Here We Go. Are You Ready?

Tomorrow, we kick off our 18 week program with a modest workout. If you're joining me for the Level 3 morning workout, you'll want to get up nice and early. I realize it's the weekend, but you'll have a lot better success if you make your morning workout a regular routine. In my case, this means I'll be getting up at 5:00 A.M., come what may.

What to Do Tonight
Spend about 20 minutes this evening stretching and relaxing. Don't exercise today. We want to be ready to start fresh with 18 consecutive weeks of strong exercise. Drink a lot of water today. If you can handle drinking more than a liter of water, aim for two.

Tomorrow Morning:
Begin by getting out of bed as soon as your alarm goes off. The quicker you stand up and get some light on your face, the more energy you'll have for your workout. Quickly put on your workout clothes and start stretching. You'll want to make sure you do some inside hurdler stretches, calf stretches, IT band stretches, and glute stretches. I seldom stretch my arms, and my back muscles are usually stretched sufficiently during the hurdler and IT band stretches. Keep in mind that the goal of these stretches is to increase flexibility, not to avoid injury. A byproduct of better flexibility is that you will avoid injury. Your muscles will also develop more quickly.

Having finished stretching, it's time to work out! Those of you who are not diabetics should consider having a glucose- or fructose-rich snack on your way out the door. Half a piece of fruit is probably ideal, be it a banana, orange, apple, or what. The energy should hit you just as you start your routine and will be a great help.

My recommendation for you diabetics, however, is to avoid snacking. We'll be starting out with strength training, which will naturally push your blood sugar higher. But you don't want your blood glucose levels climbing too high. As yet, I have not ever needed a snack prior to a strength training routine. You may also find that after increasing your blood glucose levels over the course of the strength portion of the workout, you can complete the cardio portion more safely and successfully. This is why I always do my strength training prior to doing any cardiovascular exercise.

We start with four sets of a push up / crunch / unweighted squat routine. You will have to choose a number of repetitions that is appropriate for your current fitness level. For me, this will be executed as follows:

1st Set:

• 30 standard push ups
• 50 standard crunches
• 30 unweighted squats

2nd Set:

• 30 wide-armed push ups
• 50 right side crunches
• 30 unweighted squats

3rd Set:

• 30 "triangle" (tricep) push ups
• 50 left side crunches
• 30 unweighted squats

4th Set:

• 30 standard push ups
• 50 hip raises (see this video for technique)
• 30 unweighted squats

Remember not to rest between the push ups, crunches, and squats. Our goal is to do these continuously. Take about a 60-90 second break between each set.

Once we've finished that, we'll take a 2-5 minute break before jumping rope. For now, avoid doing any fancy jump-roping. The goal here is to simply keep moving for 20 to 30 minutes. Relax, don't jump too high, don't land too hard. Remember that we have a 40-minute run to complete in the afternoon, so if you over-expend yourself in the morning, you'll have no energy left for the evening workout.

You should be able to complete the whole workout in less than an hour. If it takes you much more than 60 minutes to do all of this, you may want to consider moving down to Level 2. It's only going to get more difficult after today; it won't get any easier.

Tomorrow Evening

Nothing complex this Sunday. Go out for a 40-minute run. Not too fast, not too slow. You should feel comfortable; you should be able to stride out a little bit, too. If you find yourself working too hard, slow down. Today isn't supposed to be a difficult day. Just relax. There's no shame in slowing down to finish the 40 minutes, or even quitting a little early, if you're not used to 2-a-days. Most importantly, stay comfortable.

Up Next: I'll share my initial thoughts after my workout tomorrow, and maybe provide you with some handy tools for blood glucose monitoring.

The Marathon: Part III - The Philosophy

I believe the most important part of running, like everything else I'm interested in, is the underlying philosophy of the thing. Running isn't just about strapping on some neon clothing and raising money for breast cancer. Running is a way to explore yourself and your health on a level that's difficult to reach via other activities.

Successful running, then, involves understanding the underlying themes and applying them as you work.

No One Gets Tendonitis Running From Man-Eating Lions
There's no such thing as a "naturally gifted runner." Wait, correction: We are all naturally gifted runners. Some of us just don't know it yet.

