And now, for the local news...

Ah yes, Shallow Alto (the city others know as "Palo Alto"). The city that defeated a skateboard park because it was too "crass", has no soccer fields for its kids, but is about to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a "reflecting pool" for its old folks. A cesspool of unwarranted self-entitlement, and no place reflects that more than Palo Alto's local university, Stanford University, founded by a railroad baron who made his millions by ripping off farmers and ranchers and sending the Pinkertons to tear up the rolling stock and ripping up the rails of potential competitors in order to educate the children of the elite. Harvard wouldn't take his kids because railroad money was too "crass". So he made his own Harvard Of The West just to spite them.

Now, locally we have a bit of a water shortage caused by a judge getting pissed at the State of California for basically refusing to fix a problem with one of the water projects for ten years. Finally he said "Fine, you can't operate that water project anymore since you obviously have no intention to fix it." So Stanford decided to conserve water by putting low-flow shower heads in the dorms. Big mistake. BIG mistake. Because water conservation is for the "little people". Not for the sons and daughters of the elite who attend Stanford. So now Stanford has put the old high-flow shower heads back. Because, after all, conservation is for the little people. Not for our elites.

In other news, 60% of housing for under $400K is bank-owned repo's. Seems that banks and rich people are the only people who can afford to sell houses nowdays in these times of falling values. I looked at a townhouse around the corner from me. It sold for $650K a year ago. It's currently on the market again -- reposessed by the bank, selling for $550K. Hmm, wait a couple of years and I might be able to pick it up for $350K, which is what it sold for in 2001 before the bubble got wild, whatcha think?

In other news, The Mighty Fang is shamelessly spoiled. His new hobby is, whenever I go to the restroom, to follow me in and jump up on the vanity and stick his paws down in the basin and look at the faucet with a sideways longing look. At that point I open the tap a little bit to get a little stream of water going, and he proceeds to lick water from the falling stream until his thirst is sated. Next thing you know, he's going to require me to carry a little spoon of food from his bowl to his mouth in order for him to eat. Well, no. I draw a line there. I may hand-water my cat, but hand-feed him? Never!

-- Badtux the Cat-owned Penguin