Wow - a little economic clarity!

A little economic clarity, in these circumstances, is a better fright show than any "Halloween, episode gazillionth".

Well.

This episode (following link) of "This American Life" was absolutely illuminating. When I was in college, I would rank my teachers, and/or classes, on how many minutes of gold nuggets were found in one hour. Two minutes was an acceptable class. Twenty minutes was downright beyond belief. The show below has 40 minutes worth of gold. It doesn't have all of the understanding I've gained recently, but it sure adds a lot! This is well worth our time. Rated (by me) MUST LISTEN!

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1263

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For those of you who want to dive more deeply, check out these blogs and the pages referred:

IMHO, this is the best, most even-handed, and easiest to understand:
http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/10/marcia-stigums.html


This guy talks in circles, but when you untangle the mess, I find an intelligent and rational mind, and clear thinking:
http://crookedtimber.org

This one is far to the economic right, but I know there is one person in my address list who is of the same mind-set. They are intelligent and rational, but I believe some of the assumptions are misguided, and some realities are ignored. However, because they are thinking, and thinking rationally, they are still very useful to help understand the economic picture, if you feel like doing a really deep dive.
http://blog.mises.org

All for now.

Real Estate Roller Coaster

An interesting view of the history of home prices. A lot of fun!

Apr 3, 2007 

US Home prices adjusted for inflation plotted as a roller coaster:
http://www.speculativebubble.com/videos/real-estate-roller-coaster.php

27 April, 2012 - the old link is no longer good. The video can be found here today: US Home Prices - 1890 to 2006

What "white raven" means.

White ravens, and black swans: they are both anomalies, something highly unusual. Observations in nature show us white, or piebald, ravens and crows tending to be leaders of the flock. Black swans is a term coined to indicate the unpredictable historic anomaly that changes everything. The Black Plague, the Great Depression, WW1, 9/11, come to mind. 

In Russia, the raven is known as a clever creature. And, the meaning of clever, to the Russians, is slightly different than how we Americans usually think of it. The Russians say one is clever when they are intelligent, but they also tend to think of the clever person as one who is, or will be, successful. We tend to think of "clever" as something less than honest. Kinda like the Kiowa legend. I kinda like the Russian usage, as we don't have a common American word to describe the concept.

Thus, in Russian cultural observations, a white raven (or crow), is someone who is intelligent, successful, and different. Not your usual run of the cafeteria joe. It also carries a certain hazard in Russian culture, though, as standing out in Russian culture can be dangerous. 

A Russian friend once likened me to a white raven, in the Russian sense. A compliment I greatly appreciated.  

The story of the raven

White Crow Hides the Animals - A Kiowa Legend

This telling is borrowed from www.turtletrack.org.

Out on the plains there was a camp where the hunters were never successful. They could not understand this. Every time they went out to hunt, the game scattered and hid where it could not be killed. This caused the people to starve.

The people did not know that there was someone who went out and told all the buffalo and deer within reach that the hunters were coming and to hide. here was a man in camp who could turn himself into a white crow. He went out and told all the animals to make their getaway. This person, White Crow, would come back later in the day when on one could see him and turn himself back into a man.

The starving people moved their camp in various directions trying to find where the game went. White Crow did not move. Under his lodge was a hole where all the buffalo were. This is where he got his food.

When the people returned to one camp, they found this man still living there. He said, "Why did you come back? I have nothing to eat. I have been having just as hard a time as you. I have had nothing to eat since you left."

One day, some of the men were playing a game with sticks and White Crow came toward them. The players smelled the odor of buffalo fat coming from the direction where the man was standing. The noticed that the man had on a good-looking buffalo hide, turned inside out to disguise its newness. He also had a sacred stick rubbed with buffalo fat that they could smell. He did not like their looking at him. He slipped away so they could not ask him questions.

