Oil Rig

Unless you've been living under a rock for the past few days, read this.

Now that everyone is up to speed, read this.

If interested, watch this.

Obama promises not to open up any drilling offshore of the United States during a campaign speech in Jacksonville, Florida.  Then on March 31, 2009 Obama makes a speech ok'ing drilling offshore of the United States.  Then on Earth Day 2010 an oil rig catches fire, explodes and sinks to the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, which of course causes all of the residents of the Gulf Coast as well as those that are against drilling in the first place to start voicing their opinion on allowing the U.S. to open up offshore drilling.

Now, I am not a conspiracy nut but this is all too convenient or too much of a convenience and makes it all too easy for the President to backtrack on what he said and to close drilling once again.

Which is total crap.

Yeah, he broke a campaign promise but has there ever been a President that has not?  I think you would be hard pressed not to find one.  Ok, so there was an oil rig that went boom and is now spilling oil into the Gulf, but that happens and everything will be fine.

Problem is, many do not see it as such.  They will vehemently cry foul with anything to do with the possible negative impact of their precious industry of tourism.  Which is a problem seeing as how in the economy that we have, to rely almost totally on something that is dependent on a good economy since if times go lean, the first thing to go is the family vacation to the Gulf.

I know that I would if I was placed in that position with a family.

Now we have oil in the Gulf, a President that will most likely cave to the pressure of closing drilling once again just to make some of the rich in the area able to maintain their level of comfort.

Fucking wonderful.

As far as the conspiracy part, it probably is a coincidence but the government has ways of making those happen.  Especially if someone needs to retract something that they very recently decided to open up.

I'm all for alternative energies but we need to harness what we have now instead of sitting on our haunches waiting for alternative energies to be discovered or made accessible to the general public.  Our entire infrastructure is centered around oil and has been for decades.  It will take decades to convert this way of thinking away from oil and around the new technology.  The thing is most of the new possible known tech out there is just not feasible.  Windmills can only be placed in certain areas and they face opposition just the same as oil rigs but with the argument the windmills are an eyesore; hydro needs a dam which dislocates people; solar doesn't produce enough power with the availability of panels and are only useful in sunny areas and days; nuclear is the best but Chernobyl and Three Mile Island is the rallying cry for those that oppose that. 

So what can be used in place of oil to power America or the world?  In America, nothing is available and someone somewhere will have to invent or discover this new revolutionary source and we will all have to pray that some boob doesn't try to stop it or sue saying they invented it first.

Droid

It was time for a new phone since it has been two years since my last and have been wanting a Droid ever since it came out. Of course I really wanted the Blackberry Storm when it came out as well, but was no where near time for upgrade at that time; which was really beneficial on my part since the Storm has been an extremely crappy product from the get go. What the Droid replaces is a Motorola W755, which is a Verizon only phone and is a truly crappy phone to boot.

Now I have only had the Droid for two days as of writing this and to say I am excited would be an understatement at this point. This phone is truly phenomenal. It has apps of a dozen varieties that you can download, some free and some pay; Google maps, which is just cool to play with; Google sky map, which is even more cooler. All of this in a neat little package.

I know the iPhone is supposed to be this great phone that does everything with a billion apps and counting, but I don't like Apple and in no way was going to get one, especially with AT&Ts craptacular service. I know what the commercials say, but my work is a true deadzone to AT&T and T-mobile, so why would I get a service that I cannot use at work?

Got the phone through Wirefly.com for a much cheaper price than through Verizon. Spent a 100 bucks for the phone, a case, car charger and screen protectors; whereas all of that would have cost around 300 bucks through Verizon, while receiving a 100 buck visa card rebate. I think I got the better deal by far on this one.

I have nothing more to say. I am lost for words.

Adoption

Read this first before settling in for this new adventure.

Adopted Child Terrorizes Family

Ready? Good.

A 33-year-old woman decides she wants to start a family so she finds a child to adopt in Russia and hilarity ensues. Well not so much on the hilarity part, but it seems that from the article the woman had a case of Angelina Jolie Syndrome. This is caused by normal individuals thinking they can make a difference in the lives of some poor down trodden child in some poor backwater dirt country but are unprepared to handle the possibility or responsibility of having to put forth the actual human effort to make this child a self-sufficient productive member of society.

Now I’m not going to get into adopting outside of the USA at this point; that would be too easy.

They see the pictures on the TV, in the magazines and in the paper showing these children with Angelina being happy; they then think that they can do that as well. Which is all fine and great but a realization must be made; that is, that most celebrities such as Ms. Jolie can afford the cost of supporting, adopting and caring for a child from another country. Whereas, most of the regular people in the States cannot, we do not have those resources to be able to put forth towards such a noble cause such as this. Either it is money, time, strength or knowledge of how to raise a child; it just isn’t feasible for many of us to commit to such an endeavor.

