As the wind-up act for the Financial Analyst Day at Microsoft today, its CFO, Chris Liddell, took the stage to try to put a shine on weak financial results that the software giant recently reported.

“So, what genetic disposition do you need to be a CFO? Essentially, you need to be miserable, you need to be the sort of person who takes drinks away from people at the end of a party,” said Liddell, in his jaunty New Zealand-Hobbit accent. “So, you know, my colleagues who have been giving you drinks all day, have told me to come out here and take most of them away from you.”

Which was ironic, since the all-day event for media and Wall Street analysts ended with cocktails.

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The fun never stops at Microsoft, it seems.

Well, not fun–more like a long march of khaki-clad Softies.

They will be on display bright and early this morning at the company’s annual Financial Analyst Meeting, a cavalcade of top execs at the tech giant blabbing away.

Big topics? I am interested in the recent billion-dollar revenue miss in earnings and, of course, more details about the Yahoo search deal.

BoomTown will be there covering it in person, natch!

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Next week in Los Angeles, Microsoft will kick off its Professional Developers Conference, a place the software giant likes to unveil all kind of news in a big launchtastic flourish.

For all the noise, it’s worth paying attention, because Monday’s outlook will be cloudy, as in cloud computing.

The day will include a speech from Microsoft’s Chief Software Architect, Ray Ozzie, and others on, among other topics, its cloud infrastructure service initiatives–designed to match aggressive efforts from Amazon in the space.

But who knows what else is up Microsoft’s sleeve?

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Once burnt, twice shy?

I suppose that’s the reason Microsoft is not loaded for bear and headed back down to Sunnyvale to make another play for Yahoo right now.

Not even after Jerry Yang orchestrated activist Carl Icahn’s defenestration by inviting him on the board at Yahoo, where he will be 100 percent silenced.

Not even after the stranger-than-fiction shareholder miscount (oops–we thought no meant yes!).

Not even after Yahoo stock’s consistent flirting-with-the-teens price.

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One thing is absolutely true: It is Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and only Ballmer who knows for sure whom he is most interested in to take over the dicey job of head of the software giant’s long-suffering online services business.

But there is a movement afoot among its developers and other execs at Microsoft to push for Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie, who replaced Founder Bill Gates in the job just over two years ago.

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Do you need me to draw you the bright straight line from Skype to Facebook or can you see it all by yourself?

Ok, for those who refuse to live in a little place I like to call reality, let’s review the news coming out of eBay yesterday regarding their 2005 acquisition of Skype for the then unheard of price of $2.6 billion.

The Internet auction giant declared the purchase of the once hot online telephone startup a dud Monday, taking an asset-impairment charge of $1.43 billion for the deal.

In addition, Skype founder and CEO Niklas Zennström was out. The move, said eBay in a filing, represented “updated long-term financial outlook for Skype.”

Quickie translation: Major buyer’s remorse.

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