Wcw

Veal.

There are those who believe veal stock is unnecessary. Those people are idiots.

Carol Blymire, Veal Stock
French Laundry at Home, 20. April 2008

Hat tip: Ruhlman, of course.

Zumpano, I guess. When, where, who?
Who knows.

Zumpano may forever be relegated to the late rounds of Rock Snob Trivia, the correct answer to "What band was A.C. Newman in before The New Pornographers?"

Tom Moon, Zumpano's Power-Pop: Predating Pornographers
NPR.org, 13. June 2007

So, I'm at the record shop. Aaron, the KITS-manque clerk, is chatting. [He made it. A quick Google search indicates he still works for that worthy outlet. Good on you, Aaron.] What records, I essay, shall I buy that week. Aaron is not as reliable as Mike Slumberland, briefly employed there, but he is always enthused. Sometimes about bad, bad records (anyone want my Revolver LP?), but often about items you might not otherwise try that turn out pretty good. The Moles, say, another act whose later staying power likely surprised many.

'Well,' he says, looking a little embarrassed. This is an oddity for Aaron, whom it is easy to picture snorting lines off a stripper's ass backstage while declaiming loudly about nothing. I have no idea if he's the type to do that, but I am certain he is the type not to embarrass easily.

'Well, this LP is really good,' he says. 'Except it sounds like Billy Joel. But, you know. Good.'

Now, I really hate Billy Joel. But it isn't as if I have better things to do with my money. So I pick it up. It is Zumpano's 1994 LP, Look What The Rookie Did. It does, in fact, sound like Billy Joel, as well as any number of middle-of-the-road '70s pop hitmasters. It's catchy. Painfully so. I briefly flirt with hating it, and give up. This is the power of truly superlative pop music: it creates its own false consciousness. While it plays, you love it, no matter what. And if it's really good, and you claim you don't love it, you're just faking.

Somewhere in the decade and a half between then and now, I became too lazy to keep up with things, and while I knew I liked the New Pornographers (I mean, anyone who doesn't like Letter From An Occupant has pretty much given up on living), I had no idea they were connected to distractedly beloved, long-forgotten Zumpano.

Which is where the rock-snob epithet rankles. In a universe where most folks were like me, that LP would have gone 10x platinum like Britney, though granted -- capitalism as we know it likely would have collapsed as well. So you take what you can get.

Which is, wraparound shades.

These probabilities were generated using monthly data on non-farm payroll employment, industrial production, real personal income excluding transfer payments, and real manufacturing and trade sales.

Jeremy Piger, Recent U.S. Recession Probabilities, January 1999 – January 2008 (PDF)
1. April 2008 [sic; download 30. March]

Amid recent ugliness in credit markets and the economy, there are a few on-the-other-hand indications that a real recession isn't baked in yet. Here Jeremy Piger estimates a model of recession probability, and finds chances of a recession higher, but still remote.

Here's hoping the model is a good one. A look through the charts at the end of Piger's forthcoming paper does indicate that a low probability can change fast -- just look at the early-'90s recession, another housing-driven one.

If I find time, maybe I can try modeling this myself. Piger uses a Gibbs sampler. It would be a fun project.

Eep.

Let's hope that's all there is to this.

Total Borrowings of Depository Institutions from the Federal Reserve, Percentage of GDP, 1929 - 2008

And yet, this is not the apocalypse!

Well, at least not by itself.

Charles, You've probably heard
Through the Looking Glass, 16. March 2008

I dunno. 0.4% of GDP. Last time we hit that was the winter of 1952-1953. Before that, 1931-1933. Any time that a properly normalized series starts rivaling the freaking Depression, you have to worry.

As I've said before: mea culpa.

Hat tip: Delong.