Ad for Angus

I can imagine Angus muttering "Goldarn kids!" and aiming the Daisy through the upstairs window at the kids on the cul de sac.  "They'd better not step on my nasturtiums!"

Only in Norman, though.  Not many kids around in Santa Fe.

Wastebook

Rubbing rabbits?

A Tom Coburn Production.

Overview.

At Keith Gaddie's House

Here's what happens every fall at Keith Gaddie's house. 

His wife has to get him out from under the bed.  He makes a "fort" under there, with cushions...

OKC Pigeon Musuem

It's there.  Why aren't you there?  'Cause it's the place to be.

The Oklahoma Pigeon Museum and Library (And Library?  Really?).

It's in Northeast Oklahoma City.  Excerpt from the story....

Whether a pigeon is for show, racing or sending secret messages, they are all descendants of the Rock Dove, which is "the one that left Noah's hands," said Jim Jenner, a pigeon expert and documentary filmmaker. 

 "They're very beautiful, very intelligent. Sadly, they're the most revered bird and yet the most reviled in many ways," Jenner said. "They've been tagged as being dirty and stupid and all these very inaccurate things and that's very sad because it's made it difficult for people who care about pigeons and believe they are a wonderful pet to have." 

An excellent SNL skit, this would be.  The Noah part is excellent.  Well played, OK!

How to watch TV in Oklahoma

You're welcome!

Oklahoma? OKLAHOMA?

The obvious solution to the "we hate gay marriage" "problem" (if you think it's a problem) is to get the idiotic state OUT of the process completely.

The notion of marriage "licenses" really took hold as a way preventing miscegenation (mixing purty white blood with all those yucky black people, so, bigotry, in other words) and then eugenics (making sure that even white people were fully up to the standards of Aryan ubermenschen, so, white supremacy, in other words).

Get the state out of the picture.  This is a private contract, the state has no business promoting, allowing, licensing, or prohibiting contracts, including marriage, as long as the two parties are competent to enter into the contract by the usual common law standards of competency.

What state is leading us toward this libertarian pipe dream, this utopian notion of unfettered private contracts?

As you can guess from the title, the answer is:  OKLAHOMA!  Where the wind comes sweeping out of churches!

In 2012, when NC was convulsing itself about this question, I constantly advocated for this.  And now, someone is seriously considering it.  And NO ONE is more serious than an OK Baptist (I'm trying to get a witness here from Angus)

A Heart-warming Okie Story

A heart-warming love story.

An Oklahoma man proposed to his girlfriend last week while an officer tried to arrest him on two outstanding warrants.

An officer spotted Justin Harrel of Elk City in a local park last Friday and discovered that he had outstanding warrants out of two counties for obtaining cash or merchandise by bogus check, according to court documents.

Police said Harrel resisted arrest at first.

"I advised Justin that he was under arrest and directed him to turn around and place his hands behind his back," the officer wrote in his police report. "Justin said, 'Steve, let's talk about this. Give me five minutes.'"

When the officer took him into custody, Harrel explained that he was about to propose to his girlfriend. He asked if he could go ahead with the proposal.

The officer allowed Harrel to complete the marriage proposal, and Harrel's girlfriend eventually said yes. Harrel then asked the officer to get the engagement ring from his coat pocket and give it to her.

The officer handed the ring to the girlfriend.

How do we know for sure this is a true Okie girl?  She said...yes!  And, now, ladies, he's taken.  For about 3-5 years, at least. 

Nod to the LMM.

UPDATE:  Ha!  A guy did the reverse Angus.  Grew up in OK, moved to OH (Sandusky, in fact).  Appreciates the props for Okie ladies.  

Annals of Shameless Self-Promotion

Hey! I just cracked 4000 citations on Google Scholar!

Sadly, though that's peanuts compared to the mighty cite machine that is Mungowitz Incorporated.

Angus Update

Today I am 3 weeks post surgery to repair two torn tendons and shave down two bone spurs in my left shoulder. I was cleared to drive short distances last week. Monday I ate a meal with the fork in my left hand for the first time and yesterday I wrote on the whiteboard in class with my left hand for the first time. My physical therapist says I am ahead of schedule and reduced my visits from 3 a week down to 2 a week. I am off all pain meds and feel more like the old Angus again.

I said, "more cowbell" NOT "more tambourine"

Don't Tase me, Rev!

In Edmund OK last summer, a parishioner was tased for playing the tambourine like Will Ferrell played the cowbell on SNL.

As usual, I am not making this up.

We take our religion very seriously here, so fair warning: conform or be tased.

According to the Oklahoma County Sheriff's department, the tase-ee "was not filled with the Holy Spirit".

Again I must stress that I'm not making this up.

Apparently in Edmund, being low on the Holy Spirit is a pepper-spray and tasing offense!

hat tip to RKG.

Hey Teacher! Leave those kids alone

Check this WAPO piece about the terrible distraction of laptops in the classroom.

So much fail here.

First off, the subjects were given a 45 minute lecture, "meant to simulate the sort of experience they would have in a college classroom".

So let's start with an environment that begs for distractions.

Then, the test group was given a list of 12 specific tasks to perform during the lecture!

With the following results:

It turns out that people sitting next to the "multitaskers" also did worse.

Most students with laptops are not trying to please an experimenter by completing a series of tasks on their machines.

Even the non-multitasker did fairly bad on the test.

In my undergrad classes students are required to bring a laptop or tablet or smartphone (if they don't have one, one will be provided) to class, and I give them something to do on it.

They receive questions on the course material. Some multiple choice, some graphical, some numerical, some essay, some opinion. They can send me individual messages about things they don't understand or needed clarifications.  They answer the questions, debate with their peers when answers differ, and often come to a much better understanding in the process.

