• A tribute.

And let me end the week with a tribute to all of our friends in Boston.

• Remembering Scarsdale Fats.

"One last thing."

-- Lt. Columbo

Markets are tough, and life can be tougher. So, let's put our health and our lives into proper context after a real difficult and volatile market week.

Yesterday I memorialized Scarsdale Fats (a.k.a., Bob Brimberg) in my opening missive, which was a recap of the first column I wrote for Jim "El Capitan" Cramer on TheStreet.com.

In response, my buddy/pal/friend Craig Drill was kind enough to thank me for remembering Bob, who died 20 years ago this month (thanks to Byron Wien for reminding me!) and sent me his euology of Bob that I wanted to share with all of you:

Bob Brimberg

Remarks made at St. Bartholemew's

We are gathered at this sacred moment and in this ancient sense of community to bid farewell, to offer our love to Anne and the family, to pray, and to remember.

Now, not many of us can remember the athlete at Yale, the tackle on the football team...the captain of the chess team, undefeated.

But many of us can remember Bob's lunches which transcended the act of making money and became an art form...the joy of bringing friends together, the celebration of life. And some institutional money managers came to know that it was Bob himself who was the institution.

But the common memory that brings us all together is of Bob's great heart, his generosity...the sharing of himself. He had some thing in terms friendship that not many people have anymore. When he asked, how are you?, he meant it; it wasn't a cliche; he heard your answer. If you were looking for a job, he lent an effective hand. If you were down and out, he put you up. And he helped many, many newcomers in the business.

He cared a lot, and yet he was nobody's fool. He was probably one of the most sensitive men I ever met. There was an absolute beauty to this man. And, of course, we remember how fond Bob was of quoting, from his ancient history class at Horace Mann to English class at Yale. As Jack's remarks indicated, Bob's favorite author was Shakespeare...I remember at lunch with Bob last month, him looking down and reading from "Julius Caesar" Act IV. And, if I may, I'd would like to end with the end of "Julius Caesar," the end of Act V:

Bear him carefully, for he was the noblest one of all. He only in a general honesty of thought and common good to all made one of them. His life was gentle, and the elements in him so mixed that nature herself might stand up and say to all the world: "This was a man!"

• Enjoy your weekend and thanks so much for reading my diary.

I am calling it a day, and I am outta here like Janelle "Dolly P" Arthur was on "American Idol" last night.

It has been a long and volatile week.

Enjoy your weekend and thanks so much for reading my diary.

• Here it is.

Below is a calendar of the next seven days of earnings from either portfolio holdings (long and short) that I am involved with or am monitoring.

• They include Grand Canyon Education, Henry Schein and Berkshire.

I shorted more Grand Canyon Education (LOPE), Henry Schein (HSIC) and Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) today.

Besides my Apple (AAPL) trades, not much else!

• Let's review.

Monday began with an explanation of "Why I Remain Bearish," in which I outlined that:

• low interest rates have buoyed the markets;
• there is no free lunch;
• highfliers such as Apple (AAPL) and gold are not infallible;
• global growth is slowing with the possibility of a recession;
• the line between progress and reality is blurred;
• consensus of corporate profits are overly optimistic, and
• stocks are overbought with sentiment uniformly bullish.

I also used the news regarding the discounting of K-Cups by Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (GMCR) and Starbucks (SBUX) to short Starbucks and to buy more Green Mountain Coffee Roasters puts.

On Tuesday, I pointed out the "The Silver Lining of Lower Oil Prices," which serves as a tax cut for the consumer and subsequently provides support to corporate profit margins and stimulates growth. The price of crude might have a lot further to go, and, in the short run, prices can go below the cost of production. The law of supply and demand may start to apply to oil, and OPEC may be over -- both would be bullish for the U.S. economy (at least in the intermediate term) and possibly a negative for the bond markets as lower commodities revive economic growth. I also added to my positions in Monitise (MONI.L) andNorthwest Bancshares (NWBI).

