and now, we wait

I haven't seen the Dallas population this nervous in awhile .. not since last winter when there was a prediction of two (2) inches of snow.

Traffic seemed lighter than usual when I dropped a friend at DFW this morning, although TXDOT's freeway message signs are flashing "AVOID TRAVEL TO HOUSTON AND BEAUMONT / TEXAS HURRICANE WARNING". The grocery store parking lots aren't full, although we should be getting some of the wind and rain by this time tomorrow, unless The Weather Gal changes her mind as to Hurricane Ike's projected path.

So far, I've learned two new TXDOT terms due to Ike: evaculane (road shoulders wide and smooth enough to be used as a travel lane during times of significant traffic congestion) and contraflow (opening all lanes for outbound traffic).

Unrelated deep thought: what do you call a person from Zimbabwe? A Zimbabwiccan?

first victim of new Dallas City Council policy?

Just thirty days ago, I predicted it wouldn't be long before someone dies as a result of the recent Dallas City Council vote to tow vehicles if they're uninsured. Today, this article landed on the local paper's website:

A woman died this morning after she drove off the road while fleeing during a traffic stop, Dallas police said. Lillian Volk was pulled over around 3 a.m. in the 18100 block of Preston Road and sped away in a 2003 blue Ford pickup before receiving her ticket, according to police.

The officer did not chase her but found her vehicle about 10 blocks away in the 17000 block of Preston Road where she had driven off the road, struck several trees and flipped over, Dallas police Senior Cpl. Kevin Janse. Ms. Volk was pronounced dead at the scene, according to the Dallas County medical examiner's office. A cause of death was not immediately available.

Coincidence? It will be interesting to see if Ms. Volk had insurance, or if this was caused by something else (warrants, blood alcohol, drugs, etc.) Sadly, she's dead so she won't be able to provide her side of the story except via autopsy, or a media reporter who's willing to do some digging.

why Bubba can't analyze

Once again, an article in the local newspaper proves to me that the disparaging name "Dallas Managed News" is wholly appropriate.

Today, they printed an article titled "Plane, train, car or bus: What's the best way to go on your summer trip?". The premise sounded like an interesting experiment: send four people from Dallas to Austin (about 200 miles) in time to attend an 11am meeting, then return. Had they not proceeded to compare apples-to-kumquats, they might have succeeded. Once done with their inadequate comparison, they proclaimed that even though gasoline is ~$4/gallon, it's cheaper to drive than to plane, train or bus your way to Austin. I'm half-betting this article was funded by the Texas Oil Producers Federation (or whatever name they're hiding behind), because their conclusion was dead wrong - by a factor of two.

Honestly, where do these people get their education - a Texas Home School? Anyone who has ever taken a class in costing (I did that in 1982 or so) would understand this easily. Rather than make a fair comparison, The Managed News went out of their way to avoid defining their methodology, and the hurdles they faced (example: trains run only once every 3 days; buses run twice/day; airlines have 8 flights/day). Had they done their job, they would have easily reached the correct (and obvious) conclusion: the bus is the cheapest way to get around.

	car	bus	train	air	conclusion
paper's total	$60	$96	$432	$223	train is most expensive
round trip time	7:39	7:00	17:00	6:55
transportation only	$60	$64	$62	$160	reality: air is most expensive, all others about the same
assumptions	you own a car	free transportation to the bus station	free transportation to the train station; you must spend two nights at a downtown hotel	free transportation to the airport (although they did stipulate $10 to park)	they assume everyone owns a car, or has free transportation to the choice of conveyance
what they should have done	factor the IRS' 2008 Standard Mileage Rates - 50.5¢/mile for business
changed outcome	$202	$111	$97 (due to infrequent train schedule, hotel is needed)	$238	bus is cheapest
I assumed an equidistant 30 mile commute to the alternate transportation, which added about $15 to each mode.