Coyote was there in that village. That night he called the men together and offered to look around White Crow's camp and tell them what he learned. Coyote watched White Crow's camp for a while, the came back and told the men he needed two good men with good eyes. Owl and Dragonfly were the ones chosen. Coyote told them to lie down in the grass and watch White Crow wherever he went. Dragonfly watched so hard, his eyes came out. Owl strained his eyes until they became larger than ordinary eyes. Owl watched the man until he saw him go down in the ground.

When Owl came back, coyote told the men to gather everyone together and announce they were moving camp. Coyote was going to change himself into a little pup and they were to leave him behind. White Crow had a daughter, Coyote told them. "When the people leave she will search the camp for anything left behind and will find me."

The nest day, everyone moved and Coyote turned himself into a dog, but he forgot to put on the whiskers of a dog. The little girl found him and brought him to her lodge. When White Crow came in he asked to examine the dog. He saw that there were no whiskers and he told his daughter that he was afraid of this. He said it was a person disguised as a dog. But the girl said she wanted to keep it anyway. She refused to throw it away. She gave it a piece of meat while her father went out to warn all the game to be alert.

One day when the man was gone, the little girl removed the stone that covered the buffalo hole. She called the puppy over to look into the hole but he acted as if her were afraid. "Come over here. Look in here pup, see what we have." When she said this, the pup came over. Suddenly he jumped into the hole, and turned into a man and began to holler, "Scatter all over the world! Scatter! Scatter!" The buffalo came out of the ground like a big river. Coyote turned himself into a cocklebur and stuck himself on the fetlock of the last buffalo that go past the girl, who was waiting for him with a club. After the buffalo got out of White Crow's lodge and were a long way off Coyote became a man again and shouted "Scatter! Scatter!"

When White Crow returned to his camp and saw what had happened, he said to the young girl, "See what you have done! I was afraid something like this would happen. Now we are going to have a hard time."

Coyote returned to his people and they began to enjoy the buffalo again. This made White Crow angry. He directed the buffalo and the other animals to hide from the hunters. Soon the people were starving again. White Crow let them know he was going to make it harder than before. He flew over the camp saying, "I want you to know it was me who kept you from killing the buffalo before. You are not going to kill meat animals any more."

That night, Coyote called the men together and told them he had a plan. They would have to follow his instructions carefully. They were to announce that everyone should move over to a forest a few valleys away. Coyote would turn himself into a bull elk and hide in the brush where White Crow would not see him. When the people came along they were to kill and butcher him, but they were to leave behind his skeleton and his head with the antlers attached.

So, the next morning, the people moved to where he had directed them and some of them went out to look for game. A hunter scared up the elk, chased him, and killed him. They butchered him the way they had been told.

While they had been chasing him, White Crow had flown over Elk and said, "I wonder how I overlooked you. I should have told you they were hunting and to hide. I am to blame. But you can run fast and save yourself."

After the hunters left: White Crow found the skeleton. He lit on its antlers and thought to himself, "I know this is not an elk, I know what Coyote did before. This is just Coyote, who has disguised himself again. I will test him and find out." So White Crow stood on Elk's head and began to strike at Elk's nose with his sharp beak saying, "I know you are Coyote! I know you are Coyote!" He kept on striking. He stopped just as Coyote was about to cry out. "Well, I will try another place." He moved back to the hind leg, to the kneecap. He struck with his beak. "I know you are Coyote! I know you are Coyote!" Again, Coyote was just about to yell when White Crow stopped.

"Well, you must be an elk, but I do not see how I overlooked you." White Crow than decided he would pick out the scraps of meat left on the ribs. When he stuck his head in between them, Coyote closed his ribs and held White Crow in a vise. Then he got up and turned himself into a man. "Now, I have got you!"

White Crow said, "Coyote, please turn me loose. I will not do anything bad again. I will be good to you all. Please, turn me loose!" The people were watching from a distance and when they saw that Coyote had White Crow, they
began to shout.

Coyote said, "Now I have caught you and I am going to take you to camp and let the people do as they please with you." He took him to the camp and the people said, "This is the one who has caused us a lot of misery and starved us. Now that we have him, what shall we do with him?"

