CrazyEngineer.net

…it’s called the LTCM (Long-Term Capital Management) failure, and it happened back in 1998. And the exact same investment firms that are collapsing now are the same ones that had to pump money into LTCM in an organized bailout by private firms. Except this time, every company is its own LTCM.

I found this all out while reading a great book “When Genius Failed” which is a very in depth look at the entire life of LTCM. I’m sure you’re thinking that sticking a spoon in your eye would be more fun than reading a story about a hedge fund, but it’s an amazing read. Best part: you’ve already heard of all the financial instruments that sank LTCM: credit default Swaps, mortgage backed securities, leveraged positions; all of same players are there.

It also is a concrete example of another book I’ve been trying to get through, “Fooled by Randomness“. That one is a little more theoretical with the author quoting several obscure economists. However, the basic idea is that many times, proficiency at picking stocks (or betting on horses, or playing blackjack) is really the result of dumb luck, not the skill of the stockpicker. The problem comes when the picker and those around him believe that he really does have great skill at picking stocks. At some point, the picker’s lucky streak ends, the markets turn against him during some “once in 100 years” event that no one believed could happen, and the picker “blows up” and loses everything (and then some).

Ever notice these “once in 100 years” economic events seem to happen fairly often?

When the TARP first came up for a vote, I was yelling at congress to approve the damn thing and get these garbage securities out of the system. I have no problem with government intervention when the economic train has gone off the rails. Usually, markets are rational and move in predictable ways. But when the humans in the system get spooked, rationality goes out the window and everyone is working with primal instincts from 10,000 years ago. The system just can’t fix itself from within.

The problem is that interventions need to be quick and decisive and not wrapped up with so many rules that nobody wants the help. I just don’t understand why the Treasury is taking so long to start buying up the assets. They keep saying it’s because it is hard to gauge the value of each of these securities because they’re all different and very complex.

Bullshit. The value is what the market determines. Use a reverse auction where the security owners set the price they will sell the security for. Treasury Dept takes the amount the bank paid for the security (require them to open their books to allow them to partake in the auction) minus the amount they will sell the security for. That’s the loss that will be recorded on the bank’s books for the security. Treasury starts buying the securities with the highest calculated loss and works their way down. You want the securities off your books? Suck it up and take the loss.

As much as we’d prefer to not have the economy collapse, if we don’t cause enough pain to the banks and investors this time, they’ll just do the same crap with another bubble in a decade and we’ll be in the same mess as now (or worse).

I was working on a long post on my political views as a Social Democrat and how they are obviously superior to other plans for a democratic government.

But as we are grateful that the elections are finally coming to an end, we should try to look beyond the prime time infomercials, the Joe the Plumber meme, and “real” vs. “fake” America disputes to remember how this country started:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

The signers of the Declaration of Independence certainly weren’t perfect or divine instruments. But they had ideals. And even though its taken 200+ years, those ideals have become reality. Our ideals possess just as much potential as long as we fight for them.

So, if you live in a backward-ass state that doesn’t do complete vote by mail, brave the long lines and other frustrations on Tuesday and fight for your ideals.

Last weekend I stayed at the Venetian in Las Vegas for a friend’s bachelor party.

As someone who has been to Venice and who actually considers it one of the top ten coolest cities in the world, the Venetian is a horrible superficial copy.  Besides the “like new” look of a 1000 year old city, they actually perfume the air in the lobby (which drew the remark “the lobby smells like strippers”). I think that pretty much expresses the ulterior motive of the Venetian.

Which is really the motive of everyone and everything in Vegas: to take your money in whatever way is appropriate and/or possible. The first day or two that you are there, you try to spend money conservatively and make wise choices. But the non-stop barrage of insanely overpriced food, drink, and entertainment eventually wears you down to where you finally become detached from reality and begin to spend freely. From our female waiter at Delmonico’s giving us the number of a “friend” who ran a car service who could hook us up with whatever we needed, to the taxi driver who not-so-subtly offered us hookers and drugs; everyone was hustling.

