No, I like talking about economics. Sometimes people have misconceptions about economic data and so it's useful to point out those misconceptions.

A number of people have asked me about this and I fully agree with Omari Sharif (@fcastofthemonth) who is the absolute dean of CPI analysis.

Actual rents appear to have slowed in Oct/Nov, but not unrealistically so - about the same rate they hit in Sept.

But OER (more on that to follow) plunged.

Okay I looked into this and I was initially open to it but the data doesn't look like it was a thing. See alt text for methodology but if Black Friday was skewing prices I would expect a very large sequential decline in this series and we didn't get it. IMO, Black Friday effects were very small.

reading the 1000 page William Buckley biography on the metro, shaking my head so people know I don’t approve of William Buckley

...to see what to do next. It was a terrifying moment for me. What little things might I do or say when my guard is down that could harm my children's development? Suddenly, the phrase "my Dad did the best he could," something I had said to my wife many times took on a whole new ominous meaning. 3/3

I totally understand anyone who says, "you should have realized that BEFORE you had a kid." I thought that I did. But the moment I mentioned was early in the morning, when I wasn't fully awake yet. I was rubbing my eyes, and turned to see my son rubbing his, then looking intently at me... 2/3

I was against the Fed cutting rates at the last meeting based on the information available at the time. Given this week's jobs report & inflation data, ex post the Committee made the right decision to cut rates.

But lots of uncertainty about what next, will need more data.