National Treasure: Book of Secrets

Did you enjoy National Treasure a couple years back? Yeah, it was okay for me, too. But only because Sean Bean is a great villain.

The sequel is coming out this December. The only reason I mention it is that it shines a spotlight on the Black Hills, South Dakota, where I spent an enjoyable week gawking at giant granite carvings and toting an infant around. The movies lets you take a gander not only at Mount Rushmore, but also Needles Highway and Sylvan Lake - a picturesque little lake that we visited.

Here is Sylvan Lake in the movie:






And here's Sylvan Lake as captured by my far superior video camera.




And finally, me standing on one of the rock outcroppings.



Take that, Nicholas Cage!

Thank You, Renewable Bio-Fuel, for the $4 Gallon of Milk

Golden Corn !
Originally uploaded by Lydd_Nel

Short-sighted policies based on the crisis du jour invariably produce many unwanted side-effects--the total of which almost always outweigh the perceived benefits. Thanks to the increased demand on corn for the production of "green" fuel ethanol (which by some accounts isn't any more green than gasoline), milk could soon be $4 per gallon. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Thanks to the world's growing and insatiable demand for energy, the use of ethanol could lead to even more starvation for the poorest populations. Plus, it's hardly any cleaner than gasoline emissions.

Sure, it's not just environmentalism run amok that's driving the ethanol surge. Tight oil production and instability in the Middle East is largely to blame. But even with increased ethanol production, the oil companies are taking the cue to decrease expensive oil production and refining, leaving fuel prices about the same.

I don't know where I'm going with this, except that a lot of people are going to get rich off ethanol (I'm talking to you, South Dakota), and the government will spend billions to ensure it happens, while the rest of the country takes the hit. Bottom line, ethanol is a fake solution to a fake problem.

Flash (Flood) Back

I remember back in aught-four when the Big Sioux River burst its banks. Yeah, thems was the days. (FYI, just fiddling around with posting video to Google Video. Seems pretty slick.)