Their web-enabled device becomes a core part of the class.

To put it bluntly people, the problem is not the laptop, the problem is the lecture.

Oklahoma: cradle of songwriters

Wow. JJ Cale passed away. Mostly known as a writer of hits for other performers, Mr. Cale was from Oklahoma.

Which for such a small state has a strong musical pantheon.

Start of course with Woody Guthrie.

Then consider that Lee Hazlewood was an Okie too. Who? You know, the "these boots were made for walkin'" guy.  His music was covered by Rowland S. Howard,  Vanilla Fudge, Lydia Lunch, Primal Scream,  Einstürzende Neubauten, Nick Cave, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Beck, The Tubes, Thin White Rope and Slowdive.

How 'bout if we hop over to Hoyt Axton next. Yep, he was an Okie. Wrote songs that were hits for Three dog night and Steppenwolf. "Jeremiah was a bullfrog Okie"!

Heck, Wallis Willis, who wrote "swing low sweet chariot" was an Okie.

Not impressed yet? OK, let's kick it up a notch

Jimmy Webb? Okie! You know, the "by the time i get to Phoenix" guy. His songs were covered by
Glen Campbell, The 5th Dimension, Thelma Houston, The Supremes, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, Isaac Hayes, Art Garfunkel, Amy Grant, America, Linda Ronstadt, R.E.M.,  Donna Summer, Barbra Streisand, and Carly Simon among others.

Then there is the great Leon Russell. I love this guy.

St. Vincent (Annie Clark) is an Okie. I just assumed she was (gasp) Canadian!

So is Dwight Tilley!

Was disappointed to find out that Wayne Coyne, the frontman of the amazing Oklahoma band Flaming lips was born in Pittsburgh! We'll still count him as an honorary Okie though (just like me).

And people I'm not even getting into the slew of modern country "artists" from here (Vince Gill, Toby Keith, Carrie Underwood, Garth Brooks, et. al).

That is a very strong line up.

Okie ego trippin'

1.  Can't resist the opportunity to brag that my JME article with Gordon Tullock has hit 1000 citations on Google Scholar.

2. On the either end of my citation list, one of the funnest and least cited papers I've ever written (and the best-titled paper I've ever written), "Arbitrage in a Basketball Economy", was featured in the WAPO Wonkblog this past week. Co-authored with the estimable Bob Tollison.

3. My paper with Aaron Smallwood on exchange rate volatility and trade was recently accepted for publication in the Journal of International Money and Finance.

4. Finally, my student and co-author, Norman Maynard, has accepted a tenure track job at the College of Charleston!

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

Olympic fever

If you like NBC's tape-delayed coverage, you'll love this.

Here's me and LeBron's Olympics "preview" piece for Grantland.com.

Moving on up

As we wait on the Finals to begin, I thought I'd write a bit about the Thunder's playoff run so far.

As is well known, the team committed the most turnovers in the Association and got the fewest assists in the regular season. However, I want to compare last year's playoff stats to this year's. I think this is a better comparison rather than regular season to playoffs as the bad teams are not in the playoffs.

In the 2010-11 playoffs (17 games) the Thunder has the most turnovers (14.9),  were 10th in assists (17.6), shot 44% (31.6% on 3s).  Russell shot 39% and averaged 4.6 turnovers. KD shot 45%.

In the 2011-12 playoffs (15 games so far) the Thunder are 14th in turnovers (11.2), and 6th in assists (18.7). Russell is shooting 43.6% (35% on 3s) and averaging only 2.3 turnovers.  KD is shooting 50.5 %.

So compared to last year's playoff run which ended in the Conference Finals, the Thunder are passing the ball and taking care of the ball much better. There is much less of KD trying to "post up" while Russell dribbles out the shot clock. The offense is much more efficient.

They are also playing much better defense. In the 2010-11 playoffs, they gave up 100.6 points per game. In the 2011-12 playoffs they are only giving up 95.7.

It sounds like a dumb cliche, but Durant has really calmed down, matured, "grown up", and Westbrook is making progress in those areas as well. San Antonio really contained Harden when he drove to the basket so he's going to have to make some adjustments there, but I think the Thunder will beat either Boston or Miami and win the championship this year.

Holy Spumoli!

"I can go all night" ~ Kevin Durant

"We have always been old" ~ Manu Ginobli

That pretty much tells the story, and Mrs. Angus and I can't wait til Tuesday night!

All in the family

People! Further developments in the Okie drug-dealin' granny story. She was snitched out. By her own son! Who she had thrown out of her organization. Over meth!

Yes!!!!

Now THAT is the Oklahoma I know and love.

The dignity of work

Oklahoma authorities have arrested Darlene Mayes, alleging that she is the criminal mastermind behind an organization that supplies almost half of the marijuana in Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas & Missouri.

Now maybe 40% of the grass in those 4 states isn't very much (Mrs. Angus and I live out here and it's more meth and oxy country than anything else), because all the cops seized was 4 pounds of weed and $276,000 in cash which Ms. Mayes refereed to (probably correctly) as her retirement fund.

Behold the biggest druglord in Oklahoma:

The question foremost in my mind? Is there a prison anywhere that can hold her?

The World Belongs to the Boomer Sooners; The Rest of Us Just LIve here

So, walking in the Crystal City mall, in a deep sub-basement. And come across this extremely frightening doorway:

What fresh hell is this? U of OK has lobbyists in DC? Or, rather, lobbyists hidden deep below the Crystal City Metro? Is this a "Phantom of the Prairie" thing?

Yikes!

Outtakes from "Bill Dance Outdoors"

I especially enjoyed the "Oklahoma blade" incident at about 4:10. Those Okies.... a mind of their own!