Now, never really having been in Vegas before, I couldn’t say whether this was the normal state of the town or if this was a recent phenomenon (either caused by the economic crisis or something else).  I realize everyone has to make a living, but you also have to make the customer believe they got a fair value for their money otherwise they’re not going to come back and they won’t recommend you to others.

The CrazyFather and I were actually planning to go to DEFCON next year in Vegas for our annual trip, but now I am really hesitant to go because of the recent experience.

On the other hand, while I don’t feel like I get fair physical value for my money ($14 gin and tonics anyone?), I might have gotten fair spiritual value for my money.

I try to run my life fairly tightly and disciplined these days; mainly because the key personal resources of my life (time, money, energy, and sleep) are in short supply and I still have quite a bit I want to accomplish.  So an occasional shakeup to pull the stick out of my ass at least a little can radically change my perspective.

One of my mental tricks to keep me from becoming excessively depressed is the “at least I’m not that guy” game.  You know the game, you’re walking down the street and you pass a homeless person or some ignorant looking redneck, and think to yourself: “Well, things may suck right now, but at least I’m not that guy.”  Probably not the most compassionate trick, but it does serve to remind me that compared to 99.99% of the people on this planet, I’m living the life of a king.  And while I may be stressing that I haven’t posted on my blog for a week, at least I’m not stressing that I haven’t eaten for a week.

There is however an ugly flip side to this, which really reared its head in Las Vegas.  It’s the “Why can’t I be that guy” game.  Yes, we all know that game too.  Some guy in designer clothes with the supermodels on both arms and a full head of hair (when you’re losing your hair, you start to notice when people have a nice head of hair).  And you think to yourself: “That guy’s an idiot.  I’m smarter/funnier/more talented than him, why can’t I be that guy?”.

This of course is exactly what Second Noble Truth (the Origin of Suffering) of Buddhism is talking about.  Buddhas said that the reasons for suffering are desire, passion, ardour, pursuit of wealth and prestige, striving for fame and popularity.  Longing (especially unrealistic longing) for these things and ideas will only bring suffering.  I will never be a rock star.  I will never be a movie start.  I will never be the life of the party with hundreds of friends to hang out with on a whim.  And I will never have a full head of hair again (unless science gets off their ass and does something).

It’s tough when you’re sitting and watching all the beautiful and seemingly happy people around you, wishing you could be just like them while you know that the wish is completely unrealistic and is only going to make you feel worse about your life which is really quite terrific taken on whole.

The only problem I’m still having with embracing Buddhism is that I find it hard to know where the line between healthy ambition and longing is.  Is working hard for a promotion so you can have a little more money and a little more control over events at work an unhealthy craving/longing?  Some of the greatest leaps of mankind have been brought forth by people with unrealistic longing who suffered for their creations.  If everyone was happy with what they had and did not long for “better” things, would we all still be living in caves?

Well, probably would be better than staying in Vegas.

Because if you do get rid of it, chances are someone will come up with a really cool project idea that needed your now absent electronics. I give you The Nintendo Entertainment System Lunchbox.

Obviously I have no choice but to obtain not one, but two Nintendo units so I can craft one for each of my spawn. They may ask for My Little Pony or Dora the Explorer lunchboxes, but they’re getting NESLs. The kids will have no idea what it means, but their teachers will.

And they will know that Isabel’s and Elisabeth’s dad is going to be one of “those parents” who just can’t get with the program, be an adult, and make their kids conform.

Totally unrelated, Mrs. CrazyEngineer is trying her hand at blogging again.

Here’s a request for some honest feedback from the few souls who actually read my blog on a semi-regular basis. The events as I related them occurred about a week ago (although I wrote most of this post the day after) and while I am trying to tell the story as objectively as possible, we all saw that ST:TNG where everyone’s testimony in a murder trial was shown on the holodeck and nobody remembered anything the same way.

Mrs. CrazyEngineer and I put both kids in our double jogging stroller and walked to the nearby park around 7PM. The park was moderately busy, but by no means crowded. There is a play structure at the park (slides, platforms, stairs, etc) that Isabel has played on before and rather enjoys. We stopped at the play structure, let Isabel out to play, and Mrs. Crazyengineer and I sat on a bench to talk while I kept an eye on Isabel.

