Gas Debate: More Fuel for the Fire

Regular Sac Rag readers know that we love to debate the principles of supply and demand as they pertain to the Sacramento housing market. With that in mind, I’d like to offer up a preemptive discussion about gas prices and the proposed annual Gas Boycott that is surely making it’s way to your electronic mail inbox.

A boycott of a couple of brands of gasoline won’t result in lower overall prices. Prices at all the non-boycotted outlets would rise due to the temporarily limited supply and increased demand, making the original prices look cheap by comparison. The shunned outlets could then make a killing by offering gasoline at its “normal” (i.e., pre-boycott) price or by selling off their output to the non-boycotted companies, who will need the extra supply to meet demand. The only person who really gets hurt in this proposed scheme is the service station operator, who has almost no control over the price of gasoline.

While we’re on the topic, don’t forget to visit this site to find the lowest prices in our fair city.

You can finally unload that Apple IIe!

If you’re like me, you’ve got random outdated equipment that you’d rather not have in your house, so here’s your chance to dump it safely and free of charge. This ad was in the Bee recently; although this is not snarky or gossipy news, it’s valuable info.

When: Friday, April 21st noon-5pm / Saturday, April 22nd 9am-3pm / Sunday, April 23rd 9am-3pm
Where: Cal Expo, Lot A RAIN OR SHINE

Drop off is free. Eligible items: TVs, VCRs, DVD players, computers, monitors, mouses (mice?), keyboards, fax machines, printers, toner cartridges, cell phones, telephone equipment, video game systems and more. DO NOT BRING: copiers, appliances, microwaves, batteries, or smoke detectors.

For more info, call 1-866-335-3373 or go to http://www.noewaste.com

Lowered Expectations

This whole Internet thing has really taken off over the years. So much so that it is widely considered a credible medium for communication, especially from “trusted” news sources. With that said, when did it become so acceptable to publish mistake laden and/or poorly written news stories?

Take this “story” from the Associated Press via cbs13.com.

(AP) FAIRFIELD, Calif. Fairfield police are looking robber who wore only black underwear as he held up a convenience store.

Please to explain how an author, editor, journalist, etc. can publish a story without viewing it for errors. I know I can’t publish a post on this here web log with a typo or grammatical error without hearing about it before it has even finished pinging rss feeds. Furthermore, the date on this story is “Apr 19, 2006 7:08 am US/Pacific” and it is currently Apr 19, 2006 12:48 pm US/Pacific as I type. Ugh.

Perhaps I am just annoyed because this error has distracted me from the overall hilarity of this story. And that title, come on, is rich.

Coming Soon on ESPN2

Competitive cup stacking, cheerleading, and double-dutch jumproping will soon take a back seat to the next craze that’s sweeping the Midtown area: XTreme Blood Donations!

I give blood about every eight weeks, and I was overdue for this most recent appointment — with the wedding a couple weeks ago, I knew that if I gave blood that week, that would be the one time that they nicked something and my whole arm would be purple (for those who don’t give blood, that’s a rare occurence, so don’t let that scare you.)

Sitting in the snack area post-donation and noshing on my 2nd plate of nachos, my attention was diverted from the May ’97 issue of Better Homes & Gardens when an older gentleman asked me how often I donate.
Continue reading “Coming Soon on ESPN2”

Fish & Chips, IHOP Style

Yes, you read that right. Not only does IHOP serve fish & chips, but your intrepid diner actually ate them. I’m going to be brutally honest here: They were pretty damn good! Now, it was midnight and I had already had a few pints, but overall I really enjoyed them. The batter was a bit generic, but the fries were good and the fish was excellent. I wouldn’t tell you to go out of your way for a plate, but if you’re there and breakfast foods don’t sound appealing, go for the F&C. Oh yeah, special shout out to our server, Sherman, who handled a table of ten with 6 separate checks with good cheer and fantastic service. Give that man a raise IHOP Corporate!

IHOP (Watt & El Camino, various locations)
Food*** Service **** Ambience**

To blog or not to blog

I’ve been visiting the wikiHow site for some time. Aside from the silly posts, there are some valuable ones, too. However, none were really worth mentioning here until I stumbled upon this one today on How to Dissuade Yourself from Becoming a Blogger, which may be of some assistance if you are considering jumping on board the web log train.

Find five completely random blogs, and read them daily for a month. After thirty days, you will absolutely dread your self-imposed requirement to read all that dreck. Any blog you create will most likely be on par with what you’ve been reading. Don’t put anyone through that.

Hard to argue that one, huh?

Write on a regular basis in Wordpad instead. If that doesn’t satisfy your urge, and you feel that you must post your blog online, then you might just be craving attention and validation–which you’ll never truly find in a blog. If you give up on your Wordpad journal after about three days, you’ll do the same with a blog. That just takes up server space.

Man, bloggers are such losers.

And now, for something complete fake

My dad brought to my attention PR Watch’s report on TV news stations airing video news releases (VNRs), which are video press releases produced by corporations, the government, or non-governmental organizations for easy “plug-and-play” use by news stations. Often the local outfits will create what looks like an editorial piece that, in actuality, consists mostly of video footage given to them by one of these organizations (and which obviously slants in favor of the organization) without any disclaimers about the source of the content.

Two hits in Sacramento (KMAX 31 and Fox40) on their list of 77 stations, both regarding the American Dental Association’s spot on a new screening technique that uses saliva. You always knew they were crooked, didn’t you. Yes, I’m talking about all three.

Rivercats, opening night


Opening night – 4/14/06

Originally uploaded by cooldmz.

The family and I had an amazing time at opening night at Raley Field last night. We only made it through 1 and 1/2 frames, but the seats are great, as you can see (they belong to my father-in-law, “FIL CoolDMZ”), and the atmosphere really makes you happy you live in Sac.

Side note to the woman in Section 112, row 29, seat 22 who shushed my 3 year old daughter during the National Anthem: are you a season ticket holder? If so, we might have a problem… (and kudos to the SMUD worker (didn’t catch the name) who also saw you, miss Fun Police, and mentioned it to me on the sly. Right awn Mr. Smud PR guy!!)

“Frolic” on over to Raley’s

followtheflavor.jpg
Go ahead Raley’s,
sue me for ripping off your ripoff

I’d like to go ahead and call out Raley’s for ripping off the theme song to “Curb Your Enthusiasm” for their new meat department commercials. You can hear the Raley’s theme, complete with the tuba vamp intro (is that the right term, “vamp”?) at their fake website FollowTheFlavor.com.

Is this supposed to make me say to myself, “Self, you should really buy meat at Raley’s because it is so freakin hilarious there”? Or “Self, you should buy meat at Raley’s because then it’s like you’re in the know, you get HBO, you’re hip.” All it really makes me think is, “Self, don’t go to Raley’s for meat because if you do, you might say the wrong thing to the butcher and then later the butcher will like be next in line at the doctor’s and then you’ll be concerned he’s going to tell the doctor that you were eating meat which he knows you were told not to do because of your health, and then this concern is going to ruin your wife’s dinner party by causing you to make a scene with another guest who is a butcher but who is not the Raley’s butcher. And then Richard Lewis will call and we all know how that goes.”