On Wednesday, I took a look at data over the last month that suggest that my concerns of a pause in housing might be realized on the basis of falling housing starts and an observation by Mark Hanson of structural demand deformity of the U.S. housing market. The Beige Book was also released, though nothing was revealed that would alter the Fed's quantitative-easing program. I covered my American Express (AXP), Nationstar (NSM) and FedEx (FDX) shorts. Volatility picked up as every sector in the S&P 500 was negative. Apple supplier Cirrus Logic's (CRUS) earnings miss contributed to Apple's weakness. Meanwhile I continued to holdFord (F) and General Motors (GM) despite Europe's economic woes and an article highlighting slowing European car sales.

Thursday saw another down day as the Philly Fed number came in at 1.3 (below the 3.0 expectation), Apple continued its descent, and Danaher had weak earnings. I playedBerkshire Hathaway (BRK.B), Danaher (DHR) and Henry Schein (HSIC) on the short side along with Starbucks, Nationstar and Grand Canyon Education (LOPE). Tech continued to be extremely weak, although after hours, there were nice earnings beats by Microsoft (MSFT) and Google (GOOG). IBM (IBM) disappointed, however, and its weakness after hours continued into Friday morning.

Today started with "Learning to Live With Volatility and Disorder," in which I noted the market's inconsistency and random pattern over the past few weeks and suggested my own response, which includes maintaining lower-than-typical long exposure, being cautious of maturing companies whose time has passed, reducing investing while expanding short-term trading, increasing patience in the longer-term investments, avoiding a concentrated portfolio, trading on catalysts, and developing a contrarian streak.

So, that was the week that was -- from my perch.

• Here's a whiff.

Breadth as of 12:25 p.m. EDT:

• S&P 500 -- 380 advancers to 119 decliners
• NYSE -- 1,380 advancers to 452 decliners
• Nasdaq -- 1,475 advancers to 575 decliners
• Russell 2000 -- 1,490 advancers to 411 decliners

Volume on the S&P is 22% higher than the past 10-day average, 31% higher than the past 30-day average and 9% higher than yesterday's volume for this time of day.

• Again.

Today, again, consumer nondurables are leading the parade -- that's a potential negative near-term market consideration.

Just look at Procter & Gamble (PG), Colgate-Palmolive (CL), International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF), Clorox (CLX) and PepsiCo (PEP).

Remarkable.

• Fitch cuts the United Kingdom's credit rating. 

Break in: United Kingdom cut to AA+ from AAA by Fitch, outlook stable.

• That about what I'm down to as far as Apple is concerned.

I am down to tag-end position in Apple (AAPL), which I will hold through Tuesday's earnings report.

• Tune out the talking heads.

The business media is in the press box reporting not on the field analyzing!

Case in point: General Electric (GE) is now down by 4% on the day.

• At $397.50.

I am selling another quarter (half of my half left!) of Apple (AAPL) at $397.50 now.

I do not want to be long much going into Tuesday's earnings release and guidance, as I expect both to be well below consensus.

• I am taking profits on half the position.

I am taking off half of my Apple (AAPL) long at $397, as this morning's buy yields a $10-a-share gain.

Again, as highlighted in today's opener, trade opportunistically, and that means sometimes you have to leave your brain at the trading door!

• I bought more shares at $387.

I am adding to Apple (AAPL) at $387 now.

• My favorite long is TBT, and my favorite short is Danaher.

Favorite long: ProShares UltraShort 20+ Year Treasury (TBT).

Favorite short: Danaher (DHR).

• At Barclays, that is.

Barclays cuts Apple (AAPL) numbers -- a useless and late move after the share price schemessing.

• Here is more evidence to support my slowing global growth thesis.

Continuing my global growth slowing thesis, below are Caterpillar's (CAT) March retail sales.

Note: Reported in constant dollars and based on unit sales as reported primarily by dealers; *EAME (Europe, Africa and Middle East); **ROW (rest of the world - everything except North America)

• How should we operate in a wild, inconsistent, random and potentially non-trending market?

One day, the sardines disappear from their traditional habitat off the Monterey, Calif., shores, the commodity traders bid the price of sardines up, and prices soar. Then, along comes a buyer who decides that he wants to treat himself to an expensive meal and actually opens up a can and starts eating. He immediately gets ill and tells the seller that the sardines were no good. The seller quickly responds, "You don't understand. These are not eating sardines; they are trading sardines!"