There was one other child on the structure at this time, a boy who may have been an inch or two shorter than Isabel but who I considered to be older both do to his agility and verbal skills. He was being a little wild on the structure, but Isabel didn’t seem to mind. They were even bouncing together on one of the bridges and Isabel would laugh everytime they both fell down. The child’s apparent mother was by herself sitting on a bench about 1/4 the way around the structure from where we sat.

Also on this play structure are several painted vertical bars that the kids can spin. I did not see who started playing with it first, but I did see the boy shoulder Isabel from her position centered in front of the bars to completely out of range of the bars and block her attempt to play with them (she actually had one foot on the stairs that went down right next to the bars). Isabel began to cry.

At this point, while I was quite annoyed at the boy, I didn’t say anything about him. There will always be bullies in this world and several articles I read say that it’s best to let playground squabbles work themselves out between the kids so children learn conflict resolution early instead of having helicopter parents intervene.

The mother of the boy had run up at the same time and scolded her son for his actions, however I did not pay much attention to them as I was asking Isabel if she had an ouchie since it was possible that her hand had been caught on the bars. She seemed physically ok, so I soothed, told her she was ok, and then offered to help her swing on the monkey bars, to which she readily agreed. Incident over, no big deal, no hard feelings, everyone carry on.

Of course, as soon as I started helping Isabel swing across the monkey bars, the boy was right behind her on the platform yelling for my attention then yelling at his mother to come help him. He was really crowding us but his mother did not get up instead just yelled at the kid to stop it from her seat on the bench. I think the kid backed off at this point (again, I was focused on not dropping Izzy as I helped her across the monkey bars).

We sat for a bit, walked a bit, some more kids came onto the structure, and the boy was still being rather wild and his mother was stilling yelling to him to behave from her bench, never getting up and reading a magazine so she didn’t even always notice his antics. I remember that at this point I had already pegged the woman as the “non-attentive, I’m more important” type of parent. I wish to stress that I certainly was not watching her or her son the entire time and very well could have missed her properly correcting her child. Since we won’t have her side written here, I at least would like to point out the high possibility of gaps in my narrative.

So, we were getting ready to go, and I asked Isabel if she would like to go down the slide one last time. She nodded and ran to the stairs that lead up into the structure where the slide is. However, the boy was back, standing halfway up the stairs, hands outstreched grabbing opposite railings, and not allowing Isabel to pass. He then pointed at us and I most definitely heard him say “Go see your mother”.

Isabel backed off and walked dejectedly to us.

At this point, I felt I was in a “no-win” parenting situation. My options, as I saw them were:

1) Ignore what just happened and put Isabel in the stroller and leave.
To me, this was probably the worst thing to do. Backing down and walking away would have been what I did was a child confronted with a similar situation, and it is a character flaw I have been trying to overcome ever sense. Teaching Isabel to avoid conflict by backing down or changing her behavior to make peace is something I do not want her going through life emulating. It’s made me miserable on several occasions in the past and only now have I been able to stand my ground in more situations (possibly to my detriment of course, see below).

2) Try to say something profound about the situation and put Isabel in the stroller and leave.
Great idea, except I didn’t have anything profound at hand. And she’s two and a half; ancient Chinese proverbs or cowboy wisdom probably would have done little to offset the effects of backing down.

3) Try to convince Isabel to go back and try to get past the boy and go down the slide (he was still in his position on the stairs).
At this point, I don’t think I could have been prouder if Isabel had shoved the kid out of the way to go on the slide. She was smaller and in the right, bullies should reap what they sow. And while we all say violence is not the answer, that’s not how the rest of the planet sees it. With the banning of dodgeball and tag (tag FFS!), we’re raising kids who are going to be unable to handle physical conflict and competition when that’s all that parts of the world know.

But at the same time, I didn’t want to try to actively encourage her to push the kid. That would probably just make her upset trying to figure out what she should do since she was getting mixed messages. I would much rather have her solve conflicts with her mind than her fists. And it might have escalated the situation. Since the boy seemed stronger and more aggressive, that could be very bad for Isabel.