Bottom line: the article left me with more questions than answers:

• Did they get the best deals on public transportation by buying 21 days in advance?
• Why did they choose a "downtown hotel" for the train - was that cheaper than alternatives?
• Was there a way to optimize the meeting time so that only one hotel night was needed for the train option?
• What about mixing modes? (e.g. taking the train but returning on the bus. Since the three alternates already included taxi fares, this shouldn't have been a stretch).
• What was the Carbon Footprint for the various modes? (to their credit, they touched on this by showing that the train was least efficient with fuel and the bus was most efficient)
• Why did four people travel in the car, and only one in the other modes?
• Why the variation in lobby wait times for air travel; train; bus?
• What was the price of the "free car" they used for the automobile mode?
• Did they consider renting a car?
• Was there free parking at the meeting site?

Many of the problems I had with the article relate to normalizing the data. Certainly, there are issues of scale .. you can't hire a train for one person, and demand that only one car be used to reduce fuel usage. Ditto for the air travel - why didn't they compare a regional jet versus the (Southwest Airlines) 737? You get the idea.

And yes, let's talk about issues such as personal safety at the bus station; the risk of terrorism at the airport; the impact on societal isolation when travelling by car .. there are a host of things left unconsidered. Maybe they were just trying to save on newspaper ink - that's the only success I spotted.

DFW thanks NYC and ORD

There's a lovely article in Forbes magazine: "America's Most Time-Draining Airports" .. which ranks 100 US airports on delays. Apparently it's based on 2007 Bureau of Transportation statistics.

Good news: DFW is less delay-prone than the three (3) NYC* airports (LGA JFK EWR) and the country's worst: Chicago O'Hare. After that, it's all downhill for the local "big airport", beaten handily by six other airports in Texas. There's a direct correlation with the amount of traffic, so none of this surprises me:

12. ELP - El Paso
46. DAL - Dallas Love Field
58. HOU - Houston Hobby
59. AUS - Austin Bergstrom
61. SAT - San Antonio
80. IAH - Houston Bush Intercontinental
96. DFW - Dallas/Ft. Worth

The lower the number, the less likely you were to encounter delays in 2007, so says Forbes.

* multisearch is a truly wonderful thing. Pity there are only a handful (5) of these in the USA (CHI; NYC; QDF; QHO; WAS)

Forbes used seven (7) criteria to achieve their rankings:

• Security-related delays
• Late-aircraft-related delays
• National-Aviation-System-related delays
• Cancellation-related delay
• Carrier-related delay
• Weather-related delay
• Percentage of flights arriving on time
• Percentage of flights departing on time

To be sure, there are other airports in Texas, but they're smaller than any of those listed above. No offense intended: AMA; CRP; GLS; HRL; LBB and MAF.

death sentences handed out by Dallas City Council

Earlier this week, the Dallas City Council handed out am unknown number of death sentences, to begin in January 2009. The most likely victims will be innocent, living in the poor parts of town, but .. they'll all be random and it could happen to anyone.

Okay, so The Council didn't hand out the sentences directly; this is the result of Unforeseen Consequences Legislation. For me, this is a no-brainer but that's probably because I have the audacity to Think Before Voting.

These upcoming death sentences are due to a combination of two laws: one already on the books and the other (apparently) coming in January. It's already well publicized that the Dallas Police [DPD] have a "no chase policy" which forbids them from commencing a chase if it would endanger citizens. Now, add the new 2009 rule which will force the towing of any vehicle being operated without insurance (estimates of 10% come to mind) and the race is on.

What will happen is that the DPD will attempt to pull over someone for a minor traffic violation - broken tail light, for example. The driver, knowing that she has no insurance, will envision her car (the only means of getting to work, grocery, etc) taken away if she is stopped. She also knows (word travels fast) that the DPD won't stop her if she goes into Massive Evasion Mode, so .. she takes off at a high rate of speed. Being new at this Evasive Mode Thing, she hits/kills a pedestrian, or (more commonly) T-bones into a small 4-door sedan and kills the occupants. Thanks to the Dallas City Council, this is exactly what to expect in early 2009.