-- Seth Klarman, Margin of Safety: Risk-Averse Value Investing Strategies for the Thoughtful Investor

The market that has no memory from day to day has demonstrated an inconsistent and almost random pattern over the past few weeks, and I suspect this will continue to be the investment backdrop over the next several months.

Maybe longer.

Yesterday I mentioned the role of time frames in my trading -- as an example, one can cover short hedges (as I did recently) while maintaining a negative market view (as I do). In essence, this is not inconsistent with my view, and it is not necessarily a contradiction, as I am gaming the volatility. (Note: Time frames will be the subject of my opener on Monday. I hope it will clarify my tactical approach to trading.)

Last spring I was speaking to the legendary Ira Harris (one of the most influential Wall Streeters over the last 40 years; back in the day, he ran Salomon Brothers' Chicago office), who mentioned that he could not remember a time during his investment career when there was so much uncertainty as there is now.

Ira's fears of uncertainty represent the reality of the times today. Human beings fear that which they do not know -- be it economic, social, political, geopolitical or even environmental (especially of a climate kind).

The market's wild swings over the past two weeks is the most recent reminder of the world's fragility and the general lack of certainty -- it is a world far different than when my Grandma Koufax was investing years ago.

As I tweeted and wrote in my diary yesterday, the only thing I am certain of is the lack of certainty these days!

An important contributing factor to the market's volatility and disorder is the more frequent emergence of black swans.

Last year, Nassim Nicholas Taleb wrote a thoughtful editorial in The Wall Street Journal that underscores that investors must learn to live with general disorder and volatility and the frequency of Black Swans.

In economic life and history more generally, just about everything of consequence comes from black swans; ordinary events have paltry effects in the long term.... Modernity has been obsessed with comfort and cosmetic stability, but by making ourselves too comfortable and eliminating all volatility from our lives, we do to our bodies and souls what Mr. Greenspan did to the U.S. economy: We make them fragile. We must instead learn to gain from disorder.

-- Nassim Nicholas Taleb, "Learning to Love Volatility," The Wall Street Journal (Nov. 17, 2012)

Random market movements may also may be a function of uncertainty -- uncertainty regarding economic and profit growth but also, I think today, uncertainty of what the appropriate P/E multiple is in a setting of artificiality (and difficulty in estimating the life of policy) in which natural price discovery is being masked by the historic liquidity provided by the world's central bankers.

Volatility and disorder are likely a more constant state in a global economy that is experiencing a new normal that remains on tenterhooks, still experiencing the deleveraging and tail issues stemming from the last down cycle and, as a result, only experiencing a fragile trajectory of growth.

Below are Taleb's five rules for prospering in a world in disorder. It is a good list.

• Rule No. 1: "Think of the economy as being more like a cat than a washing machine." Policy aimed at stability and the absence of pronounced cycles is misplaced. As Taleb writes, "The state should be there for emergency-room surgery, not nanny-style maintenance and overmedication of the patient -- and it should get better at the former." Cease bailouts and keep safety nets as long as they encourage entrepreneurs and do not increase dependency.
• Rule No. 2: "Favor businesses that benefit from their own mistakes, not those whose mistakes percolate into the system." Certain industries -- such as the restaurant business (when their meals are poor in quality, they have to improve the quality in order to survive) or the airline industry (whose safety measures improve after each disaster) -- are anti-fragile. Success should be an outgrowth of adversity. By contrast, each bank failure hurts the entire system.
• Rule No. 3: "Small is beautiful, but it is also efficient." Size often increases fragility. The elephant breaks his leg at the slightest fall, but the mouse is unharmed by a steep fall. (This helps to explain, in part, why we have more mice than elephants!) We need an economic system that distributes risk along a wide range of sources.
• Rule No. 4: "Trial and error beats academic knowledge." Potential errors should be small; potential gains should be large.
• Rule No. 5: "Decision makers must have skin in the game." We ended up in the financial and economic soup in the last cycle because bankers had a "tails I win; heads you lose" compensation system. Whether that compensation includes a large portion of stock or whatever it takes, corporate executives must have a significant and vested interest in the companies they manage. They must be accountable for lack of success and must suffer financially when there is failure to execute.

