Life in General

I've noticed lately that this spring has been one of the busiest springs on record. I am not sure why. Everyone seems to be in a rush to do everything they can do, all right now. I've wondered whether people sense something happening on a larger scale. Is it the problems with Iraq and the War on Terror? Is it wearing on all of us. I wonder if all the issues going on with Iraq are starting to have a real affect at home, here in the U.S. Are people preparing for some economic crisis? Are people afraid that we don't have much time? Why? Academics are wearing down on all of us in my department and I wonder whether it is a larger problem. Other people I talk to seem to be saying that their spring is insane too.

I haven't written on this blog for a while because I've been so overwhelmed with work it's been hard to find the time to sit down and think through some of the things that are going on in this world right now. One of the goals of this blog was to talk about energy security and oil, so I would like to talk a little about this.

It seems that many people in the U.S. and elsewhere don't realize the vast reserves of tar sands and oil shale that exist in North America, supposedly far more than regular old oil summed up from all over the world. The huge problem with all of this however is the ability to extract the resource economically. It take quite a bit of energy to extract the raw resource into a useable form. I read somewhere a good analogy. Someone said that there is far more gold on the ocean floors than currently exists today, but getting all of it would be far more costly than the value of it. This doesn't mean that there isn't hope, however. I think that many of the big energy companies are starting to realize that finding a way to extract this resource could mean company security and profits for many years to come.

Anyways, I could rant on forever, but I'm tired and it's bedtime. I miss my babe...