Sure, in a perfect world I'd like to see everyone insured, too. I think the fairest way is to incorporate minimal insurance (think: Liability) in the price of gasoline. Yes, gas prices will rise slightly, but this will be mitigated by the slight reduction of insurance premiums for the 90% of us who are financially responsible. And it won't subject the rest of us to an out-of-control motorist whose only crime is that she chose to buy food for her family instead of liability insurance.

Go ahead, regulate my day

After reading Geoff's narrative "Heathrow works, Chicago sucks, Edam isn’t" I'm prone to muse about a conversation I had with Judy-Bob recently, regarding the possible return of regulation to the US airline business. I don't recall flying (much?) before the Airline Deregulation Act became law in 1978. Apparently it was implemented in stages.

What would regulation entail? Simply, the airlines would be told what routes to fly, and at what price. Given existing passenger demand, the airlines would have to accommodate the traffic, rather than creating it via incentives (long gone are the $99 LAX-NYC flights, with free-flowing champagne and gourmet meals).

Southwest wouldn't have more of a price advantage than American Airlines, but the former would probably be less profitable since they'd have to deviate from their short hop mantra (locally .. who wants to endure the grief of DFW airport when you can enjoy yourself at DAL (Love Field)? Then again, American still finds it impossible to turn a plane in less than an hour, while Southwest has the twenty (20) minute turn down to a science.

Regulation/deregulation isn't something that can be turned on or off like a switch, but I suspect that's due to incompetence more so than feasibility. Let's assume the FAA mandates the return to regulation on 1.1.2010 .. this would give everyone more than enough time to plan the routes, sell the tickets, staff the facilities, etc.

One comment J-B made astounded me: "there are seldom more than 28 different fares on any given flight". Twenty eight?? In the regulated days, there were apparently four ticket prices on a given flight: First Class, Full-Fare Coach and two (2) discounted coach fares. Why the airlines have so many different fares has been written about ad nauseum, but I still find the number 28 absurdly high .. complexity leading to increased cost and all that rot. Certainly, there's a subset of the public who takes great glee in excavating the lowest possible fare between points (using the airline's own silly rules* against them) but I suspect they're truly in the obscure minority.

* hidden city fares come to mind as one example

Honestly, I can't see the return to regulation in my lifetime. The US air travel system is so horribly broken (with enough politics to make even Karl Christian Rove go batty) that it cannot be fixed. Ever.

PS to Geoff: regulation would most certainly not fix ORD (Chicago O'Hare). Suggest you hub through CVG (Cincinnati) in the future, when making the LHR-SEA run.

Garland Goes Green

Earlier today I waddled over to Garland, to see their Garland Goes Green event. As I suspected, it wasn't huge .. but not bad for a suburb (as well as a way to showcase their sprawling Firewheel Town Center Mall).

One of the more entertaining things was a rare Corbin Sparrow -- an all-electric three-wheeled one-person vehicle, owned by a Garland resident who drives it every day. (more details here: John Brecher's 2002 Corbin Sparrow). What remains of the company that made this car is now online at MyersMotors.com, although the $35K+ price tag will scare off all but the most determined tree-hugger.

The Sparrow was part of a three-car display by the North Texas Electric Auto Association, which is a group of guys who learn about (and convert to) electrically powered cars. I had a nice chance to chat with them for about 15 minutes, learning about the various challenges faced by someone who wants to forgo gasoline-powered vehicles .. in Texas. The 30-mile range is a definite handicap, and I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of an encounter with a Chevy Suburban. Still .. since Dallas is not really in Texas .. it fills a niche.

More: EV Album: Electric Vehicle Photo Album

Obama in Dallas

At least once in my lifetime, I decided I should attend a political rally. Today was the day: Democratic candidate Barack Obama visited Dallas and spoke to a capacity crowd at Reunion Arena in Dallas.

Reunion Arena is where the Dallas Stars and Mavericks used to play, before the American Airlines Center opened. Now, it's relegated to a few weeks a year (concerts).