Why do I say this? Well, humans originated on the Serengeti plains, where we have been hunting and gathering for eons. To survive there, you have to know how to run, and run well. Otherwise, you might get eaten by a man-eating lion (or suffer some comparable fate).

From there, mankind migrated outward: to the Middle East, Europe, South Asia, East Asia, across the Bering Straight to the North American Arctic Circle, and then down to the southern tip of Argentina. In each and every culture from the African plains to the Inca Roads, humans have excelled at running great distances at high speeds.

More to the point: You cannot claim that "people like you" "weren't meant to run." You were. It's in your genes. Some of you might suggest that running hurts you more than it hurts most other people. Every time you go out jogging, you suffer uncontrollable spasms of pain the likes of which I - as a "naturally gifted runner" - surely know nothing about.

But here's a question: Do you honestly think it would be so painful to run from a man-eating lion chasing you across the Serengeti? Of course not, and there is a good reason why. But to understand it, we have to first dispel a horrible idea.

The Idea of the Perpetual Beginner
The commercial "running industry," consisting of shoe sellers, magazines, book publishers, and so forth, have made good inroads promoting running as an activity to people from all walks of life. You can go anywhere and discover all kinds of information about how to be a beginner. For many of you, you stop there. I'm here to encourage you to take strides (pun intended) toward moving from a beginner to an intermediate runner.

There is no need to be a competitive runner. Most people don't have the time or desire to make it to that level. But there are a couple of important truths about running. The first is that running is more fun when you run faster. (Notice I said "faster," not "fast." In other words, whatever is "fast" for you is also "more fun" for you. I'm not talking about universal, cardinal values of speed here.)

The second is that running is an inherently safe activity. You should never suffer running-related injuries. If you do, you have either fallen down or you're running with bad form.

The problem with the Idea of the Perpetual Beginner is that new runners are never taught good running form. As a result, they are at constant risk of injury. They also never get to a point where they are running fast enough for running to become genuinely entertaining.

Therefore, It All Starts With Good Form
Back to the man-eating lion. No one "jogs" from a man-eating lion. No one "walk/runs" from a man-eating lion. When faced with a serious threat, the human body instinctively adopts a safe, efficient, natural, and speedy running gait.

In a future installment, I'll cover tips on how to improve your form, so that you can run safely and rapidly. For now, I'd simply like to ask that you stop jogging and stop walk/running altogether. These activities perpetuate your status as an inexperienced novice and obliterate your running form. You will hate running at best, and get seriously injured at worse.

Every time you get out and run, imagine that you are coursing through the winding paths of a Mayan jungle to deliver an important message, or barreling across an African plain to reach your camp before nightfall. Focus far off into the distance, relax your shoulders and your ankles, and let your running instinct take over.

This is key to safe, happy running.

Mind Over Matter
From there, the only other thing you need is determination. When you get out there and start training tomorrow, you are going to encounter shortness of breath, burning lungs and muscles, hot sun, inclement weather, traffic exhaust, myriad distractions, and thousands of other unpleasantries.

When you do, focus deep into your solar plexus as you tell yourself over and over: Mind over matter.

The moment you feel you cannot press on any longer, repeat this mantra for a few minutes. The more your body screams and begs you to stop, the more consistently you must repeat yourself. You will find after a few short minutes that the desire to stop passes, like a brief fear in the middle of the night. You'll be running a bit faster, you'll laugh to yourself at the futile objections raised by your more fearful self, and carry on in confidence.

The difference between a true beginner and an experienced runner is how much control you have when your body starts to object to the conditions in which you've placed it. Experience means conquering your fears and calmly learning to press onward.

In that sense, running shares a common bond with Buddhist meditation. This is why I have said many times that, to me, running is a prayer. It is an opportunity to overcome your internal fears and objections, accept your surroundings as they are at that moment, accept who you are and what you're doing, and come out that experience with tranquility, serenity, and courage.

Once you've achieved that, there's nothing that can stop you; not in running, not in life.

Up Next: Tips for tomorrow's workout - the first in our journey to Montreal.

The Marathon: Part II - The Tools

I said before that in order to run, all you need is time and feet. This is true. Running is perhaps the world's oldest sport, and our ancient ancestors didn't use fanny packs and Nalgene water bottles.

