A Slow Night.

Tonight was of course Halloween. We did get trick or treaters, but I get the impression that we had somewhat less than last year. This unfortunately means there's more left over candy around than last year, and hence that many more calories to potentially end up around my middle. Good thing I'll most likely be getting some extra exercise next week.

Gas In Saskatoon, October 31, 2008.

Gas dropped another couple of cents this week to 102.9 cents a litre. However as I understand it oil prices rebounded a bit this week, so perhaps this will be the last drop for a while. I've decided I'll only do these posts if the price of gas changes, so at some point I will probably skip a week or two.

The photo this week was far more heavily cropped than the previous ones, hence the lower quality.

One More Week.

Just think. One more week and the pain in the ass we call the US Presidential Election will be over. No, it won't stop the more paranoid whiners from ranting that W. will find some excuse to use martial law to hold onto power, or their opposite numbers ranting that Obama will introduce Sharia law and have Chinese tanks on the Beltway a day after he takes office. But at least the most annoying aspects will come to an end, like the ads and the incessant campaigning that's been going on for a year and a half. The "campaign that never ends" aspect of the process is one of the reasons I'm not in favour of fixed election dates.

The Inspiration For Stewie Griffin?

If your only exposure to Superman was a carefully put together selection of some of his comic stories from the '50s to the early '70s you'd be forgiven for thinking that the various Superman titles were intended as some sort of surrealist commentary on society rather than superhero comic books. A typical example from 1970 can be found in a post to Scans Daily by Doop. (And of course I shamelessly stole a bit of Doop's scan for the picture above.) In the "imaginary story"(as a lot of the crackiest offenders were) "Beware the Super-Genius Baby!" Superman and Lois Lane have married, and soon Lois is pregnant. But a supervillain, Professor Ulvo, uses a ray to make the fetus develop into a superbaby, and within a week of his birth he has adult level intelligence. He also has an evil streak, and Supes eventually has to fight his own son to keep him from taking over the world.

The story is bizarre enough, and the little details don't help. Note for example that Lois is married to Superman, and not his secret identity Clark Kent, and they live togetber as Mr. and Mrs. Superman in a typical suburban neighbourhood. I wonder how much the property values dropped given the potential for supervillain attacks and so forth. And the poor kid has no name, simply being refered to as "Superman's baby." No wonder he goes villainous so easily!

Regular Scans Daily poster icon_uk notes that the baby in this story is very much like Stewie Griffin from the cartoon Family Guy. As I'm sure most readers will know Stewie is basically the mind of a crotchety adult in the body of a one year old, and has tried and failed at such schemes as doing in his mother Lois and taking over the world. So the obvious question is whether Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane was inspired by this old Superman story when he created Stewie. The answer is most certainly no. Stewie was obviously intended to be a play on/inversion of the typical TV and cartoon baby, who generally is there simply to be cute and do cute baby things. Still, the similarities, including both nasty tikes having a mother named Lois, are interesting.

If you find the material in the post I linked to interesting there's a lot more to be found on Scans Daily. You might also want to check out Superdickery for various bizarre comic covers, Superman and otherwise.

Free Cold.

Anyone want the cold I appear to be coming down with? Free to the first customer.

Anyone?

Gas In Saskatoon, October 24, 2008

Despite an announcement by OPEC that it will cut oil production in an effort to boost prices the price of oil actually dropped today, and once again gas prices in Saskatoon fell. Gas is now 105.9 cents a litre. The price has dropped 40 cents a litre since the first of these posts.

Gas In Saskatoon, October 18, 2008.

A day late this time, and once again no photo. Today gas in Saskatoon was 109.9 cents a litre. Since the price of oil actually went up on Friday I wouldn't be surprised if the price of gas bounces back up a bit before next Friday.

I have no idea if this ongoing idea is of interest to anyone, but I think I'll keep it up for a while yet.

House Guest.

Once again Dudley the English Springer Spaniel is a house guest here. Here's a shot of him looking comtemplative. Or maybe it's annoyed, since I wasn't paying utmost attention to him. Dudley is his happiest when he's the centre of attention.

Something In The Water?

One of the odder events in yesterday's Canadian federal election was the re-election of Conservative Maxine Bernier in his riding of Beauce. He won with a commanding 62 percent of the vote. The obvious question is why. The man is, to be blunt, an idiot. You'd think his constituents would want someone less embarrassing as their MP.