I took the DART train to Union Station (about a half mile walk from Reunion Arena), arriving at 10:30am -- then later heard that people started arriving at 4:30am, to be at the front of the line. By the time I arrived,the End of The Line was on the fourth floor of the adjoining parking structure. It reminded me of a bad (read: typical) day at Disneyland, where the line to any ride is often 1-2 hours long. And then, when we got to a certain point, the 6-across line turned into a single-file mad dash for the door, several blocks away (by then, there was no security to be seen).

Update (Friday):
Secret Service defends security at Obama rally in Dallas

"Capacity" is listed as somewhere between 16,626-19,000 depending on configuration, so I'm not sure how many people were there .. but I do know the Fire Marshall was turning some people away (there were people on the return train telling of their experience). In front of the stage was a tightly-packed standing section, with the TV cameras elevated behind them. Then there were 22 tables setup for the press (presumably) in front of a large "no man's land" on the arena floor.

Most of us were seated in the arena seats, above the floor. Here's the (zoom lens) view from my seat, so high up that I could touch the ceiling of the arena. At least the JumboTron was working.

Since the NBA was routinely able to seat 17,000 people in Reunion Arena in under an hour (for many years) it's obvious to me this "line around the building and waaaaay into the parking lot" was done to look good to the cameras (TV news helicopters hovering overhead, and still photographers carefully placed to make the crowd look more energized than actual).

next Smart stop: Austin

The Smart Car Roadshow is in Dallas this weekend (Mockingbird Station), so I waddled down to take the car for a quick spin. Sadly, that's about all I got, as they're cranking up to 500 people/day through the five (5) cars they have available for test (four Passion models and one Cabriolet).

First reaction: at $13,590 it's almost like having a disposable car (compared to my normal wheels - a completely unfair comparison). While standing in line, they show you the Crash Test Video which is a must-see, especially here in Texas where F350s and soccer-mom-powered SUVs have a tendency to tailgate with abandon.

The Smart US models have a 33 liter (8.7 gallon) fuel tank, which gives it a 300 mile range, more or less. The engine is a 3-cylinder, 1-liter gasoline powered engine. Don't expect the G-forces to whip your neck off, but for a city car .. I'd buy one. If nothing else, because they're Just So Dern Cute.

UPS: $45. UPS battery: $1030

Tuesday afternoon, I bought a very expensive UPS battery, although that wasn't the plan.

After the Nth power outage this year (queue thunderbolt) I decided to replace the battery in one of my Uninterruptable Power Supplies, since it was only giving me about 5 minutes before shutting down the system (the others give me at least 15 minutes each). So, deciding that the light rain wasn't bad, I proceeded to drive west on Beltline and fetch a replacement from Batteries+. Big mistake. I should've gone to any of their other locations. Why?

Well, at the same time I was driving (35 mph limit area) so was one of those F250s pulling a welded-metal gardener's cart. He's in the left lane, I in the center, and .. well .. BOOM! My driver's side window just exploded - no warning. I can only guess that his Gardener's Cart veered into my lane, or he opened fire. Fortunately (tempered safety glass) I wasn't cut or injured, but

1. my car door was gored;
2. my mirror destroyed; and
3. my window was GONE

Shaken, I tried to find a parking lot to pull into, hoping that the gardener would follow. He didn't. Technically, this is what's called a Hit And Run. The next day, I called the Addison TX Police, hoping there may have been a witness who got his license number - no such luck.

So, being only about 2 blocks from the battery store, I collected my nerves and got that %^&* replacement battery ($30). It was then that I opened the door and saw the 6-inch gash in the side of my car, and realized that this could've been much worse. Being 5pm on the day before a holiday, I had to wait two days to see the repair guys (I'd already called my insurance company to obtain The Procedure). I have a $1000 deductible, so that'll be my out-of-pocket cost. My last accident was in 1992 when I lived in Los Angeles, so I've forgotten some of the Subtle Nuances in the ensuing 15 years.

The repair guys say this will take 10 days and ~$3100 to fix. Happy happy joy joy?

playing with DICE

After mowing the grass yesterday morning ("there's no local storage on a lawnmower") I decided to push (!) the car out of the garage and install The iPod Connector. This will only be the second (probably last) modification I make to the car. Soon after I bought it in 2001, I installed a factory alarm system (mostly plugging into the existing wiring), although much disassembly/reassembly was required. This time would prove similar.

