Up here in Massachusetts, I jokingly refer to the size of snowstorms by the number of baby aspirins I take throughout the storm.

The geezers among us know the aspirin is a prophylactic that hopefully allows me to survive a cardiac event should I keel over while shoveling. I suppose I am too old to be shoveling and should just cave in and buy a snow blower.

But my brain is still convinced I am a 20-year old. In truth, I’m at that awkward age – too old for recreational drugs and too young to need the little blue pill.

And anyway, I enjoy the perverse juxtaposition of cranking up Bob Marley & the Wailers on my iPod while the snow is pounding down and I’m digging out from the snowplow’s latest evil pass. “Get up, stand up, don’t give up the fight” indeed!

Last week, however, it was a baby-aspirin-a-day. A stretch that included a couple of snows sandwiched between travel and meetings in Florida. That was on top of some pressing writing deadlines, which included a research-paper deadline at Harvard.

So that means today I happily and calmly engage in the simple pleasure of just doing my job, part of which entails answering your questions and comments. So, let’s hit the mailbag.

Skidding Into The China Learning Curve

Jon sent me something written by one of the inexperienced newbies on the China investing scene. You know, the guys who’ve recently started China newsletters merely to separate you from your money.

Jon wanted to know about one of the newbie’s investment ideas. Now I rarely comment on what the other guys do … noblesse oblige, I suppose … so I will respond in a broad sense.

And truth be told, I like this China newbie. He seems like a sweet, sincere guy. We can hope he’s only momentarily addle brained.

I also can’t pick on him simply because I’ve been there and done that, making mistakes on the China learning curve, while he, like the spate of other new-to-China newsletter writers, is still on the steepest part of the curve – the beginning.

So here’s a general rule for you about China investing. What you see when you’re over there is usually not what it seems.

So don’t get all excited because you see a billion-zillion Chinese plugged into iPods, or carrying a certain brand handbag, or wearing a certain brand of clothing.

The chances are all but certain that the global brands you see hoi polloi sporting in Beijing or Shanghai are total and absolute knock-offs. After all, over there, we don’t call that famous winter outerwear brand North Fake for nothin’.

That means don’t rush out and invest in Apple because everyone you see in Beijing carries an iPod. They can buy 40 to 50 fakes for the price of a single real one.

That’s not to discount the awesome fact that the Chinese middle class does possess a real and growing buying power. But to cash in on that you have to know how the domestic retail sector works.

That will be one of the over-arching themes you’ll hear about in my Asia Business & Investing newsletter, which launches here at IDE in the next few weeks.

By the way, my kudos to those of you who played the Lingo Media Corp. idea that I detailed at the bottom of last Saturday’s IDE.

Discipline + Restraint + Speculation = Smart every time.

Hong Kong Power

Got a great note from Harland in Hainan Province, which is one of my favorite places in China. It’s a tropical island that’s home to one of my favorite golf courses in the world – the Yalong Bay Golf Club.

Hainan is China’s newest province. A good friend of mine’s father was the driving force in convincing Beijing to award the island provincial status. And, yes, he is a very scary guy.

Remember the M*A*S*H episode when Frank Burns spouted the classic inanity, “It’s nice to be nice to the nice?” Well, on Hainan, it’s nice to be nice to a retired higher-up in the Chinese Secret Police.

In his email, Harland shared some info on skyrocketing apartment rents on the island.

But I wonder if that’s really indicative of a China bubble. After all, real estate prices flew in the U.S. for years and no one thought the whole economy was bubbling. At least not during the past seven years.

And, while there’s no doubt prices are flying on Hainan, I also wonder if it’s more of an evening out – a rebalancing – of prices that were deeply depressed in the cities of Sanya and Haikou for years after the 1997 Asian monetary crisis.

There is serious inflation in China and, from what Harland reports, real inflation on Hainan. But I don’t think there’s a bubble yet. If anything, it’s just starting to form.

If you’ve been to my Verge Asia blog this week, you’d have seen more proof of that. I reported on Monday that Deutsche Bank is set to move its global equity and derivatives trading from New York to Hong Kong.

The move is significant because it’s the first time anyone can remember a big multinational investment bank relocating such an important trading operation to Asia.

This reflects the bank’s increased focus on Asia, which it thinks will overtake Europe in terms of equity trading this year, according to the Financial Times.

To me, the move makes great sense because last year the bank’s revenues from its Asian equities business jumped by 80 percent.

Clinton v. McCain

Got another batch of email decrying my liberal tendencies. Actually, it was a very small batch and all from the uber right wing. The timing was weird because I haven’t written about politics in weeks.

But I am not going to rise to the bait. Or, as 41 said, “Not gonna do it.” But I will say this.

Right now, perhaps the best thing that could happen for the U.S. is a Clinton/McCain showdown come November. That’s because both are far less bought-and-paid for by those who pervert government for their own profit.

The big reason Obama raised so much money so fast is because the Democratic elite know he’s for sale. And because they know that Clinton would be her own woman in the White House … to the extent anyone can be truly unobligated in the Oval Office.

In a brokered convention, she’ll get the nod for the top of the ticket because Bill knows where the bodies are buried. He’ll use that power to get the deal done for the smiling junior senator from New York.

That’ll be great for the baby aspirin industry, too, because the Hillary haters will subjugate their anima and become a frothing, apoplectic, pulse-spiked, and shimmering mass of animus.

By the way, if you’re a Hillary fan, don’t forget to send Tina Fey some flowers. Because she nailed it: “Bitch is the new black!” Thanks, TF.