Example number 1001 that working night shift isn't good for your brain cells: butter knife in the fridge, butter in the sink.

I think the birthday trip has been decided to be Lake Lure, NC with side trips to Chimney Rock Park, Bat Cave (because I love the bat wing emblem on their fire engines), Black Mountain and Montreat. I've found a cute little cabin at the Gaestehaus Salzberg. Which appeals to the German in me. With the price of gas continuing to rise, it's a close destination.

Ever notice how gas prices shoot way, way up, then drop down, and we are all happy and relieved about it, but the prices are still 10-20 cents a gallon higher than they were before the spike?

But it's one of those areas where I have to shrug it off. People complain, I ask them if they remember 1973-74. What were people driving? Giant, gas gobbling monsters. So, what are people driving today?

Supply and demand, baby, it's what makes the world go round.

What miffs me is that we are the most technologically advanced nation in the most technologically advanced times in history and we "can't" get something other than gasoline to make our cars go?

That's when the liberal-inside-my-head (bwaahahaha) starts ranting. It's the oil companies with their money leashes firmly attached to politicians right on up through the prezzie. New technology is being suppressed. Oh, don't believe those stupid ads that Mobil is running about how they are diligently "searching" for alternatives to oil. They are diligently searching for ways to profitably extract and refine the not-so-usable oil up in Canada and Alaska in the Northern reaches.

Hey, after all, it's only some crazy native people who think eating fish all the time is fun and some polar bears, let's destroy their environment to buy us another ten years of gasoline profits.

Sheesh. That's enough rantificating for a Monday.