When you walk into a beginners-oriented running store, you are inundated with "must-have" products, each more expensive than the last. Moisture-wicking clothing, special socks, bizarre neon jackets, hats that claim to breathe better than your own head, ointments and unguents, sundry jellies and liquids that "hydrate better than water," and dozens of salesmen ready to send you off with hundreds of dollars of "necessary" gear.

Friends, this is a lie. This is marketing. What you need is simple. I have your shopping list right here.

1. A Good Pair of Running Shoes
This is obvious. Barefoot running fads notwithstanding, in order to run a marathon, you'll need a good pair of trainers. (Across eighteen weeks of training, you might even need two pair.) In general, you need not spend more than about $80 on a pair of shoes.

Refer to the diagram below:

What you should look for is a shoe that is even along lines B and C, so that your foot doesn't roll side-to-side at impact. The shoe should naturally curve from just behind line C, all the way to the toe, to ensure a healthy roll in your stride to the toes. It's okay to have some curvature behind line B, but you should not be striking your heel that far back.

Beyond those guidelines, it is mostly personal preference. In general, I find Saucony and New Balance shoes to be the most consistent. Nike is a close 3rd place, and Adidas is not bad. I stay away from the other brands, personally.

2. A Good Watch
Despite all the many technological advances we've seen in our lifetime, they have not improved much on the running watch in the past 30 years. The classic Timex Ironman Triathalon has been my watch of choice - and that of most runners - for my entire life, and I don't see that changing any time soon. Forget your latest $100 gadget, here's all the watch you'll ever need at Amazon.com for $24.

Maybe you don't want a blatant product endorsement. Fine. But if you plan on undertaking my marathon training schedule, just make sure your watch has the following: A chronograph (stopwatch) with at least a 12-lap memory, and a countdown timer with a "Countdown Chronograph" feature (it starts the stopwatch as soon as the timer has finished counting down).

In order to easily keep track of the fartlek training sessions on our schedule, you may want to splurge on a $30 watch, but don't spend more money than that - please. Don't be a sucker.

3. Shorts
I don't have any guidelines here. There are a lot of expensive and not-so-expensive options out there. The key is to find some shorts that are physically comfortable to wear. In order to finish a marathon, you'll be literally running for hours. You shouldn't spend that time chaffing or adjusting your junk, and you shouldn't have to apply Vaseline.

My personal favorites are these Under Armour compression shorts, but you can find a perfectly good pair of shorts at Wal-Mart for $10. Go nuts.

4. A Hooded Sweatshirt
I bought mine at Target for less than $10. Forget the fancy running jackets and moisture-wicking long-sleeved clown shirts. Rocky ran in a classic ash-grey sweatsuit, and so can you. When it's cold outside, throw on a couple of t-shirts and a hooded sweatshirt, and you're good to go.

5. Diabetes Stuff
If, like me, you're a type 1 diabetic, then you'll need to make sure you're carrying the following with you at all times for emergency purposes:

• Emergency carbohydrates. A little packet of PowerGel is small and easy to carry, and provides a good enough shot of carbs to get you home if you go hypoglycemic.
• A cellular phone. I don't take one with me on every run, but if you plan on doing a long run alone, you'd be stupid not to take a phone with you if you have an emergency. Ladies who run at night or in isolated places may want to follow suit.
• Rapid-acting insulin analogue. You'll probably only need to take this with you during long runs, in case your body runs out of insulin glargine/detemir/degludec/whatever. If you go into DKA, you'll want this stuff around.

This means we diabetics are the dorks running around with fanny packs. But hey, it beats death. Besides, nobody else has the cajones to run a marathon with a condition like this. So you have my permission to sock-it-to anyone who gives you trouble over this.

Up Next: A bit about running philosophy.

The Marathon: Part I - Introduction

This coming Sunday, I begin training for the Montreal Marathon. I'm in pretty good shape already; I run about 40 minutes per day, and do strength training three times per week. Pretty good. Not great.

Because this blog is a springboard for many ideas, I thought I might include my philosophy and training secrets with respect to running, too. I've been a distance runner for nearly a quarter-century; I started when I was about seven or eight years old.

