savageinfidel

We had a speaker (excellent one, at that)today at the Unknown University. Just as I got out, my cell rang - the Unknown Daughter on the phone tearfully says "Mom got into an accident and she's in the hospital". No other information. So, I rush home (I live about 2 miles from the university) and try to get some info. UW was heading to the neighboring state (about 2 hours away) for a "retreat" at our old church (actually, a sleepover with a bunch of her old girlfriends). Less than a mile from our house, she stops, since the car in front of her was turning. She promptly gets rear-ended by some moron in a Ford Explorer (she was driving our Camry, so it's likely totalled). She was able to get out of the car, but just in case (she got whipped around pretty hard), she went to the Emergency Room on a board, and called our house (we had arranged a babysitter so someone could watch the Unknown Baby Boy until I got home from the speaker). She managed to call us ...

As several readers have noted, I haven't been posting much lately. Mostly, I've been working - trying to get ahead in my classes, working on research, and in general keeping a low profile. So, here's a brief update on things. As usual, I've been juggling a couple of projects. One is (finally) just about done - it's been going on for a couple of years now, but the end is in sight. With luck (and, more important, some discipline), it should be done in the next couple of weeks. And then it'll get sent out to the Journal of Banking and Finance (not a top-tier journal, but pretty good). Then I work on another piece that will get sent to Financial Management (about at the same level). Meanwhile, I'm also working on an accounting piece that will be sent to the Journal of Accounting, Auditing, and Finance. SO, with a bit of luck, I should shortly have three pieces under review at pretty decent journals. Meanwhile, in the last two weeks, I've received th...

I'm grateful that the Unknown Baby Boy has a good disposition. He laughs easily and often, and is generally a happy kid most of the time. Here's a short clip (luckily, he gets his looks from his mother). The quality is pretty poor because I took it with my cell phone, but it give you an idea. The other kid you hear is the Unknown Daughter. Enjoy. On a work related note, looks like one paper's already been submitted to FMA (it helps having good coauthors who do most of the work). I'm still working on the second one, and hope to be done by early evening. Of course, that means I'll probably still be in my office at 11 pm like I was last night - Groan! Updated 8:00 p.m. : The second paper is done and submitted. Of course, at the very end, Acrobat refused to print it (there was something wrong with the version of Acrobat on my system). Luckily a colleague of mine also didn't have a life and was working late also, and it worked on his computer. Murphy neve...

Well, it's the last finally the day of the year. So, here's wishing you all a safe, happy, and prosperous New Year. It's been a pretty eventful one in the Unknown Household - we had one son pass away from cancer, and had another one join the family. So, I can pretty much guarantee that 2010 will be less eventful for us than 2009 (at least I hope so). We finished out the old year yesterday by taking the Unknown Daughter up to Boston to see the Science Museum's Harry Potter Exhibit. Total Cost: Three Tickets - $93 Parking - $9 Various Junk from the Museum Store - $35 Overcooked and dried food from the Museum Food Court - $20 Hearing the Unknown Daughter say (wide-eyed) "This is Fantastic" - Priceless Luckily, our two nieces were home from college., They drove down the night before to baby-sit Wonder Boy for the day, so we got to go without munchkin in tow. But Boston traffic still sucked - it took us 45 minuted to go about 3 miles on Rte 93 (and this was...

This is a bit belated - I started it, and then didn't finish before all family got here for the festivities. But better late than never, eh? Here's hoping you all had a Happy Thanksgiving. It's a good exercise to occasionally thing about the things we're thankful for, so here's a few of the things I'm particularly thankful for: My Family - I somehow managed to marry well above my station (the Unknown Wife is far better a person than I deserve, with the exception of her poor taste in spouses), I have a nine year-old daughter who still thinks her dad is pretty cool (I figure I still have another year on that score), and a very good-natured 8 month old baby boy (yeah, I'm too old for this stuff, but it's still pretty cool). My Job - I love being a professor (well, at least most of the time). I spend my workday with smart people, I get to learn interesting things about topics of my choice (they call it research), and teaching is pretty fun. And they ...

We're just got back from a trip to Wal-Mart (what could be more American) to buy some clothes for the Unknown Daughter (she's grown enough that her old bathing suit no longer fits). The Unknown Wife and Unknown Daughter tried on clothes, while I wheeled the Unknown Baby Boy around the store until he went to sleep. Not surprisingly, the large-screen flat-panel TVs did the trick (based on initial indications, he's definitely a boy-child to the core). Now we're getting ready to grill some critters, followed by fireworks. In the meanwhile, here are some links. They're from a previous year's post, but they.re worth repeating (after all at Financial Rounds, we're all about the efficiency thing): The Declaration of Independence most people have never read it through. So take a few minutes and do so before going about your day. Our Sacred Honor - a piece that recounts what happened to the signers of the Declaration The Pledge of Allegiance - ' nuff...