The problem with this particular story is that there is no mention of another person in the adopters life, either it be a husband, boyfriend or girlfriend, just her mother and aunt. Since the living situation was not mentioned in the article; I can only speculate on this portion, I imagine that Torry Hansen lived by herself and wanted a family. Just seems that she had Angelina Jolie Syndrome and was going to save some poor child from another land as a single mother; with only the support of her mother and aunt to help her along.

Now, I was raised by a single mother, it was not all peaches and cream either. There were difficulties along the way, we were poor, but we also lived with my grandparents up to when I started high school. Living with the grandparents plus an aunt; not to mention any other aunt or uncle that may have been there throughout that time frame, didn’t mean there was money to be had or a lot of extras. We were all poor and my mother had help with discipline, teaching along with my rearing from those individuals throughout that time. Torry Hansen had help by way of her mother and aunt, but that doesn’t mean they were pro-active disciplinarians; especially since the article mentioned that they ‘thought that with their love, they could help him.’ Which sounds to me that they tried more hippy means of child rearing; such as timeouts, talking to and groundings or restrictions, instead of time honored whipping some ass that has been used for centuries all over the world with astounding positive results.

Now I am not sure why a Russian child was chosen; as there are many children in the USA that are in need of loving homes. The choice of a Russian child would have been a major hurdle as well toward helping him during this time. At the age of 7, he would already be talking in his native tongue of Russian, be aware of his own customs that would all been turned upside down after being brought to America. Unless Torry Hansen spoke Russian natively or well enough to be able to communicate, it would be a major blockage to helping the child to become accustomed to his new home. I hope she took all of this into consideration before going through with the adoption; though it seems it was not.

Why wasn’t an American child chosen? Would it have been issues or protocol with the adoption process in America that would have made things more difficult that going through a foreign agency? Adopting an American child that is aware of the language, culture and customs of America would have made things much easier as well. That barrier would not have been nearly as present with an American child as it would be with some other child from any other country on this planet, Russia or otherwise, especially a non-English speaking country.

One of the many mistakes that seemed to have been made was only consulting with psychologists and not actually taking the child to one for help. This is not a guarantee that it would have been the solution, but it was an avenue that was not taken and therefore cannot be speculated upon if it would have worked out for the best. Since it was not tried, there is no way of telling what may or may not have happened.

If you cannot put forth the time, money, energy and resources to adopt a child from another country…don’t do it. If you absolutely must fill that empty space in your life with something, get a pet; if you must fill it with a child, adopt one that needs your help in your native country or the country you currently live in. Live in America, adopt an American child; Canadian, adopt a Canadian child; live in Japan, adopt a Japanese child; etc., etc., and etc.

It Ain't Easy Being Green

Seems being green is on an upswing once more.  I remember being in elementary school or middle school with conserving water and recycling was pushed hard, in middle school we planted pine saplings for Arbor Day.  That was all around 20 years ago and now once again it has come to the surface.

Now we are being asked to use “Green” products.  These products are made from either recycled products or from plant products and are compostable.  Which means that they won’t sit in a landfill for 20 years before breaking down and are not made with petroleum products.

This is all fine and great, but these products are also being touted as using fewer resources to produce.  Less water, electricity, gas and whatever else can be used to make it.  Thing is, if these products use less, why do they cost more?  How can companies be expected to be profitable in this economy when they have to buy these products that cost more than regularly produced products? 

I understand that some companies go this route because of corporate mandates or too be able to get government contracts; which is both the case for where I work, but for little companies, it will only hurt them in the long run.  Most consumers do not have a care in the world as to what the to go container that their Heavenly Hash is in, is made of.  The majority of people will look the other way in regards to their favorite eatery or coffee place and don’t care as long as the price remains the same, once that price goes up, those that frequent will tend to go elsewhere that is cheaper or not go as often to save some quid.

It cannot be expected for the small companies to ‘take the hit’ to their wallets just to be ‘green’.  It is a backwards way of thinking that is what would cause many companies to have to make cuts elsewhere if they expect to be profitable.  Those cuts would come in the form of cutting employees, lowering the quality of services that they offer.  Which in the terms of restaurants; which would the largest users of ‘green’ products, would mean cutting higher paid workers and hiring lesser skilled for lesser pay, using product for their menus that are a lesser quality but cost less or even using pre-packaged items to be able to remove some pre-prep to an item and thusly lowering someone’s hours or cutting them completely.

I think many of these ‘green’ companies are just riding a wave of popularity right now trying to get the most out of what is a bit of a scare tactic to get people to save resources.

Which is fine, but if you aren’t using all of these resources, why are you charging so much to the retailer if your product is by all means costing less to produce?