Hobo Down

Hobo is gone.  He was our sweet old dog friend.  Just an amazing friendly personality, quiet and calm.  A nobility.  He had trouble breathing, and we took him to the emergency (vet) hospital.  They took x-rays.  Poor guy had almost no lung function, cancer everywhere.

The YYM and I held him as his last breath, unlabored because they had him on oxygen, went out.  That's the third time I have seen a dog put down.  Something goes out of the world, something is gone.  Call it spirit, spark, electrical impulses, whatever you want.  But it's remarkable.

Two pix of Hobo when he was young.  Loved to nap in the sun, even then.  Note the stick in his mouth.  He was playing dead, waiting for me to try to grab the stick so he could run away.

And Hobo loved the YYM.  YYM called Hobo his "little brother."  Sweet.  Here they are in July, 2001, just  two months after we got him. (Hobo, not the YYM).  Hobo is having a little nip of ear.  Yum!

Hobo had been scheduled to be euthanized, at the pound, in early 2001. He was "aggressive," and nobody would take him.  But the lady who worked there said he was a great dog, and thought he was just scared because he was always being moved around.  So we took him home, because he had the most interesting and expressive eyes.

At the end Hobo just mostly napped in the warm sun.  And of course I was happy to join him.  His muzzle and the fur around his eyes had gone totally white, by the end.  We had him eleven years, and he was part of our family.  Goodbye, old friend.

UPDATE:  From comments....Oatmeal, and the paradox that is dog. 

But, Wait...

Human mortality improvement in evolutionary context

Oskar Burger, Annette Baudisch & James Vaupel
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 30 October 2012, Pages 18210-18214

Abstract:  Life expectancy is increasing in most countries and has exceeded 80 in several, as low-mortality nations continue to make progress in averting deaths. The health and economic implications of mortality reduction have been given substantial attention, but the observed malleability of human mortality has not been placed in a broad evolutionary context. We quantify the rate and amount of mortality reduction by comparing a variety of human populations to the evolved human mortality profile, here estimated as the average mortality pattern for ethnographically observed hunter-gatherers. We show that human mortality has decreased so substantially that the difference between hunter-gatherers and today’s lowest mortality populations is greater than the difference between hunter-gatherers and wild chimpanzees. The bulk of this mortality reduction has occurred since 1900 and has been experienced by only about 4 of the roughly 8,000 human generations that have ever lived. Moreover, mortality improvement in humans is on par with or greater than the reductions in mortality in other species achieved by laboratory selection experiments and endocrine pathway mutations. This observed plasticity in age-specific risk of death is at odds with conventional theories of aging.

I'm trying to think why age at mortality has anything to do with evolution.  Evoluntion involves mutations for variance, and then natural selection to "choose" among variants.  But, wait.... the only variations that matter are those that are relevant for the number, health, and fecundity of offspring.  How old (or how happy) you are when you die doesn't matter much.  And it doesn't matter at all if you if it doesn't increase the number of offspring (do 65 year old men really have children?  I know they could, but...), or the health of your offspring (do 80 year old women take care of great grandchildren?)  (more  after the jump...)

but enough about you...

....let's talk about me!

Over at MR, folks are peppering LeBron with requests for posts.

One request that really struck me was, "What’s the most important economics question you ever asked?"

At a facile level, it's, "why are some nations so rich and others so poor?", but I can't claim any originality there as it was asked many, many times before I got there. I'm guessing the commenter meant an original question.

The next contender would be, "why do macroeconomists ignore politics?". Here I was a little less un-original, but several others were before me.

I guess the closest thing to an original economics question I've asked is, "if we want to study growth, why are we throwing away information by using cross-sectional averages instead of panels?"

p.s. if you have requests for posts from Mungo or me, please put them in the comments and we'll see what we can do. At least here, your odds of getting chosen are much much higher!

Hey Hobo!

Y U NO write me back?

Santiago Street Dogs

Very common for dogs, even packs of dogs, to roam the streets of Santiago.

Sometimes they get hit by cars, and someone will just toss them over against the wall on the sidewalk. I took a picture of this poor guy.

