind of stuff.

But one thing’s for sure. For those with a little bit of actual cash in the bank, this might be getting within shouting distance of the time to start looking at that house we could never afford.

When that little shack gets to half its original value, I figure it might just be worth a look. It’s in a nice, pleasant spot. And you know what they say about location.

Inflation in China is very high. It’s hard to figure how that will benefit us, but on a list of things that come under the rubric “grim satisfaction,” the continual travails of that sleeping giant always register. Bad air. Bad water. Poison in the children’s toothpaste they export. Dead dogs worldwide due to crud in the pet food they offer the world. The explosion of their chief internet provider built almost wholly on illegally purloined music from American labels… so while more rain on their parade is not really good news — particularly since it probably just hurts innocent civilians over there, it’s a laugh riot compared to the rest of the crop this morning. 

Credit Suisse, which today fired a bunch of their traders who misplayed some aspect of the mortgage crisis or other, leading to a modest, single-digit billion problem that will have to be managed this quarter. That’s sort of good news for UBS, which looked really deficient recently when it took a nearly $15-billion writedown. Perhaps they’re high-fiving each other over there.

Wal-Mart beat the Street’s expectations. Of course, at the same time they cautioned that ‘08 might not be the engine for growth that people might want it to be. Earnings came in at $1.04 per share for the fourth quarter and their stock lost four cents. Yeah, yeah, it’s rational.

The head of MBIA is out, replaced with a guy who thought he had retired. That’s always a good sign, except for the fact that people who come out of retirement are generally not as adept at bailout out the rowboat as they used to be. Still, a change will do them good, right? Or the illusion of change, which in our world is almost the same thing.

Let’s see… we’re getting down to some pretty slim pickins for those looking for a lift. Most people are not prepared for retirement, according to one study. That’s not good, especially for Gen-Xers looking to take over anytime soon. Even that new head of MBIA is 59. Where’s the new blood? Oh, I remember. In charge of risk management at the banks. Perhaps the world news offers more hope for the terminally optimistic?

Heidi Klum has offered to let Britney live in her house for a while, to help the ailing victim of celebrity back on her feet. That’s nice.

Bono was seen holding hands with Penelope Cruz in San Tropez. That’s like finding out that Al Gore drives a Cadillac Escalade.

And Castro resigned. That’s got to be good for somebody.

As we used to say, without irony: Have a nice day, everybody.

1. Attend the big white sale blowout at the mall.

2. Cut a cake simply because it was the third Monday in February.

3. Dance around with Abraham Lincoln to music by John Philip Sousa to make people aware of the GREAT DEALS available at Bud’s Used Cars. In fact, it is possible that he never actually knew Abraham Lincoln.

4. It is therefore improbable that he sat around Mount Vernon feeling bad that the celebration of his birthday had essentially eradicated festivities surrounding Abrah