Author Archives: Unsigned Podcast

Taking Care of Dad

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My sister called today and wanted to talk about Dad and his declining health. Now Dad is going on 70 and had a hard, blue collar life, so his body is about worn out. Thankfully the union is covering all his medical expenses and he has a decent retirement fund. He’s still living in his own home and still drives, so he’s pretty independent in many ways. With my sister being the main caregiver of the family, her calling me about him was a little alarming.

Turns out it’s not really an emergency or anything all that hairy. She is frustrated with his refusal to do certain things the doctors want him to do and she called me to ask for some support in persuading him to cooperate. On the other hand, the subject is a little touchy and it is hard to start parenting your own parent.

Gas Prices Across the U. S.

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Found a very cool internet tool on Gas Buddy that shows a map of the entire U.S. broken down into counties and color coded to show the current cost of gas in each county. It is amazing to see the huge disparity in the cost of gas, with the highest costs always seeming to be in California and along the west coast, including Washington, Oregon, Nevada and then over to New York on the east coast, and surprisingly, Maine is very high, too.

At the moment the three cheapest states include Missouri, Oklahoma and South Carolina.

There is also a map that show the cost of gas across Canada.

Check out the U. S. National Gas Temperature map for yourself – isn’t it cool?

Ross Perot is Charting Again

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Remember Ross Perot? Rich guy from Texas, ran for president, made a lot of noise. A lot of what he says makes sense, and when a millionaire – or more likely billionaire – is willing to talk about money and share his insights, maybe the rest of us peasants should listen to him and take his advice. He is a powerful and persuasive speaker and is notorious for using lots of charts to illustrate his points.

Perot has launched a website called www.perotcharts.com that has . . . you guessed it! Charts.

He’s trying to help America manage it’s money and its debt. Check it out.

Road Rage Linked to Bumper Stickers

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Read a cool article in the Washington Post yesterday about a study that has linked drivers that have a problem with road rage to their use of bumper stickers on their cars.

A recent study by Colorado State University social psychologist William Szlemko concluded that:

Drivers of cars with bumper stickers, window decals, personalized license plates and other “territorial markers” not only get mad when someone cuts into their lane or is slow to respond to a traffic light, they also are far more likely than others to use their vehicles to express rage —by honking, tailgating and other aggressive behavior.

And you may be interested to know that I do not have any bumper stickers on any of my cars. I think they look trashy. But I have seen a few that made me laugh. Last week I saw this one on an old Humpty:


“If you are going to ride my ass . . .
. . . at least pull my hair.”

Lance Snacks

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We went Krogering yesterday and I was wanting a snack of some sort, but cruising the cookie aisle I couldn’t find anything that looked all that appealing. What I wanted was something small and portable, that I could munch on late at night when all I need is a small snack. Since I’m usually in the car and most stores are closed, I need to bring it with me.

I lost my sweet tooth years ago and most of the snacks I like nowadays are on the salty and crunchy side. So Kroger was running a special on Lance snack crackers and I stopped to take a look. I didn’t realize that there are some many variations and different flavors of those little square orange crackers filled with cheese. Do you know which ones I’m talking about? They come in little rectangular cellophane packs of 6 crackers. I picked the ones called “Captain’s Wafers” which is regular crackers filled with peanut butter and honey. I bought 4 of them them on sale and tossed them in the car console so that next time I need something for a snack they’ll be handy.