Being a Customer

Microeconomics is way too early. At least, that’s how I felt this morning. But after going through (note, I did not say, “endure”) an hour or so of class, it was much better. When I walked out of Berkey Hall and crossed the street to wait for the bus, the sun came out and that made my day.

While waiting for the bus, Nick showed up. He was going to take the route #1 bus to get some groceries so we chatted a bit while waiting. Lucky for him, route #1 comes every ten, fifteen minutes so even though he came to the bus stop later than I did, he left way sooner. Oh well.

While we waited, we chatted about the classes this term and getting additional people for our study group. In macroeconomics, study groups are recommended, but however, only for groups of two or three. Our group had four. I emailed Dr. Doblas-Madrid regarding that issue and he said that we can’t have that many people per group, but he did say that we could form two groups of two and go from there. So the plan now is to get some “new blood” into our group and see what happens.

As for the rest of the day, had a bit of a nap. Later on in the evening, I compiled a list of the textbooks both required and recommended for this term, and went down to the basement to search for books that I’ve already owned.

As for the books that I have to purchase, buying online at Amazon.com is really neat. The marketplace is great. I got a book for $20.95 plus shipping for what would usually cost $60 (and that’s already with a slight discount). Nowadays, I don’t even check the university bookstore. Why? Because the prices are absurd, I have to wait in line, and their return policy sucks.

Another cool feature of Amazon.com is that when I looked at books that I have already bought, even though I didn’t quite remember it, Amazon “remembered” for me by putting a little notice on the top of the webpage, stating when I purchased it. That’s how I found out I already had some of the books and didn’t have to be a fool and spend money again on something that I’ve already owned. Now that’s a shopping experience that I clearly enjoyed.

On another note, a contrary commercial experience. Earlier on during the evening, I received a call from Dish Network regarding special promotions on digital channels. As often is the case, the sales rep had an accent (Indian) and couldn’t even pronounce my name. I would assume it was another outsourced call center doing business from beyond the borders. Regardless, the sales rep tried to encourage me to go for a package deal priced at $31.99 per month. Sure there are a lot of channels and stuff, but the price is still high; I conveyed that message and low and behold, that bastard hung up on me. I was furious.

And when I’m mad as hell, I talk. So I went upstairs, fired up the browser and went to the Dish Network’s website. I looked for their service phone number and called them. Once I was connected to a sales rep (this one clearly an American), I told her about my experience and expressed concern about the image that Dish Network was conveying with such business practices. She noted my concern and informed me that she (or the corporation) has received other such complaints and apologized for the bad experience. Then there was a bit of spin from her saying that the call could have came from a regional affiliate doing local promotions. Regardless of the situation, it’s still not good business practice. So after a bit of hem and haw, she asked me if there was anything that she could do. This is the time where I get free satellite for a year, but I don’t live anywhere near perfect, so I just told her, nothing and bid adieu.

Needless to say, I’ll be looking at DirectTV instead of Dish Network.

To Serve of Not

This entry is for yesterday, January 11, 2006. I was not able to post it in time due to extenuating circumstances.

This train of thought was brought on after viewing Alito’s hearing in the Senate. I happened upon the feed on CNN and the following is an excerpt of the dialogue between Graham and Alito:

http://lgraham.senate.gov/index.cfm?mode=presspage&id=250378

GRAHAM: … Are you really a closet bigot?

ALITO: I'm not any kind of a bigot, I'm not.

GRAHAM: No, sir, you're not. And you know why I believe that? Not because you just said it -- but that's a good enough reason, because you seem to be a decent, honorable man. I have got reams of quotes from people who have worked with you, African American judges -- I've lost my quotes. Judge Higginbotham -- I don't know where they're at. But glowing quotes about who you are, the way you've lived your life; law clerks, men and women, black and white, your colleagues who say that Sam Alito, whether I agree with him or not, is a really good man.

You know why I believe you when you say that you disavow those quotes? Because the way you have lived your life and the way you and your wife are raising your children.

Let me tell you this: Guilt by association is going to drive good men and women away from wanting to sit where you're sitting. And we're going to go through a bit of this ourselves as congressmen and senators.

People are going to take a fact that we got a campaign donation from somebody who's found out to be a little different than we thought they were -- and our political opponent's going to say, Aha, I got you!

And we're going to say, Wait a minute. I didn't know that. I didn't take the money for that reason.

And you know what? I'm going to believe these senators and congressmen for the most part, because that's the way we do our business. We meet people here every day. We have photos taken with people -- and sometimes you wish you didn't have your photo taken.

But that doesn't mean that you're a bad person because of that association.

Judge Alito, I am sorry that you've had to go through this. I am sorry that your family has had to sit here and listen to this.

End Excerpt.

I think it was when Graham commented on Alito’s personal character and presented other statements regarding his tenure that Alito’s wife lost it. She was in tears and had to leave before Graham finished his session.

And the statement “I am sorry that you've had to go through this. I am sorry that your family has had to sit here and listen to this.” basically sums up the entire notion of serving in public office.

As participants or perhaps a better word is “entities” of a society, I believe we have a moral duty to serve. However, when a person is willing to undertake his or her responsibilities to that society in the form of service, yet has to undergo such treatment, whether it’s loaded statements or pointed attacks at his or her own personal character and associations prior to and even after that service; or when it is vile and disgust comments made regarding his or her profession (usually happens to military personnel); not to mention, having the entire family under close scrutiny, it just seems that it is never worth it, at least to me.

But there are those who can look beyond such treatment and endure it with dignity and those are the people that form the pillars of society. Whether that is something that I am willing to do is a question I have yet no answer for.

On a lighter note, class was okay. In macroeconomics, we covered Arrow-Debreu and sequential market equilibriums in greater detail. We learned that the two equilibriums could be considered equivalent under certain conditions and that Arrow-Debreu could be used to solve sequential market equilibrium conditions due to it being more “solvable”.

