PRESTOPUNDIT

The Federal Reserve worries that America's economic party atmosphere may be too giddy. Board members at this national hub of monetary anxiety apparently are sleeping poorly these days for reasons other than their usual obsession with rising inflation rates.

Recently released minutes of the Fed's December gathering - worded in their typical, awkward language - indicate that at least a few Fed czars think people forgot what "risky" means. This is no small matter. The Fed, which raised the interest rates it controls five times last year, often ends excessive business festivities in painful fashion. Remember the harsh interest-rate hikes of 1994?

So let me translate December's tough-love Fedspeak into some Orange County lingo.

"Some participants believed that the prolonged period of policy accommodation had generated a significant degree of liquidity," the Fed minutes start out stating.

In English, that's "too much cheap money led to too many silly loans."

Many Orange County homeowners cannot resist the lure of low-ball starting loan payments on adjustable-rate mortgages. Now the entire state's learning the trick. Last year, two-thirds of Californians buying homes used adjustable loans - the highest level recorded in DataQuick's 17 years of tracking real-estate trends ..

The Fed minutes from December continued by saying that cheap money "might be contributing to signs of potentially excessive risk-taking in financial markets evidenced by quite narrow credit spreads, a pickup in initial public offerings, an upturn in mergers and acquisition activity."

In English, that's the Fed worrying that "supposedly smart folks are buying stupid stuff."

Case in point: Buy.com, the Aliso Viejo e-tailer, wants to sell stock again ..

Finally, the Fed's December minutes speak of "anecdotal reports that speculative demands were becoming apparent in the markets for single-family homes and condominiums."

No need to paraphrase that sentiment in Orange County ..