(rewind about 4 weeks)

Most of the iPod<->CarAudio devices use a weak FM transmitter, but I wanted one that integrated well with the steering-wheel controls, so this meant stringing cables. I looked around at the local retailers, but only found übercheap stuff - few of them stock anything of quality since Most Americans Only Want Cheap, Not Good.

After asking around (the local car club was useful, as always), I opted for the iPod Car Integration Kit from DICE Electronics. A few weeks ago I bought the stuff from Bavarian Soundwerks in Atlanta, and it's been sitting on my kitchen table waiting for an opportunity.

Their 15-step instructions were mostly helpful, and I had everything done in an hour or so .. although I had to cheat a bit since the last step involved testing my iPod (which has local storage) with the stereo.

Next, it was time to install the spec.dock (from a company called 2point5™); this mostly low-tech gadget allows me to dock my iPod into the ashtray space, rather than leave the iPod inside the glove compartment, or (worse) dangling from a cable. The instructions from 2point5 weren't as good as for the DICE module, and this resulted in the two Band-Aids adhesive bandages now on my fingers. Once I began interpreting the directions instead of following them, things became much easier.



This morning, I made the Annual Pilgrimmage to Carl's Jr. (a west-coast QSR chain that is replicated at the Love's Truck Stops here in Texas) and played with my new toy en route. It sounds great, absent a few odd clicking sounds that may be part of The Learning Curve. Since it ties into the CD changer/amplifier in the trunk, it requires pressing [CD] twice to activate it, then the radio buttons [1-6] to do things like "select next album" (button 3) or "select next playlist" (button 2).

no victory at Victory

Check another "thing I've never done before" off the list: I rendezvoused with a DART train (34°F on the platform) so that Jill-Bob and I could ride to a Dallas Stars game. Following her directions closely, I allowed a Red Line train to pass, then hopped onto the one which goes directly to Victory Station at the American Airlines Center. Voila!

Here's the view of the rink from our seats in section 312:


The only one doing any scoring (the Stars lost 0-2) was Jill-Bob, who scored a free Chipotle burrito coupon:

from the Chipotle blimp (doing acrobatics a few feet above our heads):

Jill-Bob was entertained by the guys from a local radio station (the "Jack FM Speedo Team"):

while I was entertained by the Dallas Stars Ice Girls. I wonder if they make house calls? I have some snow that needs shoveling too!

Aside: one of the advertisers was Yet Another Energy Drink : HAVOC. Isn't that market (pardon the pun) oversaturated?

either way, it's still $20

I typically use a tire (tyre, to you Brits) pressure gauge in the car, when I remember to check the air. Often that's about once a month, unless I notice the car's a bit sluggish taking a corner.

So, when it came time to replace a front floor mat, I spotted (nearby) an acceptable price on a set of Indicator Valve Caps for the tires (Tire Check, by Kleen Wheels). Now, as I'm approaching my parked car, I can glance down and see when one/more of my tires has lost enough air to merit a stop at the air pump. The indicator is difficult to master: green=good and red=bad. Golly, I hope I can remember this. The set of four was $20.

Speaking of air, I recently asked the "experts" about the trend of some car service places to fill tires with nitrogen instead of "plain air". The merchants claim that the nitrogen molecules are larger, and hence won't leak as fast. For $20 (i.e. $5/tyre) that should be true, but my local experts say it's basically a marketing ploy (i.e. "crap"). Maybe if I was driving a racecar around Texas Motor Speedway, but not on the way to the market.

The DecaPlane Plot: overreaction

Okay, there's no need to rehash The DecaPlane Plot: you can read about it on every major news website. Suffice it to say that there's a lot of overreaction at the moment.

