I’ve been having a conversation with myself over the national debt, knowing full well that, like bad summer weather, shaking my fist at it won’t make it go away. Surely we can all agree this debt is a bad thing, created by decades of profligate overspending in Washington, largely on things the government should not have been spending money on in the first place.

The dumbed down appeal from the president is that we as a nation can’t default on our obligations, the money was authorized to be spent by congress, we spent it, and now we have to pay our bills, he says. Others in government want to make their approval to borrow more money (I guess from China) to service the debt contingent on large spending cuts to stop increasing the debt. The president’s response to this is, he will not have the country’s obligation to pay its debt held hostage to a demand to reduce the growth of its debt. Huh? Reducing the growth of the debt is a conversation I’m willing to have, he says, but not now, down the road.

Oh, I see.

Reduced to a household metaphor graspable by The Folks: “Honey, we need to get another credit card just to pay the interest on our other ten credit cards, and later we can discuss whether or not to continue eating out every night.”

That kind of logic would go over like a fart in church at most supper tables. But coming from Washington, we are all supposed to just smile and say the president is doing the best he can, this isn’t a problem of his creation, he inherited it from the bad guys, the ones bent on destroying the country and its reputation, therefore don’t listen to them.

At this point in my schizophrenic conversation the principle and practical diverge. In principle, I agree with the bad guys, we ought to reduce the size of government to lessen its influence over our personal and economic liberties. The most obvious way to accomplish this is to severely reduce the amount of money the government spends. But in practice, how much should I really care about something I have no power to change? Indeed, what if not changing it, but encouraging it, for the rest of my years in this life is in my own interest? After all, in the next decade the government will begin mailing me and Happy Wife social security checks. Before long (by law) the government will be our primary health insurance provider. If principled arguments for severe austerity include the reduction or delay of these things to me and my wife, why should I agree with them? The usual come back argument is that I should think beyond myself and consider our children’s future, how they will have to bear the economic burden of continued profligacy in government. Except we don’t have children. Our concern may extend to our nieces, and possibly their children, but beyond that relationship my concern rapidly fades to good luck.

Anyway, an ongoing conversation with myself, which lately usually occurs during winter walks in a world of white.

Summit Lake, 75 miles south of Anchorage:

BIGGER.

The Packers were like a boat that could not get on step. They were close — hell it was 24-24 late in Q3. But leave the bow flapping in the wind too long and you begin to take on water, left vulnerable to the rogue wave. Plus no defense in the world is prepared for a quarterback to rush 200+ yards.

In other words, maybe next year.

At Mr. Lileks blog he points to a recent comment made by Brent Musburger during televised coverage of a college football game, a comment that evidently caused a brief kerfuffle. To wit:

“Wow, I’m telling you quarterbacks: You get all the good-looking women,” Musburger said as the camera focused on Webb, sitting with McCarron’s mother. “What a beautiful woman. Wow!”

Some found the remarks from Musburger, 73, out of line. On Tuesday, ESPN released this statement: “We always try to capture interesting storylines and the relationship between an Auburn grad who is Miss Alabama and the current Alabama quarterback certainly met that test. However, we apologize that the commentary in this instance went too far and Brent understands that.”

Mr Lileks opined: “It’s permitted to praise in beauty your own group and above, but not below; then it’s creepy.”

My thought: If Ruth Buzzi had been nearby to whack Musburger over the head with a purse said kerfuffle might never have occurred. Or, if instead of Ms. Alabama, he’d said Betty White is hot, who would have cared?

Good grief this is Brent Musburger we’re talking about. What he said is about as creepy as a grandpa sneakin’ a smooch with his grandson’s wife on Thanksgiving.

Over three years ago I moved to Alaska for the third time to live and work, from Cleveland where I earned my PhD, where I had traveled to from Alaska, where I had moved to from California to live and work for sixteen years, sans one, during which time I lived and worked in Santa Fe, NM before returning to Alaska. Straightforward, right? Over these twenty three years I owned (or co-owned) and lived in seven different residences: two condos and five houses, including the present house. Make that eight if you include our recently purchased beach house. Throw in the temporary places where I’ve lived, at least four, and you’ll understand why even the mere thought of moving again causes my face to transmogrify into a Munchian Scream.