I ran my last marathon in 2008. I finished in a modest 73rd place, out of about 3,000 people, at a time of 2:47. A year later, I was diagnosed with type 1 (juvenile) diabetes mellitus. It's been a goal of mine for the past year and a half to run a strong marathon as a diabetic. It can be done, and I will do it.

And frankly, if a chronically ill guy like me can, then so can you. So why not join me?

Here's the deal: I'll be posting my 18-week training regimen right here on Stationary Waves. What I plan on undertaking shall be dubbed the Level 3 (Advanced) regimen. I will also include the Level 2, for recreational marathoners; and the Level 1, for less experienced runners interested in tackling their first marathon.

Along the way, I'll be documenting the impact this kind of training has on my diabetes control. There is precious little information out there for diabetic endurance athletes and, while I cannot claim the ability to contribute to the scientific literature on the topic, I can offer firsthand experience to other type 1 diabetics in similar circumstances.

First stop: Check out the training regimen right here, and choose the Level that's right for you.

Up next: What you'll need to successfully run a marathon.

Further Adventures in Canadian Health Care

Tonight, after two weeks,  I am finally going to be able to get a re-fill on my prescription for test strips.

I originally did not get a new prescription because I missed my April appointment with the specialist. (I was out of town on business.) No problem, though, I still had plenty of strips.

Then I attempted to refill the prescription. First, I called the pharmacist and asked whether I had remaining refills. She assured me I did.

When I arrived at the pharmacy, they informed me that I actually did not have any refills. I told them that I called beforehand to ask and wouldn't have wasted my time refilling my prescription if I didn't have any refills. The pharmacist said, "I agree with you." What? Then she said she would call the doctor to refill and then call me when it was ready.

...No call, for a week.

So then I called the pharmacy later and asked them if they could contact my doctor for a refill. They said yes and that they would call me. No call for a day.

Then I called the doctor's office, and they said sometimes that happens when the doctor hasn't seen you in a while. And they tried to give me a fax number to give to the pharmacist. I said, "Well, wait a minute. I'll take that fax number, but how will I know if the doctor will refuse to fill the prescription?" She asked me when my next appointment was. I said July. Then she checked to see if she could get me in any earlier. She said the earliest available appointment is October. Then she said, "I'd keep your July appointment if I were you..." (no kidding) "...so I think the doctor will refill your prescription."

O--kayyy....

So then I called the pharmacist again and said I have been waiting to hear back from them. They said they haven't heard back from the doctor yet. I gave them my doctor's name and the fax number. The pharmacist said that they would fill an "emergency prescription" for me.

So all that, and I still don't have my actual prescription!

Nothing in the USA equates to how bad this system is.

Did You Miss My Latest Article?

Yesterday the Ludwig von Mises Institute of Canada published an article I wrote comparing the epistemology of Rand to that of Mises. Find it here.

Preaching the End of the World

I spent the afternoon transcribing this beautiful Chris Cornell song.

Lyrics and music all rights reserved by the original publisher. This is merely my take on it.


PREACHING THE END OF THE WORLD
By Chris Cornell, Natasia Shneider, and Alain Johannes
Transcribed by Ryan P. Long


A       Asus2
Hello I know there's someone 


F#m              F#m/E
Out there who can understand and who's


D      Bm7              Esus4    E   
Feeling the same way as me


A          Asus2
I'm twenty-four and I have


F#m           F#m/E
Everything to live for, but I 


Bm7             C#m              Dm       Esus4    E
Know now that it wasn't meant to be


       Em      E 
'Cause all has been gone and


A7      Em
All has been done and there's


D              Dsus2 D Dm
Nothing left for us to save


Dsus4 Dm    Dsus2 Dm  A
We    could be    to  gether as they


C#m         F#m
Blow it all away      so if you 


Dm                    F#dim            Esus4   E
Find that you've been feeling just the same    Call me now it's


Bm
Alright


              F#m                F#m/E
It's just the end of the world


           D                     C#m
You need a friend in the world


                 Am/C
'Cause you can't hide


   Bm7               Esus4      E
So call and I'll get right back


          F#                F#7
If your intentions are pure


              D              E          A       E
I'm seeking a friend for the end of the world




I've got a photograph I'll send it off today
And you will see that I am perfectly sane
Not for a lifetime or forever and a day
'Cause you know now that just won't be the case


