full_of_wind

Long time gone

2009-07-05T13:50:53Z

Been on travel for work and life.

Saw Spring Awakening in at the Hippodrome. Best music in a musical I have ever seen. This rounds out our subscription this year and convinces me that I actually do like some musicals. In fact, I enjoyed about half this season very much, but we don't have plans to renew.

Just got back form Europe. Mostly Germany: Ramstein, Wurzburg, Berlin, Prague, Dresden, Munich, Bertchesgaden, Oberamergau, Garmish, and back to Ramstein to fly home. All interesting and much rain. WWII, Cold War, 30 Years War, Beer, Driving VERY Fast, Mountains, Family, Salt Mines...

There is much to do this summer.

What do you want?

2009-06-15T02:00:55Z

I offer you the sky. Respond back for purchase price. It can be worked out in kind.

Beautiful Day

2009-05-31T21:22:31Z

The weather was almost perfect in DC today. We went down to the mall and walked miles and miles. Then we went boating on the Tidal Basin and walked more.

After that, we went to China Town for dim sum. It was the most rush restaurant experience I have ever had. It went something like this:

Waitress: You want pork dumpling
Us: No pork or beef please.
W: You eat shrimp, you eat chicken, you eat vegetable, you drink tea. Now!

*dumplings scattered on the table* 15 minutes pass

W: You pay me. Cash ownry'. You go way.

It was a like a trip to Hong Kong to eat where the poor eat.

Morrissey is 50 today

2009-05-22T13:28:49Z

I heard about it on NPR.

Now that says much about much.

Laughing with a Mouth Full of Blood

2009-05-20T14:14:33Z

St. Vincent's new album is really good and wins the best song name contest for this year.

National Shrine

2009-05-18T19:11:20Z

Sunday was a day for getting our Catholic on. First the National Shrine and then the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center. The Shrine is built in the style of the Eastern Church and is a Basilica with a tall clock tower. The interior is a mess of mosaic. Hundreds and hundreds. The main event was a sixty foot, blue eyed, blond hair Jesus. He was wearing an off the shoulder red toga and was stretching out palms to show off their bloody holes. He also looked pissed.

It all added to a feeling of myth and this feeling increased at the turn of each corner. At one point, I remarked that I was expecting to see giant sea monster in battle with Neptune. Around the corner there was an angel fighting a dragon in a 50,000 piece mosaic. Have mercy on us.

The Cultural Center was sad. A complex without a mission. About 50% of the interior space was dominated by a ramp that criss crossed four floors. There were several videos with weepy priests recounting stories of the Holy Father and plenty of exaggeration on how much JPII added to the demise of the Soviet empire.

I am not a religious person but I can see how ceremony and sacrament can bring comfort. Even if it looks really silly to outsiders.

Public Health = Public Good

2009-05-13T16:17:54Z

Most of the time this is true. Not always. So the budget for the National Center for Health Statistics is about $120M and the budget for the National Endowment for the Arts is about $150M. Go figure?

Activists

2009-05-08T12:46:20Z

The debate over whether to accept same sex marriages from other states as legal has begun in DC. My position is sure, why not? Of course, not everyone feels that way. The local NPR station interviewed an "activist" who gave the following comment: "What's next? Ploligoli? People who wants to has sex wif chirens?" Sic, sic, and sic.

This begs, at least, two questions. 1). What does such an activist do when his or her position prevails, i.e., his group is successful in limiting the behavior of another group of people? Find some other group that needs their behavior restricted? 2). Is it a coincidence that the producers of the piece used such an inarticulate spokesperson to represent the negative position?

H1N1

2009-05-04T17:41:01Z

I have weakness and fatigue. I ache in muscules, head, and throat. My stomach is upset. We had 90 people over for the Kentucky Derby last Saturday.

Holocaust Museum

2009-04-27T15:43:49Z

I still don't quite understand why it is in Washington, but it is a great and moving institution. We went to prepare our son for a trip to Europe this summer. I have been to the museum about three times and do not recommend so many visits because you become numb to the monstrosity.

The curators portray the whole of 1930s and 1940s Germany in its horrific glory. There is unimaginable video and historical record. The experience is also physical in that the architecture is designed to make visitors aware of the others and feel generally cramped. We were crowded onto an elevator that resembled a cattle car to start the tour and then herded along hallways that narrowed ever so slightly as they went on. The result is emotional and physical exhaustion.

Notes of interest:

* The complicity of the German people in the crime cannot be denied.
* There were 9 million Jews in continental Europe in the 1930s. There are now about 1.5 million.
* Jews account for about 1 in 450 people in the world population. I think I know them all.
* The Heinz comment on the museum experience: "Dang, that Hitler dude was a stupid head."

GREAT LINES FROM HEINZ

2009-04-24T01:15:29Z

I am happier than usual. If you drained all of this happiness from me, I would still be happy.

The above lines can be used together or independently.

Also,

When I am happiest it goes down to my weiner.

This from a nine year old.

THAT IS ALL.

Watchmen

2009-04-22T20:00:00Z

I finished the compilation last night. The first third was absurd and a drag. Then it got better. Then it got really good. Finally, stupid again.

I have seen reviews that say you can't really judge Watchmen unless you read it right after it was published. These reviewers attribute the need to read the comics in their zeitgeist and "during a time of palpable fear and threat of war." .

