The Buffett Trip

As some of you may know, students at the GSB make an annual pilgrimage down to Omaha to meet Mr. Buffett. Unfortunately, this year we had to make do with attending the shareholder meeting. The story goes that Mr. B wanted to give other schools a chance at a meeting (he is, as you might imagine, in fairly high demand) and the GSB had gotten an audience with him for 6 years running. I'm not sure if that's the real scoop but hopefully we will get an in person event next year because, while I hate to be a grinch, the shareholder meeting was not worth the trek. None of us were particularly thrilled with waking at 4 a.m. to watch Mr. B on a big screen and listen to mostly silly questions for 6 hours. (Plus, Saturday is family day for me but I got home at 11 pm - missing any opportunity to see Baby Y at all, and today I'm back at the grind to prepare for mid-terms. Where'd my weekend go!) If you are at all familiar with Mr. B's opinions on investing and life, I don't see how a shareholder meeting or even lunch itself can be all that enlightening. And, while I do admire Buffett generally (and certainly not singularly), the slavish devotion of his fans is a bit creepy. I've never been one for human worship. Watching the audience was perhaps as interesting as watching Buffett.