Nearly all of the stuff that TSA is confiscating from carryon luggage will turn out to be benign. I question the decision to ban all amounts of liquids - an ounce or two of nail polish here, an ounce of two of mouthwash there. The fact that the same liquids may be stowed in the hold of the plane (presumably with a timer or pressure-sensitive detonator) means they haven't thought this through. The last time al Qaeda tried this apparently involved larger bottles of explosive disguised as contact lens solution (much larger bottles).

I'm incredibly ignorant of explosives - but doesn't it stand to reason that a certain minimum amount of this stuff would be needed to blow a widebody jet out of the sky? I've heard that small amounts of C4 explosive can be used, but suspect those fancy detection machines can sniff out trace amounts of that. I've watched the TSA guys swab the handles of my laptop bag, place it in a tester and wait for the green light.

This strikes me as about as effective as banning nail clippers from flights, unless there's a new model which can clip its way through those reinforced cockpit doors.

Maybe the next step will be to fly the passengers luggage on a cargo flight 30 minutes ahead of the passenger plane, and not have it onboard at all? Conceivably it would also contain everyone's shoes, PDAs and Personal Liquids.

Also, since both an explosive and detonator (reconfigured iPod, etc) are needed, it stands to reason that if all liquids are banned, then portable electronics can be (re)permitted? -- what good is a detonator without something to detonate? Don't I recall hearing that El Al (Israel's airline) has a long list of the precise weights of Personal Electronic Devices? If a laptop is too heavy or too light, it merits further inspection. If not, I suspect there will be a lot of really bored passengers crossing The Big Pond, unless the quality of the movies improves substantially.

to hell in a handbasket

whatever happened to whitewall tires?

why don't dimebags cost $10 anymore?

why did "crew cuts" go out of style (except in Alabama)?

A few days ago, I was driving around and suddenly (!) noticed how very few tires have whitewalls anymore. When I was growing up (in the 19th Century) people who drove "blackwalls" were frowned upon, since they couldn't afford the oh-so-chic whitewalls. Now, I see an occasional truck with white lettering on the tires ("tyres" if you're a Brit) but only aging Oldsmobiles and Plymouths have whitewalls.

This is obviously yet another sign (besides the continued popularity of Pat Robertson; Rick Perry and Tom DeLay) of why this country's gone to hell in a handbasket (a phrase used by GOPhers when they're talking to Like Minded [White] Folk).

Surely there must be other obvious Handbasket Signs that I no longer notice, now that've become commonplace, I suspect even the phrase itself is a Sign (as some Older Folk still say H-E-double Hockey Stick rather than say The Word, since its mere utterance will condemn them to an eternity of damnation). Er, tarnation.

still sneezing after all these years

I must be getting used to the allergens quickly. I was driving around Dallas with the sunroof open, and whatever's floating around (looks like the same stuff from earlier in the week) didn't bother me today. Hmmm.

Today's allergy levels for DALLAS, TX: Thursday - 11.1/High
Today's predominant pollen: Cedar/Juniper, Oak and Hackberry

(thanks to pollen.com for the daily update)

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spotted at a building in Santa Clara, California:
What's with the bias against irregular steps, anyway? Is that why they are chained off?

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What's that? Did I update the Sundry on Thursday blog for your web surfing pleasure? You bet! How hard can it be?

ah-choo!

One of the joys of living in Dallas is dealing with allergies.

"I didn't used to have them until I moved here"

is a common overhearance. Yesterday, I woke to a massive headache (pretty rare for me). A couple hours later, I was driving the big, white porcelain bus* and not much of a happy camper. I've never been tested for allergies; I suspect most people are allergic to something.

One of my former co-workers is allergic to everything but water and noodles; go figure. Eventually, the meds (Tylenol) kicked in and I was able to function like a normal Human (more or less) and today's not nearly as bad. I don't normally stock allergy medicine; in the past the OTC stuff I've bought has expired before I used more than one or two tablets. Guess I should see an allergist; I'm curious what they'll tell me.