So call me now it's alright
It's just the end of the world
You need a friend in the world
'Cause you can't hide
So call and get right back
If your intentions are pure
I'm seeking a friend
For the end


              A7
Of the world


D
There'll be no committment and 


D7
No confessions and


G7                   C      Csus2 C
No little secrets to keep


Cm
No little children or


G
Houses with roses just


   F#dim                 Esus4     E
The end of the world and me


Em            E
'Cause all has been gone and


A7      Em
All has been done and there's


D               Dsus2  D  Dm
Nothing left for us    to save


   Dsus4  Dm    Dsus2  Dm  A              C#m         F#m   F#m/E
But we    could be     to  gether as they blow it all away


             DM            F#dim         Esus4     E             
And we could share in every moment as it breaks




[Chorus (x2)]


F#m    Am/C    Dm     Esus4    E    A

Worth Commemorating

I have finally worked my way up to 60 minutes of cardiovascular exercise every single day. I have not been able to do this since before my diagnosis in 2009. We'll say it was about July 2009 when I last did this much cardio exercise regularly.

From my perspective, this is a huge accomplishment. I was convinced that I'd never be able to do this regularly again. A big thanks to Sean Burch for writing the book Hyperfitness, which has given me the right workout philosophy and some great workout ideas. I see reading this book as being the turning point for me, allowing me to push myself back to my previous exercise levels.

In other news, I finally have about 30 data points in my bio-stats spreadsheet. When I get some spare time, I will run some regressions and see what seems to be affecting my blood glucose the most. In terms of "gut feel," I'd say total duration of exercise and number of consecutive days of exercise are the two variables that make the biggest impact.

More to come.

A Morning With Frank Zappa

Sunday morning. I've spent it listening to the 1996 PRI documentary Frank Zappa: American Composer. On all levels, this is a fantastic documentary, and I highly recommend it to any and all. (Yes, I even recommend it to those of you who are not Zappa fans. As many have discovered, Zappa's television, radio, and cinema contributions are entertaining on a more public level. But you don't have to take my word for it...)

Cruise on over to Zappa.com and stream the documentary directly to your chair now!

One of the standout aspects of this documentary is the recurring theme that Zappa's music is essentially the artistic representation of freedom. I whole-heartedly agree. One of the real challenges of being a Zappa fan is the tragic shortcoming of language as tool used to describe the beauty and importance of Zappa's work. All Zappa fans run into this. We try to explain to people what they're dealing with, and the words just don't come.

But it comes down to freedom, beauty, creativity, and the pioneering spirit.

Zappa was creative essentially every waking hour of the day. He was constantly composing or planning an idea of some sort. Today, we all sit surfing the internet rather than pursuing the kind of intense creativity that Zappa pursued. (And others!) I think this comes through in art today. We are so incredibly lazy in our intellectual pursuits. We have too many distractions to invest in anything whole-heartedly. I think Zappa was among the last people in the modern world who had the kind of dedication and intellectual integrity to rise above the distractions.

Well, have a listen to the documentary and learn something. Then get out there and do something. 

Why Do We Err?

People make bad choices every day. And despite how much I blog about economics, no I am not talking about "irrational exuberance" in this case.

A close neighbor of mine seems to have all the appearances of a drug dealer. I can't prove it, of course, but I can say this much with absolute certainty: the aromas wafting from their door testify to the fact that they are heavy users, if not dealers. I only realized that they were dealers recently, upon a bit of introspection on the matter.

Let's be absolutely clear on one thing: people who do drugs, and people who sell drugs, aren't fooling anyone else. We all see them, we all know who they are, we all know what they're doing. In regard to all of this, we're nobody's fool. The fooling begins after the fact. The dealers and users fool themselves into believing that no one else knows what they're doing. We, the neighbors, fool ourselves into thinking it's no big deal, or that it's not taking a toll on the neighborhood, or that kids will be kids, or etc.

Why do we do it? We do it because we don't want to live next to drug dealers. They do it because they don't want to confront the shame they would feel if their neighbors looked into their eyes and said, "You guys are f--king drug addicts!" You, the reader, do it because you may have done some drugs yourself and you don't want to fess up to the fact that there's something really awful about drugs that if you admitted, then you'd have to confront that part of yourself, too.

