my 23,000 BGF shares are bobbing along just below the surface at about 1.5 per cent less than what I paid for them. Meanwhile, the alternative buy, Biota, has jumped yet another five percent after a twelve percent rise on Monday. the bird flu thing must be really scaring people; Biota makes a flu vaccine.

There is nothing I can do about this situation; I could of course pull another ten thousand out of my mortgage and chase my losses. But it's a little early in the game for that as yet. All I can do is wait for the BGF shares to bob up again to my sell level just over 2 per cent higher than I paid for them, and then see what's next. I'm certainly downgrading my estimate of how fast I can pay back my original 10,000. But as long as I'm making more than seven per cent a year - and the market overall is doing that right now - I'm OK. And even if I only make enough to make my mortgage and costs payments - about $100 a week, roughly 50 per cent profit a year - hell, that's pretty good, isn't it?

I think I need to make some of these purchases in the larger stocks, which I have a higher bank limit on, if only for speed and convenience, and to reduce the heart-in-the-mouth factor.

Meanwhile, I'm in the process of transferring some other shares to my Commonwealth account in order to bump up that limit on what I can buy.