Wednesday, July 30, 2008

The World is Upside Down


The other day there was a middle-age man in a suit standing at a bus stop at 6:45 AM. This is just not right. After all, standing at bus stops is only permitted for cleaning ladies in the late afternoon as they return home to their barrios.

Then there was this chubby guy riding a bicycle of all things, along a main road between the industrial city of Santa Ana and the residential/professional city of Irvine. He was wearing a brand new velour sweat suit. I guess he doesn’t understand that these roads as just for motor vehicles. Bicycles are for the parks on the weekends.

How about the people walking along sidewalks during rush hour? The injustice of it all! They create a nuisance for us SUV drivers trying to make a right hand turn as they actually have the nerve to use a crosswalk.

I must have seen several of these Vespa-like scooters out and about during rush hour. I try to run them off the road but they scamper about between the rows of vehicles as if they have some superiority over us traditionalists. I’ll get one some day if I just keep trying.
Then I hear there are people actually using old vegatable oil to run their vehicles. Make it stop!

Now we can see the results of all this nonsense. In May U.S. drivers drove 9.6 billion less miles that in the previous May. That’s about $2 billion loss in revenues for the oil companies. Now you see who is driving who off the road. I say abandon the bus stops, bicycles, scooters and walking shoes. Back into your vehicles you beatniks. Think what might happen to my equity investments in big oil. Think about my retirement. My children’s inheritance. Woe the injustice of it all.

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Moderate Quake hits SoCal

A moderate earthquake occurred at 11:42 a.m. (PDT) on Tuesday, July 29, 2008. The magnitude 5.4 event occurred 3 km southwest of Chino Hills, CA. The hypocentral depth is 12km.
This is about 20 miles as the crow flies from my home in Irvine. The shaking was quite severe for about 15 seconds followed by a slow rolling motion for about 30 seconds. No significant damages.