Spider Old Woman said, "Let me have him. I want to see the one who has caused us to starve." As she held White Crow, she was entangling him with her web but no one knew this. As she was doing it, White Crow got out of her hands and flew up into the air. He circled the camp, laughing. "This time I will have no compassion on you. This time I am really going to starve you!"

Coyote turned to Spider Old Woman and said, "I am going to tell the people to kill you for letting White Crow get away." Spider Old Woman said, "That White Crow doesn't know what he's talking about. I will get him." She began dragging in White Crow as though she was pulling on a rope. White Crow said. "Hey, I was only joking. I will be good. Have compassion on me." But Spider Old Woman went on pulling him in until she got him in her hands. She gave him to Coyote. "Do whatever you want with him," she said.

Coyote ordered the men to go and get firewood. They built a big fire and put White Crow in it until he was burned all black. Then Coyote said, "I am going to make it so you can never do anything your own way. All your life you are going to be a bird flying about looking for scraps. You are going to be frightened by everything." Now, this is the way with Crow.

___________________________________

But, you will notice that the crow is clever, as in smart, and successful.

Equinox

It is past the equinox now. The equinox - one day when all our days are the same length. The time, in Russia, when it was not that the days were shorter, but that the nights would now be getting longer. A tide mark of time.

Here, in southern California, it is still warm during the days. Some days it even still gets into the 80's, more than warm. I like this, because I can ride my bicycle, but I miss the autumn. I would have liked to ridden the back roads during another fall. I would have liked to gotten more use out of my winter clothes - the fox sharka (hat), the down coat, the mittens. Maybe another time.

Here I can ride with lots of other bicyclists, racing bicyclists. There are plenty of them in their 40's and 50's, and probably more than a few older. I'm not the only old Joe riding my road bike here.

Back in the US of A.

I have one more post for this journal, after this one. I am going to recap my experience and thoughts. I believe I have a more cohesive view now.

For now I am back, working, in the U.S. California, as a matter of fact. Interesting contrast.

Cycling in Moscow

I rode again today, for the first time in DAYS. It has been rainy, windy, and cold. Not fit for riding without fenders. And on the windy days, it was terrifying to think of riding with that wind. If you were riding into it, you'd be going backward!

It rained this morning, too. But I actually saw the sun about midday. Then it even began to warm up. Positively a miracle! And, on top of that, I even began to think of riding, when my mind has been preoccupied with finding work and determining forward paths from this point. So, when I got home, I was looking at the clouds to see if I could get any idea of whether it was going to rain on me if I rode - or not. There was very black thundercloud coming rapidly over my part of the city, obviously pouring rain on the way. But, it was moving very rapidly, and within a couple tens of minutes it obviously was not going to vent on my section of the city and my roads. And, the skies looked calmer behind it.

When I did get out and ride, it was fine. No rain. But then I had to find new city streets to ride, new paths to get from one point to another. My objective today was to find a path to a set of bicycle and walking paths along the Moscow River that are between 5 and 8 miles from my apartment.

Remember, Russian cities are golden for the numerous back ways available. But on the other hand all the back ways merge into these huge major streets, like little streams and major rivers. You can follow the streams easily, but they often intersect the major river, and then you have to cross this dangerous and huge expanse of hostile territory. Except, if you know a little about the flow and ebb of the large expanse of hostile territory, it is not so hostile. At least not overtly. It is more like a force of nature, that one must recognize and deal with, but it is predictable, at the least.

My explorations today go awry soon enough. The maps do not quite match the reality of the streets. At one intersection, where I plan on going straight, I cannot. Then I cannot find street signs to indicate a name when I need one. And then I run into a section of town that is dominated by one-way streets. Once again I am forced into unwilling, and unwitting detours.

I do not make it to my destination, but I do learn more about the streets I must travel. I begin thinking it may be easier to go ahead and travel the major routes across town. There is more traffic, but these roads must be crossed if not used, and crossing is, if possible, more dangerous than traveling along them.