An acquaintance of mine has been romantically involved with a man who doesn't love her for years. Every so often, he takes her out on the town, shows her a good time, gives her flowers, says some nice things about her, and she forgets all about the fact that he doesn't love her. She doesn't want to think about it, because it's a buzzkill. She wants to be pampered and sought-after and desired and so she shuts the love thing out of her mind long enough to enjoy a little meaningless make-believe. She doesn't want to face the part of her that wants to be genuinely loved so badly that it makes her terrified of being alone.

Why do we do it? Why do we lie to ourselves? Why would we rather lie to ourselves than confront and acknowledge our weaknesses and move on toward a more productive approach to whatever aspect of our lives we happen to be talking about?

Look, I'm not going to debate how destructive and wrong drugs are. I don't care how many great people you know who have done them. Deep down, everyone knows what I am unafraid of saying: drugs are terrible. And you know it.

Likewise, a lover who flatters you with everything but love is a John. You know it, I know it, he knows it.

Why do we lie? Why do we pretend?

We do it because we're scared. We're scared of what it might mean if we acknowledge the error of our own actions.

Look, I'm no saint. I've gotten a lot of things wrong over the years. But why be afraid of admitting it? I am guilty of every wrong thing I have ever done. I will not fear my mistakes. Instead, I will mend them and try to be a better person in the future. But fear? That's not my gig.

I have said before that fear is the single most destructive force on the planet. I feel that from the bottom of my heart. Fear can chew up absolutely anything. The noblest, purest, most wonderful thing in the world is powerless in the face of fear. It is an incurable disease that can undo - and has undone - every good thing anyone can think of.

Push fear out of your heart and mind as soon as it appears or rue the day you made it your master. Whatever you do, keep clear of fear's event horizon. Muster up your best courage and let life have its way with you. You might screw up, and you probably will. Heaven knows, I have. But don't be scared. However bad it gets, it is always worse with fear.

Endgame? The Great Stagnation?

John Mauldin over at The Big Picture put up an excerpt from his forthcoming book, Endgame. The excerpt is excellent, which is par for the course with Mauldin. I do plan on buying and reading his book. The phenomena he describes in his excerpt smack a bit of the Cowenian concept of "The Great Stagnation." (Mauldin calls it "the great immoderation," and wisely avoids capital letters.)

It will be interesting to see where Mauldin takes this concept in his book. Judging by his blog, I'd say he stops at making the point of lower public debt, saner regulations, lower spending. Basically, all the "home run" concepts that (I think) we all agree on. From the looks of it, though, I think Mauldin's book will fail in its endeavor to kick start important conversations simply because it's too smart.

Cowen can rake in good money selling what amounts to an e-pamphlet using simple language and concepts to call for more parental focus on science. These are easy, feel-good answers that don't really go anywhere but give us all a moral "way out" while costing us absolutely nothing. (No wonder leftists love it!) Mauldin, with his comprehensive charts and talk about futures and price volatility doesn't stand a chance.

All this is just one example of a question that has dominated my thoughts tonight: Why do we insist on lying to ourselves? Why do we think ignoring a problem gets us off the hook?

Folks, you simply cannot lie your way out of conflict. You can't lie to others, and you can't lie to yourself. For one thing, there is a lack of courage involved there. It's cowardly to hind behind lies - even to yourself - to brush aside some difficult thoughts.

It would be great if incentivizing little Johnny to become a math whiz could revolutionize the world; but that isn't going to happen. And what's worse is that Tyler Cowen knows it's not going to happen. So why pretend? Because it dulls the pain and gives us an easy way out. Every political success has that in common.

But the real problem here is that we in the USA have it so good that we're losing the drive to further innovate. We have most of our basic needs taken care of. The effort it takes to change the world is too much for most of us; and for the rest, they'd rather change the world with an easy answer than a hard one.

Similarly, if you have a personal conflict, you won't fix it by pretending that either (a) there is no problem, or (b) the problem is everyone else's fault, not your own. You can't lie your way out of it. You have to confront your reality. It's dishonest and cowardly to do otherwise.