As for the econometrics course, Dr. Schmidt continued on with the introduction of estimators and related material. He talked about the Best Linear Unbiased Estimator, or “BLUE” and other measures of estimation. Throughout the class, he cracked jokes on various things and quite a few of them were genuinely funny.

However, the class could be better enjoyed if I were in a better seat. I did arrive to class a bit early to get a better seat, but apparently almost everybody thought the same. As a result, I had to settle for row three on the side. Not that I had any hard time following the class (I can still read the blackboard fine), but it just didn’t feel “optimal”. I guess next time I’ll camp out or something.

Slow Start

The microeconomics class I have this term is very early. By that I mean the class starts at 08:30, which requires me to take the 08:00 bus (the #24 bus runs every 35 minutes); factor in the time of my morning routine, I’m looking at waking up around 07:00 every Tuesdays and Thursdays. Not that getting up at that particular time poses any problem; it’s just that with only one hour between waking up and walking out the door, things seem to be a bit more pressured and rushed.

Usually when I have class around 09:10 or so, I still wake up around seven o’clock, just to get a head start on things. With more time, I can take a leisurely shower; have a nice hot breakfast, like scrambled eggs and bacon with toast plus coffee… the whole works. I can even boot up the computer, check out the weather, the news (even read into the articles a bit more), check my email and all that. With the shorter time span, I’m forced to pick up the pace. Again, not that it’s such a big issue, but I only like to be pressured when I want to.

I guess in short what I’m trying to say that it’s way early.

As for the class itself, it’s taught by Dr. Jay Pil Choi. He’s from Korea. One thing that I noticed most about him was that when I was browsing his website, he had an interesting article regarding toilet seat etiquette. I’ll leave the end result for you to read.

The material we went over today was basically introductory monopoly and game theory stuff. Nothing too fancy or hard, just the basics. His accent is okay, and there isn’t that much of an issue when it comes to understanding him, so I’m thinking I should follow along quite nicely. Whether that translates to comprehension and a high course grade remains to be seen.

As for the rest of the day, I cleaned up the place (which is in dire need of a complete cleanup) and later on in the afternoon, I met with Kevin and ran some chores. I drove him over to the district library to pick up some books, and on the way back to his dorm, he got takeout for me so I didn’t have to cook. The chili is quite tasty, and a bit addictive, too. Oh yeah, I also brought over some stuff that he missed when he moved back to the dorms; nothing major, just small stuff. He also “made available” assets that were previously spent but were promised to return.

All in all, not a bad day with it being sunny and getting things done. I’ll try to pick up the pace on my studying and reach high gear next week.

New Semester, New Year, New Beginning

So classes began today. This time around, the math economics course will be taught in conjunction with the macroeconomics one. The very young professor for this class is Dr. Antonio Doblas-Madrid, a visiting faculty from Texas A&M. He explained that he had a dual last name; that “Doblas” is his father’s last name, and “Madrid” is that from his mother’s. I would presume it is custom of Spain. Did I mention he is Spanish? So, in order to prevent confusion, he has it hyphenated. He also said that after this year of visitation, he will become a faculty here. Cool.

As to the “young” part, yeah, he’s very young. Like “right-out-of-school” young. If records on the internet are to be believed, he has just recently received his PhD from University of Minnesota, as in year 2004.

Anyhow, personal information aside, so far he has been able to convey the course material in a manner that is easy to comprehend. That and his language is near impeccable. Hopefully, with all those conditions going for me, I’ll do much better in macroeconomics this term than the previous.

Prior to class, I chatted with Randy a bit. He had a very nice winter break, especially so because of the warm weather. He went back to Tennessee and according to him, the average temperatures were in the 60s, not to mention, it was sunny most of the time. Contrast that to here, and I can see why even animals migrate south. We had no snow during Christmas, which was quite a pity; then some seemingly random snow showers/flurries/hail/freezing rain that never really accumulated. And when there is no white stuff falling, it’s just gray. I can’t recall the last time I saw the night sky with stars. All in all, depressing weather.

During the break between the two classes (math & macro), I had the chance to talk to Nick a bit. He just arrived back on campus this morning around eight o’clock. His flight from London was delayed, and that resulted in him missing the train from Chicago back here to Lansing. He took the bus instead, which was five or six hours long all through the night. And the most impressive thing was that he didn’t look at all a bit tired.

After the morning class or classes, I went to the department lounge for lunch. This time I brought a ham & cheese sandwich plus a strawberry jelly (or is it jam?) sandwich. I also brought quite a few peanuts and filled up two water bottles to help everything go down. It seemed like a balanced meal, not to mention, the cost is killer. Gotta save the greenbacks when you can.

The afternoon econometrics class is taught by Dr. Peter J. Schmidt. He is one of which I would call the “heavyweights” of the department. He has written quite a few books, and for our class purposes, an econometrics book simply titled Econometrics.

His hand writing is a bit small and kind of hard to read, so come next class period, I’ll go for the second row, instead of the third. So far the class has been review so I can’t really say how it’s going to be. But again, hopefully I’ll learn all the econometrics I need (save EC 823 – Applied Econometrics) in my professional economics career from this class and this distinguished faculty member.

The title, which is a quote Kevin made just yesterday when I drove him back to his dorm, is what I should keep in mind for these couples of days and also the period leading to the countdown of the prelims. Not only is the mindset important, but also the work ethic that must follow. As for preparation for the prelims, If my sources are correct, the preliminary exams will be two weeks after class and finals, on May 15th and 16th, a Monday and Tuesday respectively. Given my current situation, such as the purchase of certain “assets” and for my own professional career, I must not and shall not fail.