Here's a short update on goings-on in the Unknown Household: The Unknown Daughter is now done with school for the summer. I get a feeling that she'll be doing a lot of social activities this summer - since Friday (the last day of school), she's already had one sleepover (at a cousin's house), and has her second one (at our house) this Wednesday. In addition, she's just finished Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard book . She gets a real kick out of describing the plot to others - it's an unusual tale where the humans are largely the evil characters, and the supernatural ones (ghosts, vampires, werewolves, etc) are the good guys. Next on the agenda is Madeiline L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time (she just finished the 6th Harry Potter book, and is looking for some variety before tackling the 7th). All in all, not bad for someone who just finished 2nd grade. The Unknown Baby is now starting to make sounds - a LOT of sounds. So, he's become the star ...

This tough to write. The recent post on the Unknown Son's treatment was somewhat encouraging. In the blink of an eye, this one turns our lives around 180 degrees. This morning, Unknown Son tried to go for a walk around the hospital unit (the walking helps expand the lungs, and would speed his recovery). We noticed after a few steps that his left leg was dragging. We put him back in bed, and he was unable to squeeze my hand with his left hand. A quick CT scan followed, and revealed that the cancer had spread to his brain – in three separate spots. We hadn't known this previously since all our scans had been focused on his chest region. One was pretty large, and since it was on the right side, it was the likely cause of the problems with his left leg, arm, and hand. This changes everything – he now likely has a matter of days rather than weeks. We gave him some radiation to see if we could slow the swelling, but at best that only buys a bit of time. So, we took him home t...

It's Memorial Day - time to remember and honor all those who fought to preserve our way of life. As I've done in previous years, here's a link to Ronald Reagan's classic " The Boys of Pointe du Hoc " speech, given in commemoration of the 40th anniversary of D-Day (compliments of American Rhetoric ). After that, go see this PowerPoint file sent to me by Bob Jensen. If you don't have Powerpoint click here to view it without music. If you do have it, download the file here (both stored on DocStoc ). Now it's off the the movies, followed by charring some animal flesh on the grille.

For a number of reasons, I haven't been blogging much: First off, I'm still in post-semester recovery mode. This happens every Spring - after the semester is over, I need a week or two to decompress, clean out the detritus of the year from my office, and kick back a bit before refocusing on my summer research goals. This time around, between the timing of exams and faculty meetings, it was worse than usual. Second, we've catching up on some "family time". We offloaded the Unknown Baby Boy (UBB) to the Unknown Sister-in-Law and took the kids to Six Flags in Lake George for a couple of days. Unknown Son is currently into a minor Looney Tunes obsession, and they have an entire section of the park with an LT theme. Without UBB, we got to focus on the older two kids, and we even got a couple of good nights' sleep. We're also cleaning up the Unknown House. Because of all the craziness we've had this spring, we're doing Spring Cleaning this time ar...

The semester is now officially over at Unknown University. I gave my last final Tuesday afternoon (the last slot in finals week). Unfortunately, grades had to be turned in by 4 today (only 48 hours later). I finished the almost all the grading last night at 3 a.m. (except for the final assigning of grades). So, it looked like the coast was clear. Unfortunately, nothing is ever easy in the Unknown Household. This morning, Unknown Elder Son was looking and feeling washed out. So, after a quick trip to the local hospital to have his blood counts taken, it turns out he needed a blood transfusion (not an uncommon thing - anemia is a common side effect of chemo). Unknown Wife took him in for the transfusion, and I got to attend the faculty meeting with the Unknown Baby in tow (he slept through the entire morning, which is probably the best course of action when on a faculty retreat). After lunch, I left to feed him and drop him off at a neighbor's house for the afternoon, so I co...

We're off to a neighboring state to visit my mother for Mother's day. It'll be the first time my side of the family gets to see the Unknown Baby Boy in person. As for the rest of my life, I have a final exam to write for Tuesday, followed by an executive education class on Wednesday, a Faculty retreat on Thursday, and a trip to Six Flags in Lake George over the weekend (Unknown Older Son is a big Loony Tunes fan, and we wanted to go there before his stem cell transplant in early June). So, blogging will continue to be light for the next week or so. Now go tell your Mother (or the mother of your children) how much you appreciate her.

I thought I'd put a few impressions of the EFA conference from this past week. While pretty short, it was a very good time: catching up with old friends, making some new ones, getting a lot of work done, and SLEEEEEP! Because of all the other stuff going on in the Unknown Household, I was only able to get away for a day, so I took an early Friday flight to Baltimore, followed by the train to Washington. I arrived at the conference hotel just before lunch. Between 11:00 Friday and 1:30 Saturday (when I took the hotel shuttle to the airport for my return flight) I Had two papers presented (both were presented by coauthors), and received good comments on both. In both cases, the papers were well received by the discussant and the audience. Met with coauthors on three papers (the two mentioned above and a third one that's also coming along nicely). On two of the papers, we just talked briefly to discuss what needs to be done next to get them out the door. On the third pape...