Before this third (and final) move back to Alaska I told Happy Wife that I intend to take my final breath in this house. This pleased her greatly — the staying put part, not the final breath.

Except for far northern Alaska, the rest of the state has been on a cooling trend the first decade of this century.

Paper here.

Based on mean values obtained from temperature stations located around Alaska (n=20), there was a 1.3° centigrade decrease in temperature from 2000 to 2010, which the authors pointed out is a pretty large value for a single decade. While they also concede that 11 points is a small number of observations with which to compute a trend, and I would agree, evidently the trend held even when monthly values at the individual stations were considered. Personally, I’m not too impressed with the fit of that line to the data. But then again I don’t think one could fit a least-squares line to these data (with equal or greater r-value) having a slope of the opposite sign, which would indicate a warming trend over the decade.

Curiously, the mean temperature in Alaska had been increasing (from background mean) since about 1976 (see Figure 2), so this past decade is a reversal of that trend, something the authors postulate may be due to a change in polarity of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO).

Okay then.

All I know for sure is it’s unmistakeably winter outside, has been since November, and Maui in February can’t come soon enough!

Reaction to a Viqueen fumble recovered by the Packers…

… while enjoying a bowl of homemade roasted tomato soup dolloped with sour cream and avocado, and cheese bread smeared with spicy red stuff.

Wine was also in evidence.

Tony dumb-gee, the “analyst” on the pregame show, said he expected the Viqueens would win the game because their starting QB was out, and the Packers would be flustered by a Joe Webb offense. They were flustered alright. It was late in Q3 when the Packers were up 24-3 that the flusteredness must’ve really sunk in.

On to San Francisco.

Viqueens starting QB, Mr. Ponder, has been inactivated in today’s playoff game against the Packers. Evidently he has boo-boo elbow. Tsk tsk.

Well then.

Welcome to Lambeau field, Mr. Webb.

[deeply sinister laugh]

Went to the mall today. Happy Wife wanted to have a pair of jeans I’d bought her for Christmas hemmed.

You must be aghast: You bought your wife jeans?

Yup, two pair in fact. I knew it was risky. Told the the saleswoman at Nordstrom as much. But she reassured me and away we went together, amid the countless racks of jeans. Good grief, The Selection. What now? Settle down I told myself, you can do this. First, I ruled out Mom Jeans. No frumpy comfort fit pleated pants for my girl. Uh-uh. And skinny jeans, which accounted for most of the selection, I also knew were out, as I once recall Happy Wife refer to them as “sausage casings.” After considerable browsing I settled for two pair of “slimming, boot cut” jeans designed to be worn low on the waist, one in denim blue and one in black. Cool, I thought, hip without being ho-hum.

Christmas arrived and I crossed my fingers.

She liked them! Except the black pair, she said, may be a bit too long.

Yet after she came out of the dressing today at Nordstrom I was pleased to hear the length, with heels on, was in fact just right.

Score two for the Happy Husband!

Now she needs a new robe (aka “fluffage’), as her old standard permanently resides at the beach house. Until her birthday in March this one will do in a pinch:

Suggest a caption!

NYE @ Jens restaurant:

When giraffes neck it isn’t necessarily because they’re feeling romantic.

Hat tip: Fred Lapides

A bald eagle spotted this morning during our beach walk.

I don’t know what that pole is there for. It towers over the houses on the beach and it’s been there as long as I can recall. We could barely see the mountains through the low hanging clouds and fog — it was over forty degrees on the beach this morning. By the time the dogs and I got back to Anchorage later today it was forty six here, twenty degrees above normal said the teller of weather on TV. I don’t think she’s a real meteorologist. Then again I don’t suppose you need to be, if all you do is read a national weather feed and repeat the prediction for the next five days on the evening news, something she’s been doing for at least twenty years, without any evidence of improvement. She still seems as awkward and uncomfortable on TV as ever.

Like Linda Blair in the Exorcist I swear that eagle turned its head 360 degrees tracking Buddy’s every movement as we passed by. At 15-20 pounds Buddy is probably a bit too large for an eagle’s talons, but it’s not unknown that eagles have swopped down and snatched smaller dogs.

I left Happy Wife at our beach house to prepare mole and tamales for a party she’s hosting for her girl friends, who drove down from Anchorage as I was driving back. By now I expect the six of them are in the hot tub, likely nude, well fed, imbibing, and carrying on.