Coffee Klatch

Michael Crichton died on Election Day. He was one of my favorite authors. I always appreciated how well he researched topics before writing a book about them. Evidence of his compelling stories, characters, premises, and plots lies in the number of his books that have been made into movies. Here’s the list:

The Andromeda Strain (1971)
The Terminal Man (1974)
The Great Train Robbery (1979)
Jurassic Park (1993)
Rising Sun (1993)
Disclosure (1994)
Congo (1995)
The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
Sphere (1998)
The 13th Warrior (1999)
Timeline (2003)

This isn’t counting original screenplays (e.g., Westworld, Twister, and others) or materials he wrote under pseudonyms while he was a med student. Pretty impressive. The literary and film-making worlds will mourn him.

His official website
Bio and Trivia from IMDb

I actually found this website because it was featured in a commercial during the medal races for rowing in the Olympics today. FuelEconomy.gov is a site that is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy and which provides all kinds of information regarding automotive fuel efficiency. You can put cars side by side to compare their emissions, MPG, safety, etc.; find the lowest gas prices; get information about hybrid vehicles, and learn anything else you like about energy efficiency and renewable energy.

I heard an interesting story on NPR’s “All Things Considered” the other day about some lobstermen (like fishermen, but they catch lobsters) who are using the Internet to sell their lobsters. Instead of selling to dealers or whatever, they’re selling direct to consumers. The guys in the story are college age and are providing unique services along with selling the lobsters. To get the details on this really interesting story, visit the NPR Story.

Today President Bush said that the U.S. economy is still strong and growing. What the heck? Is he living in the same country I’M living in?

[This morning President Bush] attempted to calm jittery economic markets and anxious Americans at a morning press conference, insisting that the U.S. economy is still growing despite its problems, even as new reports showed inflation rising at the fastest pace in more than a quarter-century, and the prospect of more bank failures loomed.

If consumer confidence is any indicator of the strength of the economy, it’s far from strong. Many other indicators say the same thing. Yet Mr. Bush chose to point out that:

“our economy’s continued growing, consumers are spending, businesses are investing, exports continue increasing, and American productivity remains strong.”

Food and gasoline costs are the highest they’ve ever been, there have been runs on several banks (some actually folded), the housing market is still going down, foreclosures are STILL going up, job losses are still going up, the stock market is still going down, and the U.S. dollar is weak all over the world (including at home). That sure doesn’t sound to me like a strong economy.

Somebody is seriously deluded.

He’d be better off explaining what’s truly going on and suggesting ideas to make it through the tough times he acknowledges we’re in. Instead, all I hear is “We’re doing fine. We’re doing fine!” That’s no help. It’s delusion.

I‘m on Mars!

The Phoenix Mars Lander has successfully landed on Mars at the North Pole. Its mission is to analyze ice samples found a couple of inches below the surface, examining them to see if the water samples could have supported microbial life.

Also on the Phoenix is the first library on Mars. It is a collection of literature and art related to Mars and is on a micro-DVD along with the names of over 250,000 people who support it. My name is on the list, so I’m a part of that interplanetary library! Woo-hoo!!

For more info about the journey to Mars and the landing of the Phoenix, visit Space.com.

Well, I’ve seen gas prices go up as high as $3.79 a gallon this week! It’s funny to think that it wasn’t that long ago that $2.79 would have looked horrendous. Now it would be hugely welcome!

And even at that high of a price, we’re still better off than much of the rest of the world. Considering how little of the raw materials we actually get from our own land, that IS pretty amazing.

According to a CNN/Money story, the cost in US Dollars for a gallon of gas in Amsterdam is $6.48!

Maybe you’d rather live in Cairo, where it’s only 65 CENTS per gallon! Wow!

Apparently much of Europe taxes their gasoline pretty heavily; sometimes it’s up to 75% of the cost of the fuel! It seems that the U.S. is somewhere in the middle pricewise worldwide. Maybe it’s not so bad, just that we’re not used to it. Click the link above to read more about gas prices around the world and what affects them.

Current music: The Rough Guide to Chicago Blues

The founder of the Weather Channel is saying he will sue Al Gore (among others) for fraud. He feels that the media is only presenting one side of the global warming issue and that the whole issue is nonexistent. But since he can’t get anyone to dialog seriously about it, he figures maybe the courtroom will get the issue discussed.

“As you look at the atmosphere over the last 25 years, there’s been perhaps a degree of warming, perhaps probably a whole lot less than that, and the last year has been so cold that that’s been erased,” he said.

“I think if we continue the cooling trend a couple of more years, the general public will at last begin to realize that they’ve been scammed on this global-warming thing.”

You can read more about this news story here.

It’s raining iguanas in Florida. The cold temperatures have gotten so bad this week (mid-30s in Miami) that dozens of iguanas “froze” and started falling out trees. I think they’re much like frogs, who can freeze for the winter and then thaw in the spring, using a form of suspended animation. The iguanas come back to life when they warm up in the sun. Kinda like some people I know, waking up and going, “Where the heck am I NOW?” Pretty weird!

Click the picture to get the full news story from the Miami Herald.

Wired.com reported today that Snorting a Brain Chemical Could Replace Sleep. Just imagine being on a long driving trip, feeling tired, and using a nasal spray to restore your mental abilities back to a level similar to when fully rested! It won’t allow your body to get the rest it needs, but for people in situations requiring mental alertness for longer periods of time, this may become an option. Click the link to read the article.

Well THAT was certainly kept hush-hush!!

On September 16 of this year (three months ago), Robert Jordan died at his home in South Carolina of a blood disease. WHO HEARD ABOUT THIS? I sure didn’t! (Maybe since his real name was James Oliver Rigney, Jr., we missed it in the news.)

He was working on the 12th and final book of his Wheel of Time series. For all those fans who started reading the series a decade ago (the first book came out in 1990), there’s a large group saying, “We KNEW this was going to happen! Why’d he take so FREAKING LONG on these last few??” (Even though we do admire his valiant fight against cardiac amyloidosis that he contracted over a year ago.)

Well, rest assured, al-Thor-fans, the Wheel of Time will continue to spin as Brandon Sanderson, author of the “Mistborn” series, will be finishing the final novel, according to CNN. Jordan did leave a ton of detailed notes and hours of audio recordings, so his influence will still permeate the final book, entitled A Memory of Light.

So far, CNN reports that books in the “Wheel of Time” series have sold over 44 million copies! I blogged about the series in March 2007 and July 2005.