4) Walk over with Isabel to the boy’s mother and tell her that her child was bullying my child and could she please move him out of the way.
Yes, this was probably the wisest choice of action. But to expand on the previous point, kids need to learn how to handle conflicts on their own, not always run for help from adults (there are obvious exceptions of course). Today it’s just a toddler bully on the playground, soon it will be a 2nd grade girl in the girls washroom bullying 1st graders. Better to instill an assertive streak in her now that will not only make bullies choose easier prey but will allow Isabel to ask and strive for what she wants instead of meekly taking whatever she gets.

And quite frankly, I was rather annoyed at the mother who in my opinion was doing a very crappy job monitoring her child. I would be horrified if Isabel was shoving other kids around on the play structure and would correct her at close range, if not leave outright, immediately. That she was just sitting on a bench with a poor view and occasionally yelling at her child (who ignored her) probably explained the child’s behavior.

5) Walk over with Isabel to the boy, and if the behavior continued, call to the mother to draw her attention to the unacceptable behavior of her child.
This is somewhat like 4, except with the added benefit of embarrassing the mom and putting her on the defensive in front of several other parents at the playground. I had hoped that walking over with Isabel and appearing slightly menacing to the boy would make him back down. Apparently I can’t even scare pre-schoolers.

6) Walk over with Isabel to the boy, and if the behavior continued with no notice by his mother, move him myself.
Yes, this is what I ended up doing. Obviously, at this point 1 million years of evolution had gone out the window and this had become a primal threat to my genetic legacy which required all the testosterone I could muster for defense of my offspring. After glowering at the boy (with no perceived intervention or calls from his mother), I growled “move kid or I’ll move you”. Hardly a polite warning, but a warning nevertheless.

So I grabbed his right arm, pulled it away from the railing, creating room for me to lead Isabel by the hand past him. I’m fairly certain the boy cried or screamed at this point (not from physical harm as far as I could discern, more of a “why am I not getting my way” cry). I stopped paying attention to the boy and his mother at this point, partly because I think Fight or Flight tunnel vision had kicked in and partly because I wanted to make sure I got Isabel past the boy and to the slide without further incident.

Isabel went down the slide, happy as a clam. We walked back to the stroller and got the whole family strapped in. Wasn’t sure where the boy was, and didn’t care at this point. I considered it over, the boy was probably back playing on the play structure and we were leaving.

However, we had to walk by the mother on the way out, at which point she said somewhat testily “In the future if there is a problem with my kid I would appreciate it if you let me handle it.”

Ah, how I wish I had 30 seconds to compose a perfect response that would have been such a verbal volley has to silence the mother. Something like, “In the future, I would appreciate it if you actually did handle it instead of just sitting over here and forcing me to do it.” However, I was on the spot and merely replied, “Well, if you were paying attention I wouldn’t have had to.”

To which she of course got defensive and replied “I was paying attention.”

With the obvious retort from me: “No you were not. You were sitting over here doing nothing while your boy bullied my child.” Or something slightly less coherent from me. The mother was saying some other things being defensive I think, but I just kept pushing the stroller and left, not wanting an argument over really what was a fairly minor squabble.

So, was I totally out of line? Was she? Mutual parenting failure? Was there another course of action I could have taken? I feel like everything I did was measured and sensible, but intellectually I know I could very well have missed something that should have changed my responses. What could I do to prepare for handling another such incident?

Been awhile since I’ve posted, but this time I actually have a valid reason. On Thursday, August 14 at 17:12, CrazyBaby number 2 was born using unnatural natural means. Natural because no drugs or invasive procedures were used. Unnatural because Mrs. CrazyEngineer broke the labor speed record, going from transition to second stage labor to birth in about 12 minutes. Considering the first time took three days, the sudden onset was a bit of a shocker (especially to our newbie nurse and to our midwife who didn’t even make it to us in time to deliver the child). Ellie tipped the scales at 9 lbs, 10 oz; more than a pound heavier than Isabel. But she came out so fast that she still had a bunch of liquid in her lungs which caused her to have a low pulse-ox reading of 80 with room air (you usually want at least 95).