Poor thing, legs all up in the air, just tossed like garbage. Except I noticed he was breathing. So I rubbed his belly. Dog was momentarily startled, but then stretched out his front legs and did that loud "mmmmmmmm" that dogs to do react to belly rubs, and he went back to sleep. Not a very comfy position, but then he's a dog. Living the dog's life, not hit at all, just laying around.

Daughter of Cuddles Wins Rhodes!

News article:   SC student studying at Stanford is Rhodes Scholar

The Associated Press  Posted: 11/20/2011 11:16:21 AM PST   Updated: 11/20/2011 11:16:22 AM PST

COLUMBIA, S.C.—A student from Columbia studying at Stanford University in California has been chosen as a Rhodes Scholar.   Katherine Niehaus is one of 32 American students who were awarded scholarships to study at Oxford University. Niehaus will have all her expenses paid to the prestigious university in England.   Niehaus' work focuses on biomechanics and she wants to apply her research to high technology entrepreneurship. She also is a mentor and tutor for students in low income families. Niehaus was star student and track athlete at Spring Valley High School, where she won 14 state championships. She was the captain of Stanford's track and cross country teams.

Congrats to Kate!  That is very cool.  I met Kate when dad Dr. Greg Niehaus and she came to visit Duke.  She "settled" for Stanford, I guess...

Anyway, Kate should know that Angus had an important role in her past.  Because Angus used to sing this song, loudly, when "House" was around.  I should note, we called Dr. Niehaus "Cuddles," because he was captain of the 1979 Kenyon football team in college.  (His teammates called him "House."  He's still tied for the Kenyon record for most interceptions in a single game:  3 against Grove City College in 1979) .  Just LOOK at the guy:  clearly he should be called "Cuddles."
The song:

Cuh-cuh-cuh-Cuddles!
Beautiful Cuddles!
He's the only math-uh-matt-ish-uhn we adore!
By the luh-light of
A silvery slide rule
He'll be differentiating on the floor!

I am 100% serious, by the way.  We really did sing this.  And Angus really did make it up.  Congrats to Greg and Liz, and of course to Kate.

Nod to Chateau

Main Dog Faces Difficult Choice

As many of you know, our main dog is Hobo (aka "The Wonder Dog.")  He'll also answer to Ho-dizzle, of course, if it's done respectfully.  (Tanzie, our safety back-up dog, is kept around in case the main dog goes down, as often happens.)

Yesterday Hobo faced the kind of difficult choice that only a Wonder Dog could hope to solve successfully.  It was quite cold, so I built a nice fire.  But the sun coming in the picture window has reached the angle where it is very warm also.  Well, you see the problem.

Not even a Wonder Dog can be in two places at once.  So Hobo divided his forces. He scooted his butt as close as he could get it to the fire, and then kept his front half in the sun.  This optimization problem was so tiring that he needed a nap.

we going to Sizzler!

One of the few good things about going to Wash U was Cardinals baseball. Me and Mungo were there for some pretty good years (1980-84). We would sit in the LF bleachers (I want to say that tickets were $1.50 but that can't be right can it?), smoke cheap cigars, chant obscenities at the people in the RF bleachers and hate the Cubs. A couple times we even took the train to Chicago and caught a Cards-Cubs game at Wrigley. Jeez, no wonder we almost didn't make it through the program!

HerHonor The Mayor

The coolest lady, the best argument for not retiring, and the special category "Best wearing of a bike helmet during an interview" awards go to...this woman:


Oh, and by the way, the city has zero debt. None. And she's 88. What did YOU do today?

Grandpa Toots

Mr. Tooty was being extra weird last night. Had to take a photo:




I didn't even know the iPhone 4 had a flash until last night!!

Hello From Mr. Tootie Thrills Tanzi!

On my recent return from Sweet Home Oklahoma, I was honored to pass on the greetings that Mr. Tootie had given me for Hobo and Tanzie.

To say the least, Tanzie was excited!

re-kindled

I finally got a Kindle! And I like it. It's so ez to use. You can control the font size. It's ergonomic.

My only complaint?

You can't read the damn thing in the dark!