I don't think so. I was a cold warrior during 1985-6 and remember more waiting for the Wall to come down than the tanks to race across the Fulda Gap. We all thought more about drinking Russian vodka than Russian ICBMs. Everyone except the CIA knew the jig was over back in the '50s. Most estimates placed the Russian GDP, where measurably, at about 25% of the U.S. GDP.

The "palpable fear" mentioned earlier is indeed one of the must successful government products. It never goes out of style like this classic.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

OMG OMG OMG HE LIED ABOUT HIS DOG

2009-04-14T14:05:15Z

HE SAID HE WOULD ONLY GET A RESCUE DOG THAT WAS A MUT. HE LIED. HE LIED. HE GOT A DOG THAT IS A PURE BRED AND IS RELATED TO KENNEDY'S DOG NAMED "SPLASH" THAT HE GOT AFTER THE CHAPPAQUIDDICK MURDER. I HEARD IT ALL ON HANNITY.

OMG OMG OMG HE LIED. DOESN'T ANYONE CARE?

HE AM RISEN MUTHERFCUKERS

2009-04-12T12:41:11Z

Happy Spring!

Muslims are Crazy

2009-03-29T18:09:20Z

16 month old is starved to death after not saying Amen at meal time.

Oh wait, this is about Jesus and stuff.

Ennui

2009-03-18T16:24:44Z

It's all too good and easy

Coraline 3D

2009-03-16T15:56:55Z

It is a remarkable movie. Not just for kids.

Shifty Bankers

2009-03-07T01:36:29Z

(See previous post first)

I also have to admit that my son's college fund, my secondary retirement funds, and my wife's primary retirement fund are down by 40%. That is not down from a high. It is a capital loss. The combined funds are down by about 75% because I was a good investor before. We will be fine because my primary investing was not part of my employment based accounts. We have been swindled.

Shifty Real Estate Professionals

2009-03-07T01:25:48Z

This is great. Suzane the Realtor. I have to admit that my house is only worth about 5% more than I bought it for 6 years ago. That seems like reasonable appreciation? I don't care. It provides me with housing services, good schools, and I still love it.

Oh, I made sure I could afford my house. Where is my bail out?

Washington Foodie Post

2008-11-29T05:30:05Z

On the Metro tonight ...

She: What you do for Tanksgiving'?
He: Ronald McDonald don't believe in that shit. I worked. Ronald McDonald goin' get his money.

We went to Komi. It was very good but not all that. We have now been to all of the big-time foodie places of the season. Ordinal:

1. CityZen
2. Nora / Kincaid's (tie)
3. Komi
4. Inn at Little Washington
5. Citronelle

Thanksgiving: I am greatly thankful

2008-11-28T05:23:21Z

I am having a great life. I have a great mate. I have a great kid. I have a great job. I have a great house. I have great prospects. Great!

Thanks are in order.

Time for a Rational Change

2008-11-26T01:22:24Z

Terrorists should die. Our government should seek out and kill those who practice terrorism against us. Doing so is a targeted act of self defense. Trying to wage a war on terrorism leads to the accumulation of state power, misspent billions, and fear mongering propaganda. It also increases the probability of the loss of innocent lives, and many, many other negative consequences.

It is as indefensible as the War on Drugs.

I only wish that the Obama would end this shameful power grab. I would applaud his courage in the face of shameful, fearful ignorance.

This

... the "war on terror" has degraded our national psyche. It encourages the U.S. to remain in a psychological state that is simultaneously fearful and aggressive -- an infantile state, one that prevents us from thinking clearly about how to address our real foreign policy challenges. The U.S. is too powerful and self-confident to act like a three-year-old having a permanent tantrum. One successful terrorist attack, no matter how horrific, should never have led to a fundamental change in America's geopolitical strategy.

Austrian Business Cycle

2008-11-22T02:40:33Z

ABC I know. I did some of my graduate work at one of the only institutions that also truly knows what it is. ABC does not fit most models but it fits the current economic situation well.   The thing about models are that "all models are wrong, but some of them are useful".

The ABC model is useful but not perfect. People who are full-on proponents of ABC, and who have had the pleasure of reading Bohm-Bawerk, are my confederates.  Others are opportunists. Some "Austrian" analysts watch charts and daily gains and forget about the subjective, temporal, and ignorance factors that are also part of the theory.

The truth is that ABC fits this time. There is no good economical model for all times.

p.s. I am buying into the slump. The misaligned capital investment does not negate the capital investment some entrepreneur will find a use for it.

Mad Men

2008-11-22T01:32:17Z

The writing is great. I have seen so, so many movies (actually I've made a few shorts) and I know that writing is the corner stone of the art. Then comes the acting and then, for the brilliant, you need the cinematography, set, costume, and on.

Two lines:

Colleague to heart attacked colleague: "What do you expect after living the last twenty years of your life like it was shore leave?"
Wounded young womanl working in NYC speaking to a dismissive suitor from the same hometown: "People from Manhattan are better than us. They dream of things they haven't seen."

Those are just gems. The rest is solid drama with the embellishment that people fuck more often than they really do.

Side note: The Broadway production of the "The Grinch that Stole Christmas" is an abomination. Fatwa.

Leaves

2008-11-15T16:45:36Z

We live on a park filled with tall oaks, maples, birches ... thousands of them. There is a day every year when the season and wind conspire and the leaves come down. Today is that day. We can look out the back windows and there are at least five or ten leaves in free fall at any given time. This goes on all day long. Usually this happens earlier in the year. It is remarkable.

It is also the day after our 22nd anniversary. We have now been married for more than half of our lives. It has been spectacular.