* vomiting

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Unrelated: I was at a meeting last night at someone's home, and the phone rang 3 times in one hour. Each time it was the Republican Dialing Machine, whose sole purpose in life is to annoy The Living Shi'ite out of us. I stopped counting when I got more than 2 dozen calls in 3 days. The subject swiveled to Rick Perry (a/k/a Governor PrettyHair) and I was shocked to hear the three others agree that he's a mental vacuum. Two of us (at least) are planning to sit out today's primary election, so that we can sign Kinky Friedman's petition. The only word that comes to mind: WOW.

road trip : day two

My aunt and I met with the funeral director this morning, and everything's in motion. The next available day for a funeral is Monday, so now we'll simply notify everyone, and wait.

This smalltown funeral home handles about 90 funerals a year, and (Murphy's Law) now they have four scheduled in four days.

Long ago, we decided it would be best to hold two services: one in Mississippi (mom's side of the family) and another in Kentucky (dad's side, where she lived for 42 years). So, we'll hold one Monday morning here in Grenada MS and another the next afternoon in Louisville KY. The cost to transport mom is about equal (flying versus driving) so we opted to use ground transportation. Mom always hated the idea of flying, anyway.

the pinnacles of success

Maybe it's because the servers are overloaded, but I couldn't get a decent download of any podcast Wednesday. I've been playing with iTunes & Podcasts for a few days, but honestly ... pig vomit in North Dakota in February runs faster than this. Several days ago, the podcast downloads were nicely quick .. not so anymore.

If there was a rational way to blame SBC's DSL speed on the sub-32 temperatures (Fahrenheit : a quaint scale), I'd do that.

Aside #sqrt(-e): the SBC Self Support Tool is about as worthless a piece of software as I've ever encountered (unless of course, your Internet connection consists of exactly one Windows PC directly connected to the Internet, which is another quaint remnant of the past).

Now, Dallas is virtually shut down due to the 0.03 inches of sleet that fell Wednesday. Grown men are shaking in their ostrich-skin boots, fearful of driving their F350s out of their driveway. Instead of road noise, I can hear crickets chirping (for the first time since gasoline hit $3/gallon).

Honestly, what a bunch of wimps. Texas is dead last in education in this country, so driver's education couldn't have been much of a priority. Certainly nothing like high school football, or being a cheerleader (the pinnacles of success in Texas). Then again, somewhere between 25-60% of the Dallas population was born in Mexico, and I suspect Driving On Ice wasn't even the subject of Science Fiction class.

use the web, Luke ...

Yesterday I moseyed to a nearby store to fetch some DVDs that have been on my Wish List for many months. After All Was Said And Done, I paid ~2% more than the Best Price I could find on the web, and got immediate delivery of most of the films on my list. Sure, these are "used DVDs" but unless they're scratched I'll never know the difference. It's not like a VHS copy that wasn't rewound at the end of every viewing.

To effect a fair cost comparison, I added sales tax to my local purchase (and deducted their in-store promotional discount) then compared that with shipping charges from the web merchant. I did not add 45¢/mile for travel (or whatever the going rate is for petrol these days).

My local purchase comes with a 30-day guarantee from the merchant (Moving Trading Company at 5907 Beltline - west of Preston). If I ever need to wring their necks, they're in easy range.

The thing that drives me to the web in the first place is that I loathe driving around town looking for what I want. I suppose If I Shopped Like A Woman (walking through stores, day-after-day, aimlessly looking for Random Crap With Which To Fill My Home) I'd have a different attitude. But most of the time, I know exactly what I want, since I've thoroughly researched my purchase in advance.

If I do make the mistake of going to a Brick & Mortar store, odds are that what I want is either:
- not in stock
- located somewhere that only a sociopath would think to hide it*

* stock clerk: I'll put the frozen tater tots in the section marked "videotapes"

unrelated #98.6: Stores should have SABR-free day each week when the Salvation Army Bell Ringer won't be annoying customers needing to shop. I started to grab something at Fry's in Plano yesterday, but made a U-turn when I saw The Bell and decided my purchase can wait until January.

unrelated #867-5309: Rambo's come for a visit .. not sure how many days. He and Beta will probably stay up all night and have a pajama party.