Friday's storms

Chicagoland experienced two fast moving, strong storms Friday. Around 3:30pm in the afternoon there was a knock on my office door. A colleague was making sure I was aware we were being "strongly encouraged" to be out of the building before 4:00pm when the first of the storms was expected to hit Chicago's Loop. I left shortly before 4:00. It was just starting to rain and I felt obliged to open my umbrella within the first block on my way to Union Station. The rain was not particularly hard, though, and when I was outside I did not experience anything to suggest concern. The train left the station at 4:20. For a little more than two blocks the train tracks are under buildings. After coming out from underneath The Boeing Building the sun lights up the interior of the train cars. Not Friday. It was as though it was night time. I could not tell when the train came outside because it was so dark and the temperature differential caused the windows on the train to fog up. My son claims the temperature dropped twenty degrees Fahrenheit within ten minutes. I do not know if that is true, but I do know the thermometer at my office building showed 92°F when I left and when I got to my car in the northwest suburbs the temperature was reading 71°F. Well before the train got to my station the severe part of the storm had long since moved over Lake Michigan and northern Indiana. The twenty minutes I was on the train in Union Station must have been when the storm was so strong. I am attaching three pictures from The Chicago Tribune showing the spectacular and ominous cloud formation that caused the commotion.




Uribe, Abel. "Strong Thunderstorms in Chicago Area - Chicagotribune.com." Chicago Tribune Breaking News, Sports, Weather and Traffic in Chicago - Chicagotribune.com. The Chicago Tribune, 18 June 2010. Web. 20 June 2010. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-100618-storm-photos-pictures,0,233684.photogallery. Images 17 and 22


Garcia, Alex. "Strong Thunderstorms in Chicago Area - Chicagotribune.com." Chicago Tribune Breaking News, Sports, Weather and Traffic in Chicago - Chicagotribune.com. The Chicago Tribune, 18 June 2010. Web. 20 June 2010. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-100618-storm-photos-pictures,0,233684.photogallery. Image 24

A nice night out

Donna and I ate at Peggy Kinnane's Irish Restaurant and Pub last night. I realize it has been a quarter century since I went to school in Ireland, but the only thing vaguely Irish about the restaurant were the fake newspapers in Gaelic. That is not necessarily a bad thing. For an appetizer, we had a basket o' rings. Thankfully they were not fried in lard as is the custom in Ireland. My American digestive system far prefers vegetable oil to lard. Our entrees were both salads. Ahi tuna on spinach with sesame oil dressing and a Cobb for Donna. Neither qualifies as Irish. The one time I saved money to eat at the Great Southern in Galway and ordered a green salad I was shocked to find out in Ireland that does not include lettuce or spinach. I do not remember of what it was composed but I can only think it was something like the lime Jell-O salad that always seemed to show up in Midwestern picnics. Despite, or perhaps because of, the lack of authenticity, dinner was superb.

After dinner we went across the street to Metropolis, a small community theater in Arlington Heights. We were a little anxious as roughly a quarter of the seats were not filled and this was the last performance. There was no reason to be anxious. Mid-Life!, The Crisis Musical, was entertaining and worth the ticket price. The show was performed by six regional actors; three women and three men. In a series of musical vignettes they went through the various aspects of middle age. Most were humorous and one, in particular, about the decline and care of parents, was poignant. The acting was good, singing good to excellent, and the changing displays on the flat screen monitors added to the production. A pit orchestra would have been nice, but the pianist did a decent job. Yes, a patron in front of me was wearing plaid shorts, referenced in one of the early numbers, so I did not feel too bad during the solo about a lost love - hair. It was not Broadway, but it was good entertainment and we will attend future Metropolis productions.

Economic education and politics

Given the excessive partisanship in the United States today, I look for the opportunity to focus on points of agreement - there are many - instead of the constant barrage from all sides on points of disagreement. It seems as though The New York Times is a channel of the "progressive" political perspective. I hoped the 07 June 2010 article by Patrick McGeehan, Does Studying Economics Make You More Republican?, based on the Federal Reserve Bank of New York study Is Economics Coursework, or Majoring in Economics, Associated with Different Civic Behaviors?, would raise another point of agreement. Unfortunately as the Fed's study is being popularized by commentators, beginning with Mr.McGeehan, with characterizations of Republicans and Democrats leading to more divisiveness. Our political discourse seems to be based on the model that one defines a caricature of the opposing perspective and then attacks the caricature in hopes of discrediting those who do not hold your position. This approach seems prevalent regardless of political perspective. This is particularly frustrating given the fiscal irresponsibility of both major political parties. While there is a difference in velocity, both political parties have been directing the country toward financial disaster through recklessly wasteful spending. I am fortunate not to know any political ideologues personally (albeit some occasionally display such characteristics from time to time) which perhaps explains why I know no one who is presently satisfied with any political party. If my experience is representative, then why is our political environment so partisan?

My area of emphasis in my undergraduate studies was in macroeconomics. The Economics faculty tended to be monetarists, whereas most universities at the time tended to tilt towards forms of Keynesianism. I no longer have the familiarity to assess whether the schools (Florida Atlantic, Nebraska-Lincoln, North Carolina, and Purdue) from which the Fed's study was based were from a particular school of thought. I suspect there is a positive correlation, influencing the outcomes.

References:

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/07/does-studying-economics-make-you-more-republican/
http://www.newyorkfed.org/research/staff_reports/sr450.pdf