| August 31st, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon Lessons in Parenting Yesterday, a man in Bakersfield, California gave a 40mm military shell to a group of children to play with. The shell exploded, killing two children and injuring at least five others. This comes on the heels of Liz and David Carroll Jr.'s arraignment on charges they killed their 3-year-old foster son Marcus Fiesel, and then hatched an elaborate two-week hoax to avoid suspicion. Naturally, the Carrolls pleaded not guilty to charges of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of child endangering, making false alarms and two counts of inducing panic. And this just in... A RadioShack in Texas apparently used email to fire around 400 workers as part of planned job cuts. Employees at the Fort Worth headquarters received messages Tuesday morning that read: "The work force reduction notification is currently in progress. Unfortunately your position is one that has been eliminated." At least when ZoomTown was dispanded in 2001, we got severance pizza. See you all later; I'm going to move to Pluto where its safer. | ||
| August 24th, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon Pluto Needs Male Enhancement Apparently, size does matter. In a move that sparks debate amongst astronomers everywhere (and prompted me to finally throw away my now-inaccurate 5th grade Science Fair project), the International Astronomical Union (a few members, of which, actually DID go to their Prom) voted Pluto off the planetary island. Sadly, Pluto's size and oblong orbit no longer meet the new definition of "planet", which prompted a spokesperson for Pluto to respond with, "From this point forward, Pluto will now be known only as  ...or more simply, "The Planet Formerly Known
as Pluto". Michael Brown of the California Institute of Technology was pleased by the decision after arguing that Pluto and similar
bodies didn't deserve planet status, saying that would "take the magic out of the solar system." Let's just hope nobody gets crazy
and decides to kick Pluto out of Disney, as that would take the magic out of the Kingdom.The biggest impact of this decision, however, is felt amidst the mnemonics community, who now have to come up with new ways to teach children how to memorize the planets in order. Popular phrases such as "My Very Excellent Mother Just Sent Us Nine Pizzas" and "My Very Easy Method Just Simplifies Us Naming Planets" are now left without their clever endings. What will my very excellent mother bring us now?! Nothing?! That sounds quite less than excellent. Next thing you know, people will start wondering if Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain, or if Big Elephants Can Always Understand Small Elephants. It's pure madness, I tell you... | ||
| August 23rd, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon Sign of the Times Paul Daugherty is a Cincinnati Enquirer sports columnist and has chronicled Cincinnati sports since 1988. I love this quote from his editorial today:
While he was talking specifically about the Cincinnati Reds' decision to not renew Steve Stewart's play-by-play contract, I couldn't help but draw some parallels to other events and conversations of late. Strong... | ||
| August 22nd, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon Experiments in Bovine Nutrition I figured adding two cubes of frozen wheatgrass to my morning coffee was an easy way to get my daily dose of vegetable-type substance. In doing so, I secretly hoped the resulting beverage would no longer have the bitter, stale after-taste of the bulk, store-brand coffee, but rather possess a smoother, earthy, nutty taste similar to the Sulawesi or Sumatra from Starbucks. Instead, it tasted like grass. Expensive grass, of course, but grass nonetheless. Yet another reason I'm happy I'm not a cow. | ||
| August 21st, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon FOUR?! Happy birthday, Kelsey! | ||
| August 17th, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon If It Doesn't Fit, You Must Acquit Police in Bangkok charged 41-year-old John Mark Karr with the death of JonBenet Ramsey. The arrest will likely dispel the cloud of suspicion hanging over JonBenet's parents ever since the girl's death on Dec. 26, 1996. And somewhere, in a celebrity golf tournament halfway across the world, O.J. is signing autographs and telling people, "See? I told you so!" | ||
| August 16th, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon August and Everything After... I need a muse. A friend of mine said that, depending on my creative need, the appropriate one will appear, or I could go into the woods and light a candle. But with the way things are going of late, I'd burn down the entire forest. Perhaps the way to the muse's attention is not to wish for one in particular, though I've a few folks I'd like to turn into crows. (*singing* "Fussing and flapping in priestly black, like a murder of crows...") Hmmm...that makes it sound like I need a witch, not a muse. But which witch? Perhaps a sandwich? A lightswitch? The wicked witch who stitches her riches, but snitched about getting hitched in Poe Ditch? Guess it depends on which niche we pitch for said witch. Reminds me of a story my brother and his college friends wrote years ago, which began with "When the light bulb burned out, Johnny began to pout." Why is the light bulb on when its snowing outside? | ||
| August 8th, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon got gas? BP said it discovered corrosion in the transit lines and has to replace most of the 22 miles of pipeline at Prudhoe Bay. That line produces around 2.6% of the nation's daily crude oil supply, most of which goes to refineries in Washington, California and Hawaii. This begs the rhetorical question of, "If a crude oil pipeline in Alaska corrodes and needs repairs, why do gas prices in Ohio immediately jump 50-cents per gallon?"
The pipeline from Alaska's North Slope imports crude oil to the west coast. Most of the
United States oil reserves reach the midwest and east coast via the pipelines in Louisiana and Texas - not the pipeline from Alaska...primarily because there IS no pipeline from Alaska into the United States. The crude oil is loaded onto small boats, which then pass through the Panama Canal and into southern California. Sounds expensive, right? It is. So is that the driving factor behind the price increase? Maybe...depends on who you ask. If you ask me, it seems the Big Oil folks look for any opportunity to make an extra dollar.
The government has about 700 million barrels in storage on the Gulf Coast to be used in case of a serious supply disruption. Each
barrel of oil contains 42 gallons, which yields 19 to 20 gallons of gasoline. In the United States, something like 178 million
gallons of gasoline are consumed every day...an average of 20 million barrels of oil per day (bbl/d, according to the
Department of Energy). If you do the math, that means
the reserves will last about a month. BP expects the repairs to this pipeline to last anywhere from 1-2 months.
Thing is, contrary to what you hear on the news every day, the price of crude oil is not the sole driving factor behind gas prices.
The cost of refining the crude oil, distribution, marketing, and taxes also determine the price of gasoline at the pump. Granted,
the cost of crude oil determines more than half the price per gallon, but the remaining 40% or so is the overhead. Consider this
pretty chart from the Department of Energy: 
And you thought I was joking about the yacht? | ||
| August 7th, 2006... | ||
|
Posted by: Zoon Fight the Bull Download Bullfighter and start using actual substance in your writing instead of jargon. |