Its eight o’clock and I want to watch TV. The Olympics, along with some obscure and nearly unwatchable sports, are gone and back is the regular television schedule. Unfortunately, on the second night on Olympics free television I’ve found that everything that I want to watch has been preempted by the Democratic National Convention. Hillary is jabbering at the moment about blue collared Americans - she hasn’t really mentioned wall street employees and members of the financial sector - how odd for a Democrat to make such a major gaffe. Uh oh… here comes the let’s think about the children line. What a trite and tired line - I love politics but come on. This is why I love the internet. I can get a full transcript of this speech in a couple of hours when I’ll have the time to properly dissect it. Most of us are only watching this because there is nothing else on at the moment - we really don’t care. In fact, the overwhelming majority of us are already decided and only a minority can be considered swing voters. As a swing voter I think they’re making a mistake. They really don’t want to piss off a potential voter by preempting my regular television schedule. It’s time to pack it up DNC - go to bed - I’ve got some TV to watch.
If you’ve been paying attention - we’re paying more for many of the things that we use daily. The rising cost of oil impacts the cost of transportation, consumer goods, and food. Companies are trying to cut costs wherever possible while trying to retain the most talented and hardworking individuals. Some would blame the war for our economy that is in a downturn. Everything is linked - I read a few articles and found myself hitting CTRL-B five times and I thought it was worth sharing. Each is tied to the other; lets hope that I can explain what I mean.
According to recent polls many Americans have stated that they have felt that it has been much harder to “get ahead.” Our standards of “ahead” have changed since the days when my father was growing up in the 60’s. I’m going to guess that getting an education, having shelter, a good family life, and something (anything except mustard greens) to eat. Times were tough but if you were to persevere you could make a better life for the next generation and hopefully yourself in the process. Now we demand consumer goods as a measure of how well we are doing. Measures of American success include an car (or two), a house, high speed internet, and cable TV. Without these things many believe that they are failing in the race to get ahead. We’re demanding more than ever while overlooking the basics. I’m going to go out on a limb but maybe we should be looking for a little less - check out the full text at the Washington Post.
Some who claim they are having trouble would point the finger at the ever rising costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the increasing price of gasoline. While the cost of the war far exceeds most if not all of the original estimates we’ve paid for most of it with credit. Its been added to our national debt and will probably remain for years to come - the price of oil is increasing rapidly due to increased consumption in America and in south east Asia in places like China and India. Companies outside of OPEC control have made few if any significant discoveries in recent years. It takes a considerable amount of time to find a sizable cache of carbon deposits, negotiate drilling rights, and remove them for refining and delivery. Simply put, even if there are reserves available we may not find them before demand outstrips supply. We have plenty of oil to last for the next 20 years but there has been rampant speculation of what will happen if consumption continues to increase at the current rates. If we cannot find additional reserves we might have a problem - we might find ourselves in a global energy crisis. (I hate the word crisis because I feel as if I am on a cable news network where EVERYTHING is a crisis). The futures market has seen this and that is why we are experiencing the recent increase in oil prices - sure - they could have seen this years ago but its happening now. I wonder if they took off their rose colored glasses at some point in the last two years and saw the error of their ways - the end result of their revelation is that we’re paying for it.
We can do our part to consume less but its going to take a concentrated effort. If we were to determine car insurance premiums based upon the number of miles that we drive we could leverage our savings against those who drive everywhere. They would be forced to consume less simply because they would be unable to afford all of the driving. Enacting immediate changes in MPG requirements and subsidizing companies that reduce consumption while taxing those that use heavily could help. The economic impact of such a decision can hardly be measured by me, but, it’s on the table.
Everything is tied together - change is going to impact our ability to “get by” and may impact our quality of life. We cannot continue to increase consumption at current rates or we are going to see a bubble - a big bubble - and only the those with the most resources in the end will be able to survive.
Most of you suffered through the television writers strike - that is, if you’re the type of person that watches television. Late night shows were struck hard as they had to rely on the creativity of the host to get some laughs. One of my favorite late night hosts is Conan O’Brien - he’s just silly - and he makes me laugh. I can’t give you an overall synopsis of the writing during the writer’s strike because I simply don’t know. But, I can show you this clip because there was some comedy gold during the strike. Watch, enjoy, and laugh.
There has not been much going one these days. Saturday John and I went to a very nice dinner. We ate at Salty’s on Alki and it was the best place I’ve ever been to. The food was amazing, and the chocolate cake, to die for. I got my wish of a window seat and it was an amazing view of the Seattle skyline at sundown. I had a great time.
I’ve been feeling sick this week.l I guess it’s that time of year for the cold bug to make it’s way around to everyone. This has resulted in me not wanting to do much. So John and I get to spend time doing what all Americans love to do, watch T.V. On Mondays we watch Chuck, Heros, and Journeyman while recording 2.5 Men, How I met your Mom and Big Bang Theory. Then Tuesdays we watch Beauty and the Geek, House and Eureka. Wednesday I have Gossip Girl, Pushing Daises, Bionic Woman, and ‘Till Death. Then we have Thursdays we have Smallville, CSI and Survivor China. And to finish it off on Friday, we have Friday Night Lights.
So as you can see we devote most of our time to T.V. Thank God for DVR.
So, I ordered a new PC case to go with all of the components that cram my current case. As it stands now, I barely have enough room to get it all inside the case. So, I’ve bought one of the biggest cases on the market and I thought about leaving it plain… then I started thinking about what I could do to it. What would be cool to geeks and non-geeks alike… how about a case based upon a cult classic 1980’s T.V. show starring none other than Mr. T…. how about an A-Team case? I don’t want to drop a ton of money into modding it so I’m thinking a few red cathode tubes on the inside, an A-Team logo cut into the side of the case, some bullet holes, and a red stripe like the van had on the side (the case is black). I’m definitely going to do quite a few mock-ups and sketches before I bring out the dremel tool. This could be interesting…..
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