Once again, it's that happy time - the end of the semester at Unknown University. I teach my last classes tomorrow - in one, I hand back some assignments and talk about the final (that means today is all about the grading, and in the other (the student managed fund), I hand out stock assignments for which they must come up with final analyses. As always, the last week was crazy - the student-managed fund class makes a presentation to the Alumni at the end of every semester, and it's always a mad rush to get it done. They did it this Saturday. As usual (with one or two "foot in mouth" moments) they did a job that far exceeded expectations. So, all I have left is a bunch of grading (for tomorrow's class) and a couple of exams to write. Then it's back to research (lots of projects to rein in) until Unknown Son starts the next round of treatment. As my end-of semester treat, I get to fly to Washington for a couple of days for the Eastern Finance Association mee...

I'm a flaming extrovert: I strike up conversations with people waiting in line, with the guy (or gal) in the seat across the aisle on planes or trains, and in general with almost anyone I spend some time with. The good thing about this is that I find out a lot about people, and much of it is pretty interesting. Last night, I was on the train, and I started talking with the guy across the aisle. He was a fellow extrovert (and, it turns out a law professor at Harvard), so we had plenty to talk about. Thanks to him, I picked a great idea for all you married guys. This guy (Dave) got married on May29 th almost 24 years ago. Since then, he's sent his wife three dozen roses on the 29 th of each and every month since then. I asked if he ever forgot, and he responded "no - they do it automatically and just put it on my credit card. Every month they put together a mix of different colors (red, pink, white, etc...)". Of course, she doesn't know about the ...

I just realized that I've gone 11 days without posting - the longest stretch since I started the blog. First off, Unknown Baby and the rest of the Unknown Household are doing fine. Not surprisingly, having Unknown Baby around has been time consuming. We've done this twice before, but I was much younger then (Unknown Daughter is now eight years old, and I was 40 when he arrived). The sleep deprivation isn't nearly as bad as it was for Unknown Son (who might be upgraded on the blog to Unknown Elder Boy) and Unknown Daughter. I'm a night owl, so I've been taking the 10 p.m. and 1 p.m. feeding. This way, the Unknown wife can get some sleep (as they say down South, "If Momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy"). Unfortunately, I seldom sleep past 7 or so, so I end up about an hour short of sleep every night. Not great, but livable. I've discovered that third kids are much easier than first one, because you're not nearly as stressed out ab...

Yesterday, the Unknown Family was set to go to a nearby city for an overnight trip to check out a couple of hospitals (part of the Unknown Son's treatment plan). We were getting ready to leave in the morning, and then the fun started. Unknown Wife's experienced some leaking. We were somewhat concerned, but not much, because the the new baby wasn't due for another three weeks. We called her OB/GYN, and he told us not to bother about coming to his office - just go straight to the hospital. So, it was off to the neighbor's with the Unknown Son, off to school with the Unknown Daughter, and off to the hospital with us. Halfway there, her water broke. We arrived at the hospital, got checked in, and then proceeded to wait. It took quite a while, because, while her water had broken, the baby was in no hurry to move to his new digs. To make a long story short, 16 hours later (at 12:20 A.M this morning), a new member of the Unknown Family made his appearance. After ...

Unfortunately, one of the side effects of the Unknown Son's Chemotherapy is that his hair has fallen completely out. Everyone says it increases our resemblance. But, as he often reminds me, "Daddy, at least MINE will grow back". So, I looked around on the web, and found this company JKaye Designs (actually, a one-lady shop) that makes colorful surgeons caps. Yesterday, he showed up at the clinic wearing a cap in this pattern: I wore one with multiple Snoopy characters on it, but unfortunately it's out of stock, so I don;t have a picture. And the Unknown Daughter has this one on order: Unfortunately, we can't convince the Unknown Wife to wear one. In any event, if you know anyone undergoing chemo who wants to dress up their noggin, give JKaye Designs some business. A small one fits a kid pretty well.

It's a chemo week for the Unknown Son, so things are a bit on the crazy side. While I don't usually get into the details too often, I thought it might be instructive to walk you through a typical chemo week. U.S. gets the chemo every day for five days (the clinic where he goes is only open on weekdays), so we make the 45 minute drive every day. We leave the house at 7:30, armed with a backpack full of whatever his latest video obsession is - for the moment, it's classic Pink Panther (the cartoons, not the movies). Monday's are the long days - he first has to get his fluids up to snuff, so they take about 2 hours to put in lots and lots of saline. Then they start the chemo (two separate drugs, proceeded and followed by various other meds to protect him from side effects) usually around noon or so. I get the morning shift, and the Unknown Wife relieves me around noon (after her Ladies Bible Study) and takes the afternoon slot, which allows me to go into my office for ...

I get to close out 2008 on hospital room duty with my son. He's doing well - had his breathing tube out yesterday, is eating regular food, and slowly recuperating. He should be moved out of the ICU tomorrow and into a regular room. With some luck, he might be home by Monday the 5 th . The Unknown Wife and Daughter are going to a neighbor's house for a little New Year's cheer (the non-alcoholic kind, since Unknown Wife is expecting), and then home by about 10. Here's hoping 2009 finds you healthy, prosperous, and happy.