I talk a lot about economics and politics on this blog, but all that stuff is really just a vehicle for a more important message that gets lost in the mix. This isn't about left, right, or center. This is about how we choose to live our lives. I'm never going to change the world, but if I stay true to my beliefs, I just my change my world.

It's easy to live an honest, courageous, and ethical life. Join me.

"Information Is Not Knowledge"

Way back in 1979, Frank Zappa released his epic Joe's Garage album, a 3-CD rock opera. Near the end, one of the characters expounds that "information is not knowledge." But still. Sometimes simply recording events as they occur lends such compelling insight into life that you can't help but question Zappa's hypothesis.

Case in point: the every-day statistics recorded by my friends the Kleparek brothers, David and Anton. There is nothing genius about their charts; they have simply recorded information about their lives in common home computer applications and presented the results graphically.

But what a story it tells! Here is David's body weight over the course of a year:

The big dip you see was a two-week fast he undertook.

Here is Anton's distance running log by month:

Feeling inspired by such a simple way to make life more interesting, I drew up a spreadsheet of my own, consisting of most of the biological statistics I can collect on a regular basis.

I'm going to have some fun with this. Over the coming months, my hope is to provide some charts, graphs, trends, numbers, and maybe even some hypothesis testing.

Stay tuned.

Caplan on Mathematics PhDs as a "Dead-End Job"

In an otherwise interesting post on dead-end jobs, Bryan Caplan makes the following observation:

You might think that parents would universally discourage Dead Ends.  Sometimes, they do: Few parents want their kid to tell them, "I've decided to be an actor," "I've decided to be a rock star," "I've decided to be a poet," or "I've decided to pursue a Ph.D. in philosophy."  However, there is a long list of other Dead Ends that parents enthusiastically encourage: Classical music, sports, ballet, chess, and Ph.Ds in mathematics are leading examples.

If you just did a double-take as you read the words "and Ph.Ds in mathematics," then you're not alone. In the comments stream, many people took the time to object to Caplan's conclusion. I myself dusted off my keyboard, rolled up my sleeves, and prepared to do the same.

But then I thought about it. Caplan didn't say "people who study mathematics," he said PhDs. Holding fast to this distinction, Caplan's point becomes crystal clear. Anyone who has taken the time to apply for jobs recently has likely noted the world of opportunity that awaits anyone with a degree in mathematics or statistics. But there are a lot of opportunities for holders of Bachelor degrees, and marginally fewer for those who hold Master's degrees. Finally, there are even fewer - marginally speaking - for math PhDs.

In other words, the return on investment for a math PhD is far lower than the ROI for a mathematics B.S. or M.S. Makes sense.

Maybe the phrase "Dead End" is a bit too much to describe mathematics PhDs, but I think Caplan's point is essentially a solid one.

This is What Economic Analysis Looks Like

For those of you accustomed to reading all the star economic blogs, I want to direct your attention to one of the best economic analyses I've yet seen in the blogosphere. Here is John Mauldin at The Big Picture:

Oil in the 4^th quarter rose from roughly $81 to $89, or about 10%. On an annualized basis, this is 40%. Inventory investment is equal to the change in book value of the inventories, minus what is known as the IVA, or inventory valuation adjustment, which is used to correct for prices going up or down. Because the value of oil rose and thus cost more to acquire, the accounting requires that you reduce the value of the current inventories. Thus “real” imports fell at a 13% annual rate. Why? Because the deflator rose by 19%, largely because of the rise in the price of oil.

And the punchline:

If oil were to go back down this quarter by the same amount, that “growth” could be wiped out. There is no conspiracy here. It is just a statistical necessity, like hedonic measurements, and it is all very clear in the fine print; but when there are wide swings in oil prices over a quarter, and because our imports of oil are so large, you can get these odd accounting factoids. Which the gunslingers on TV (and elsewhere) miss in their urge to be the first to get out a bullish statement!

There is much more meat there, and it is all worth reading. Mauldin next proceeds to explain why the United States is headed toward a major monetary crisis, based purely on US debt levels.

Meanwhile, the rest of the economic blogosphere debates whether boosting "NGDP" will set us on the path to recovery. Folks, our problems run much deeper than that.

I have been reading The Big Picture for a couple of weeks now, and I am absolutely sold.