Don't Forget...

...that if you're an adult Canadian tomorrow is the federal election. So get out there and vote. Those of you who don't vote without legitimate reason, please refrain from complaining about whoever gets elected until you actually vote.

Famous Moose Reported Dead.

Hard as it may be to believe, there are reports that Bullwinkle has been assassinated. Hmmm, I wonder how the US press will cover this important story.

Gas In Saskatoon, October 10, 2008

After missing a week here we are again. The falling price of oil as a result of the current market panic sure has driven down the price since I first made one of these posts just a bit less than a month ago. How long this will last is another question. Given that some industries benefit from lower oil prices you'd think this would offset the decline in oil related stocks, but this apparently hasn't been the case.

The Power of Habit.

Last night I forgot to set my alarm. But I still woke up at about the time I needed to wake up anyways. But given the weather in Saskatoon today if I had the choice I'd probably go back to bed.

Renewal.

I renewed my Saskatoon Public Library card today for another year. It cost me nothing. You can't beat that, especially when you have to pay for a library card in other places. Given the amount of stuff I've taken out over the years I'd probably shell out the money if I did have to pay for one.

Gas In Saskatoon, September 26, 2008.

No picture today. I forgot my camera. Today gas in Saskatoon at most stations was 126.9 cents a litre, 3 cents down from last week.

This post was brought to you by Pornsack Songsaeng's Luck Andro and Ginger Baker's Horses and Trees, the cassettes I was listening to as I drove.

Scheduling.

Sunday night saw the last major league baseball game held at Yankees Stadium. (Unfortunately I missed the broadcast.) Frankly I was a bit surprised at this. You would think that given this historic event has been in the offing for a good while now Major League Baseball would have scheduled it for the last day of the season. Instead the Yankess will end their season on a road trip, including 3 games starting tonight against the Blue Jays at Rogers Centre. Of course one assumes a lot of people thought that the Yankees would make the playoffs, and hence Sunday's game wouldn't have been the last. The new stadium is located across the street and will be open for the start of next season. The cost? A measily 1.3 billion. Nice cash if you have it.

Gas In Saskatoon, September 19. 2008.

What a difference a week makes.

A Bargain.

Like a bargain? Me too. Here's mine for today, a couple of CDs I picked up at the Centre at Circle and 8th Zellers for a buck each. Even with the tax they came to less than a bottle of Coke and a bag of chips. At that price if you don't like them you can toss 'em if you really want to. On top we have Steppin' Out by Genesis touring guitarist/bassist Daryl Stuermer. It's '80s style rock/light jazz instrumentals, some of which could probably have been used as TV themes. Nothing special but competently performed and recorded. Then we have Pete Townshend's peculiar 1993 concept album Psychoderelict. Not only do you get songs you get quite a bit of dialogue as well. Apparently this was sufficiently off putting to a lot of people when the album came out that Pete later released a music only version. And without getting into details some of the plot seems eerily prophetic of events that would happen to Pete some years later.

Woo Board?

This billboard, which has been up for a good while in Saskatoon's downtown, has made me raise my eyebrows more than once. It features what sounds like a dubious idea. A bit of research indicates a 2001 study did claim milk production from cows varied depending on what kind of music was played, with calmer music leading to more milk production than louder, faster music. But colour me skeptical, especially since the study has apparently had no followup. So I can't help but wonder if the school board should be using the idea in it's advertising. On the other hand it is an ad for the music program, not the science courses. If it for the latter I would find it a lot more questionable.

Rick Wright, RIP.

It was announced this morning that Rick Wright has died of cancer at age 65. Wright was a founding member of Pink Floyd, meeting group co-founders Roger Waters and Nick Mason while they were architecture students. Besides being the group's keyboardist he wrote a number of songs for Pink Floyd, including "Us and Them" from Dark Side of the Moon, and sang either lead or harmony vocals on many Floyd cuts. Wright would be forced from the band in 1979 by Roger Waters due to personal frictions between them, and ironically would actually make money from the tours for The Wall as a hired gun, unlike his fellow Floyd members who lost money. Wright rejoined the Floyd for 1987's Momentary Lapse of Reason album and remained a member until the group's unofficial demise in the early 2000s. Wright also released several solo albums during his career as well as appearing on David Gilmour's most recent solo album On an Island.