This unfortunately meant that instead of Mrs. CrazyEngineer holding Ellie right away, our child was wheeled off to the nursery to be given extra oxygen to get her pulse-ox level up. I went with her and stayed in the nursery letting her hang on to my pinky while she had this plastic hood over her head giving her 30% oxygen. It actually looked worse than it really was, but not exactly the birth we had in mind. But Ellie did improve and she was finally wheeled into the room to be with her exhausted parents around midnight.

The good news is that post-natal care is going much smoother this time. Mrs. CrazyEngineer is feeling much better than she did after giving birth to Isabel. We’re getting plenty of help from the in-laws so the adults still outnumber the short ones on most days. Ellie is nursing well and is actually allowing us to sleep several hours at a time (as opposed to Isabel who pretty much woke us up every hour).

Speaking of the Izzy, she has fully entered her defiant toddler phase. It’s becoming quite annoying how she now no longer listens to directions and moves at her own pace. I’d like her to pick up the pace sometimes, but I’ve seen other parents trying to get their kids to hurry up, and I just don’t want to be that kind of parent. So I just take a deep breath, try to enjoy our time together, and take comfort in the hope that she will grow out of this in a few years.

Today we get to the meat and potatoes of the Calgary Stampede: the rodeo. Every day of the Stampede is a qualifying round, with the final round on sunday where the winner of each event gets a check for $100K (Canadian). I’ve never been to a rodeo before and have only seen snippets of it on television. So I didn’t even know that a rodeo wasn’t just guys riding bulls, there are actually seven events:

• Bareback Riding: Ride a bucking horse without a saddle
• Steer Wrestling: Jump off a perfectly good horse onto a running steer.
• Team Roping: Two guys try to rope and subdue a steer.
• Saddle Bronc: Ride a bucking horse with a saddle.
• Tie-down Roping: Rope a steer from the horse then run over and tie its legs together.
• Barrel Racing: For the ladies, a cowgirl races a fast horse around barrels.
• Bull Riding: Guess.

Now, I can understand how most of these events evolved. Roping, riding, breaking a bucking horse: these are all tasks that cowboys would do in their daily life. But what the hell does Bull Riding or Steer Wrestling have to do with the daily life of a cowboy? Why would you EVER need to ride a bull? And wouldn’t you just rope the steer instead of jumping off your horse and risk getting injured on the range? I think the bull riding started as a bet between some cowboys around a campfire.

“Reckon you can’t ride that bull.”

“Reckon I can.”

Alcohol was most definitely involved.

That evening, we got another huge super-shot of cowboynasity as we attended the concert in the Saddledome. The CrazyFather had somehow started liking country music. I think it’s because his mind is going as he ages. Anyhow, this was his can’t miss attraction of the Stampede and really wanted me to go with him. So I put my baseball cap on backwards, drank some beer from a can, and tried to look like I drove a pickup truck.

The opening act was Miranda Lambert, who I actually enjoyed quite a bit. She has a really great stage personality, because even though I couldn’t make out any of the lyrics and didn’t know any of the songs, I could still get excited by the show and have a good time.

The main headliner was Sugarland, which apparently is the Sonny and Cher of country music (the wife has the talent and the husband is dead weight). I’d have to give them a big “Meh”. Except now I know who is responsible for that “All I want to do-do-do-do” song.

Sugarland, you’re on my list. And it’s not the “Who gets cake list.”

Today started with a long drive back from Jasper along the highway east of the mountains. Tonight was our first day in the Stampede, and it was raining. That meant we really didn’t do much exploring since every place with a roof was packed. I also managed to restrain myself from buying a molded plastic cowboy hat for $20. We did listen to an AC/DC cover band on one of the stages. Yes, the lead guitarist is wearing a cow suit. Yes, that was the only memorable feature of the band.

The event for the evening was the chuck wagon races. This whole sport is one big mess. The key thing to understand is its not just four chuckwagons (with four hourses each) on the track, its four chuckwagons plus four outriders per wagon. When the race starts, the outriders have to load the camp stove and tent pegs in the back of the wagon, then jump on their horses as the chuck wagons race away. They need to catch up because if all four outriders aren’t at least 150 feet behind the chuckwagon when it finishes, there is a time penalty. So you usually have one or two wagons fighting for the lead, followed around the track by a gigantic mob of people and horses.