So, how do we incorporate Taleb's socioeconomic lessons into our trading/investing playbook, and how do we deal with a market without memory from day to day?

Many of my most successful hedge fund friends as well as investors such as Warren Buffett have made their fortunes in buying and holding -- namely, by discovering investment acorns that rise into mighty oaks. They contend that, regardless of the environment, there will always be those opportunities.

Many of these hedge-hoggers have prospered by bottoms-up stock picking and have often downplayed the macroeconomic backdrop and the market's short-term volatility.

But perhaps the landscape has changed, and the investment fields are simply not as fertile as they were in the old days.

Perhaps substandard and meager returns lie ahead and buy-and-hold is dead or dying.

Perhaps, trading more aggressively in the future is a way to deliver better investment returns.

Perhaps a trading-sardine strategy will trump an eating-sardine strategy.

Investment Conclusion: How Should We Operate?

I would conclude that, while my hedge-hogger friends might be correct -- as for many, it has paid mighty dividends -- the unique conditions that exist today make the harvesting of those great investments ever more difficult in the future relative to the past. Indeed, there are numerous fundamental, valuation, sentiment and technical factors (and uncertainty) that support the notion that volatility, randomness and a market without memory from day to day will be more of a mainstay.

Generally speaking, my tactical response to an unsteady backdrop is to err on the side of conservatism. Here are my rules in the market's new normal:

• Maintain lower-than-typical long exposure. For example, if your normal invested position is net long 70%, think about maintaining net longs of 40%-60%, depending on your risk tolerance.
• Be careful of large, maturing companies whose time has passed. More often than not, they are value traps subject to disruptive competition. (See Taleb's rule No. 3 above.)
• Be receptive to committing an expanding part of your investing portfolio to smaller and more disruptive stock positions.
• Reduce the amount of investing you do while expanding your short-term trading activity. Be more active in long and short rentals.
• While being more active in trading, be more patient than usual in your longer-term investing and wait for your right pitch, both with regard to an earnings and price timing setup. Volatility and disorder are accompanied by repeated opportunities to capture attractive entry points.
• Be more active on the short side. Volatility encourages disappointment for those companies' managements that are inflexible, that are unable to respond to shorter economic cycles, whose margins might come under pressure (and pricing power limited) and whose profit stream is vulnerable to an economic wind no longer at the global economy's back.
• Avoid concentration by diversifying your portfolio across industry lines, and keep individual equity commitments lower as a percentage of your total investment book.
• Learn to trade based on specific catalysts, ranging from generic industry developments, earnings and other factors.
• In order to be a nimble trader, you must learn how to buy red and sell green. To do that, you have to overcome your emotions and learn to acquire more of a contrarian streak.

In summary, looking out over both the near and intermediate term, as unappetizing as it appears to me (and others), we must learn how to operate successfully in a trading-sardine market, not in an eating-sardine market.

• JPMorgan has its doubts about global economic growth.

JPMorgan Chase says it has doubts emerging about global economic growth.

That was the core of my opening missive on Monday.

• Here's a motley crew.

Steve "Hernán" Cortés "de Monroy y Pizarro," 1st Marquis of the Valley of "Fast Money," at The Society of the Four Artspresentation last night on China, The U.S. and the markets.

• The business media imagines a good quarter for GE -- not so.

Break in: The business media is touting General Electric's (GE) results.

While costs aided EPS as well as real estate gains in GE Capital, there were some negative reads in the better profit release. (Most of the beat was lower costs and real estate gains in GE Capital.)

Specifically, industrial sector margin performance was quite disappointing (with power and water as sources of weakness), falling by over 300 basis points year over year.

I expect the shares to sell off rather than gain as some of the business media opined.

• Let's take a peek of overnight and early-morning market action.

In a market without memory from day to day, today is a new day and yesterday has been forgotten!

Overnight and early-morning markets are risk-on:

• S&P futures up 11;
• European markets up;
• euro up;
• crude up $1.00;
• gold up $21; and
• 10-year U.S. note  yields 1.71%.

Finally, at least one of the bastards has felt the weight of justice.