Stockyard Paul's Harvest Hotlist

To be honest, I'd forgotten that Stockyard Paul was still on the payroll. Turns out he's been sending me his investment column every week, and they've been going to my junk folder. Quite embarrassing, really. On that note, let me admit that I never understood the concept of his "hotlists." Bernice had to explain to me that a "hotlist" is a guide for investors, so they know what to buy, what to hold, and what to divest. That makes a lot more sense than what I'd imagined. Anyway, as an apology to Paul, we'll give him this week's front page.

First, though, you can find the solutions to Lewis Carroll's doublet puzzles here:
https://www.casualobserver.co/solutions-lewis-carrolls-doublet/

Happy fall, pumpkineers and pumpkinettes!

Stockyard Paul here with your guide to autumn's sure bets and risssky business. Here's my Harvest Hotlist, the investments I'm tracking this season, either to make big gains, to hold their value, or tumble down the board. Let's go!

AI Assistants
Large Language Models suck at math. But now some data wonks have figured out that Bard, Google's AI assitant, does better math if you remind it to "take a deep breath and take it step by step." Look, if your robot won't do math without a pep talk, sack it and hire an arts major. Same problem, but they'll make you coffee.
Sell

Pumpkin Spice
Now that Hefty Bag has rolled out pumpkin spice-scented trash sacks, it's tempting to think we've reached peak pumpkin. I disagree, and here's why: (A) Pumpkin spice is delicious. Its haters are objectively wrong. (B) Its "basic" market may be saturated, but the spice has room to flow. For example, there's already pumpkin-spice protein powder on the fitness shelf. One little rebrand, say, "LIBERTEIN SwoleSpice Punkin' Power Powder (with Natural Amphetimines)," and the p-spice could make huge gains among the Freedom Dudes.
Buy

Leaf Blowers
In yesteryear, the sound of autumn was the soft shush-shush of a rake on the lawn. The new sound of autumn is a ceaseless mechanical cry of havoc, a cross between a goat-scream and a fork in the blender, leaving one to yearn for the relative peace of a jetski derby. I'd love to say that leaf blowers are on their way out, but it seems not so. Since that's the case, we'll fight a hurricane with a hurricane. When your neighbor starts up his blower, strap on a bigger one. Huff and puff and blow his house down.
Buy

Proctor & Gamble
P&G paid a team at UC Irvine to study the effect of scent on the aging brain. Lo and behold, the neuro-nerds report a 226% increase in cognative capacity, after six months of nighttime scent exposure. So I hope you're ready for lemon-scented dreams and a juggernaut of ads for the AIRIA Smart Scent oil diffuser by Febreeze.
Buy now. Sell before the independent follow-up study.

Kittens
Puppies were the rage in the mid-pandemic, but the dog days are officially over. Earnest is out. Aloof is in. Welcome to the Season of the Cat.
Strong Buy

U.S. House of Representatives
Everybody's buying congressmen these days, and no wonder—they've never been so cheap! But don't think you can buy low now and sell high later. Low as they've gone, they're nowhere near the bottom. Swallow your sunk costs, sell your critters, and pocket a new one in '24.
Strong Sell

Other movers:
Spam (by Hormel): Buy
Fallout Shelters: Tentative Buy
Standing Desks: Hold or Sell
Tiny Dancers: Hold
Sharpie Markers: Permanent Buy
U of O Football: Sell the sellouts
Acorns: Sell or Bury