For the math majors out there, that’s 32 horses and 20 humans racing in close proximity around the track. In the mud. One outrider actually got hit by a wagon and his horse had to be euthanized. Needless to say, everyone was covered in mud by the end of a race.

It’s a great concept for a sport, but it is really popular only in Western Canada. For an American audience, it would need more danger: spikes on the wheels, a second rider in each wagon firing flaming arrows at other wagons, outriders defending their wagon and trying to knock the other wagon out. Now that would be a sporting event.

Today is the scenic sightseeing day. We’re going to drive from Calgary west to Banff (Be Aware, Nothing For Free), then through the National Park to Jasper (Just Another Silly Place Extracting Revenue). The first thing we noticed when we stopped to walk along a canyon was that this place was CROWDED. Here we are, in the middle of the Canadian Rockies, and we’re having trouble finding a place to park. I guess this is their summer (even though it feels like Grants Pass’s winter).

Next along the parkway was Lake Louise, the big tourist trap in the parks. On the advice of the Crazy Mother-In-Law, we hiked up to the Lake Agnes Teahouse on the side of the mountain. It was a 3.4km hike going up 400m, which one could consider moderate. I actually felt pretty good along the way, so I guess all that spinning and lower body lifting is actually doing some good. On the other hand, I think it almost killed the CrazyFather. We made it though, then had a bunch of tea and a light lunch for only $50 USD. When did the dollar turn into the equivalent of third world country courtesy? (The Canadians think this is hilarious and joke about it often).

Last big stop of the day was the the Columbia Icefield, which is one of the most accessible icefields in the world. We actually took a tour and walked out on the Athabasca Glacier, which extends from the icefield. Because of all the rock sediment (called rock flour) in the otherwise clear water, all the ice has a very odd turquoise color. I was thinking it might be fun to come back for the three or six hour glacier hike, but from either the bitter cold wind blowing down the glacier, the icy rain we were in, or the day’s previous hiking exertion; the CrazyFather vetoed this idea.

Um, how do I know this is Canada? Looks the same. Aren’t you all supposed to be wearing those hats with the ear flaps?

I linked up with the CrazyFather at the hotel. We didn’t have any tickets for events until Thursday, but we figured it might be a good idea to scout the route to the Stampede, especially since a famous cowboy restaurant Buzzard’s Restaurant and Bar was only a few blocks away. Our desk clerk helpfully suggested that we drive as far as the C-Train, Calgary’s light rail, and take that into the city since it stops right at the Stampede location. Parking at the C-Train station was free, and parking at the Stampede was wicked expensive (as pretty much everything in Canada is for us poor Americans).

It was at this point, I discovered what the CrazyFather had discovered when he was riding through Alberta: these people lack the ability to give directions. Street names and distances are simply not ingredients used in an Albertan direction recipe. Instead, they do their locational cooking with previously existing structures and street lights.

Moreover, I’m convinced that the kilometer has destroyed their concept of time and space. For example, “Turn right out of the parking lot, turn right at the first light, turn right again, then you’ll take a left onto Highway 1″ would seem like a fairly quick trip, would it not? Too bad it takes about 40km to cover those directions, much to our surprise.

This has become a source of tension due to the difference in the CrazyFather’s and the CrazyEngineer’s styles of troubleshooting poor directions.

I approach directions logically and love following a map. If I’m expecting to hit a cross-street on a map, I don’t panic until I reach a cross-street that is past my desired destination. At that point, I know I must have missed it and should either turn around or attempt to re-adjust my route. This has become handy since Canadian maps are not exactly drawn to scale, with 2km stretches of road taking up just as much map distance as 20km stretches.

However, the CrazyFather’s approach is to, at the first inkling of going the wrong way, ask the first person you can for directions. Perhaps in some cases this is a good strategy, but when you combine it with an Albertan’s inability to give good directions, it becomes a frustrating exercise in triangulation as we must constantly re-ask for directions as we get closer to our destination.

Having navigated Calgary’s mass transit system and glimpsing the Stampede Park, we decided instead to go driving off into the Canadian Rockies.