HOYA SWALLOWS PENTAX !

In article ,
Ron Hunter wrote:

You are testimony to the the theory that living in NYC tends to make one
somewhat less than rational.

Actual research shows that Manhattanites are among the sanest people in
the world, but don't let reality check you.


Owning a car in NYC (and many large cities) is not practical. However,
NOT owning a car in places like Beeville, Tx. is worse than not
practical, it is probably fatal unless one can hire a full time
caregiver. My sister lives 6 miles from the nearest grocery store,
Doctor, pharmacy, etc. She is 76 years old. I doubt she would be able
to ride a bicycle 12 miles to get groceries, or to take her brother in
law who lives across the highway to his many doctor's appointments in
Corpus Christi, or San Antonio.


She's old enough to be retired which means she could move to a city with
good public transportation or a small town with a active downtown. And
there's Raleigh Court in Roanoke, Virginia. She's chosen her addiction.

If her brother-in-law rode a bicycle, he'd be in better health. British
studies show that riding a bicycle prolongs life by well more than the
dangers of accidents.

In article ,
Ron Hunter wrote:

I would HATE to live
in a city where I had to depend on the schedules of public transportation.

It's because you don't have enough money to afford to live in one of the
places where public trans really works and waiting for a bus or train is
a matter of no more than ten minutes.

The problem with poverty in the US is that not only do you get to be
poor, you're forced to buy and maintain a car.

William Graham wrote:

Besides, I object to the use of the word, "squander". Just because I am

Objection noted and overruled. Oil is increasingly scarce and has been
known to be a finite resource. Yet, we (and in particular the US) have
squandered oceans of the stuff with gas guzzling vehicles and other
innefficent uses of oil.

There is an illusion that it will never end, 'cause it never does. At
2005 consumption rates there were 40 years worth of proven reserves...
but of course consumption increases each year so that that 40 years is
really less than 20.

The most productive fileds in the world in Saudi are now pumping out as
much salt water as oil.

The easiest to get, cheapest to refine oil is all gone. Forever.

using the world's resources, that doesn't mean I have to be squandering
them. Perhaps my use of them is legitimate. After all, If I don't use them,

Most use of energy is "legitimate". However it is also inefficient.
Vehicles are too large and heavy (and F=ma has not changed). Thence
they are overpowered (need to have kick ass acceleration for some
reason, and guess what? F=ma still reigns).

then someone else probably will. Also, since I pay fair market value for
every resource, how can you say that I am "squandering" them? If you think
they are more valuable then, by all means, their purveyors can always raise
their prices until the point is reached where I will no longer purchase
their products. And, in any case, anyone else may outbid me at any time for

Macro economic rules can be considered until a resource no longer
exists. Despite knowing the increasing scarcity of oil we have done too
little, too late over the past 30 years to reduce the waste.

The sad thing is:
1) We knew we needed to reduce.
2) Governments (esp. US) promissed, but did little
3) Big US gov't (US) is too tied to the oil and automotive industry
interests
4) Pollution, pollution, pollution

So not only have we squandered a neccessart ecomnomic resource but we've
polluted the planet at an ever increasing rate. Global warming is not
only here it is accelerating.

Ironically, perhaps appropriately, Japanese companies with their more
efficient fleets have continuously taken US market share from the big
three. The big three concentrated on big, ineficient vehcicles and when
the price of oil goes up, boom, they're in the doo-doo.

Blame it on CAFE rules all you like, but the reality is failed US
leadership is the reason why the big three are dying, people have no
jobs and Exxon et al are raking in the largest corporate profits ever
seen. Where is that money being re-invested?


whatever it is that think is being squandered.
I live in, and believe in, a free market economy. Whatever I have is for
sale at any time to the highest bidder, and I hold no manufactured item that
I possess too holy to be replaced by a new one, or a more updated version.
If people have been selling me gasoline at 1/2 the European price for the
last 40 years, whose fault is that? - Certainly not mine. I suggest that
they offer it to me at twice the price. Perhaps then I will buy less of
it.......

If it were simply a matter of high school economics, that would hold.
But we're not trading hogs bellies.

Cheers,
Alan

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Rebecca Ore writes:

It's because you don't have enough money to afford to live in one of the
places where public trans really works and waiting for a bus or train is
a matter of no more than ten minutes.

Transportation is only for people who can't afford to live in walking
distance from work

On Wed, 27 Dec 2006 10:39:51 +0000, Laurence Payne wrote:

On Tue, 26 Dec 2006 20:27:00 -0800, "William Graham"
wrote:

And by what you do for a living, and where you have to do it, and by many
other variables that usually grow along with your other choices, so changing
overnight is quite impossible, and certainly shouldn't be expected of a
whole nation of breadwinners.......

If we have to, it will be possible. It could happen tomorrow. Our
attempts to control the oil-producing countries may backfire even more
seriously than they have already. If the Saudis fall out of our
pocket and align with their kin we could be in real trouble. Doubtless
if America added its resources (though they'd doubtless dump us) we
could annihilate them. But WINNING the war without destroying the
resources would be harder.

Who is this "we" who would be in real trouble? You live in Israel or
something?

Hint--if you think that anything that happens in the Middle East is going
to result in the US suffering a significant oil shortage you might want to
check the importation figures.

--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

On Wed, 27 Dec 2006 03:17:06 -0600, Ron Hunter wrote:

Arnor Baldvinsson wrote:
Hi Ron,

It is freedom-centric. Most US residents just want to go where they want
to go, WHEN they want to go and don't want to wait on a bus, cab, or
subway. I find the whole idea of using public transportation VERY
restrictive, and confining.

That's because the public transportation system here is horrible. I don't
see much difference waiting on a bus than waiting in a car. At least in a
bus or a train I can read, work or do something but when driving I'm driving
and that's the end of it. Don't have that freedom here and I for one miss
it. I lived in Denmark for 3 years and they have one of the best public
transportation system in the world. I didn't own a car there and had no
reason to. But the "problem" is that you may actually have to move your
butt from place A to place B - as it getting up and walk for 5 minutes every
day, which seems to be a mortal sin hereg

I have fun every time I go to the grochery storey and there is a line of
lazies waiting to grab the nearest spot to park. I just enter the end of
the line and sit on the horn until the idiots start distributing into more
"distant" slots and actually might have to walk 2 or 3 meters further. I
may have saved a heartattack or two by nowbg

I bet that really makes you popular! BTW, give some thought to this.
There are some of us who can't walk for 5 minutes. Even so, I don't
wait for a parking place to open up, I just park a bit farther away. I
really get annoyed when I am walking from a distant parking place and
pass a handicapped space and see some obviously able-bodied man or woman
whip into the space, and dash into the store for a pack of cigarettes.
I hope they remember that when they are old, or ill, and NEED one of
those spaces, and some idiot is doing the same thing they did.

Part of that is state policy on issuing permits for those spaces. I had
a professor one time who had a handicapped permit and used it. The reason
he had it was that he had had a heart attack. The condition of his heart
didn't keep him from running 10 miles every day, but apparently it did
keep him from being able to walk 100 yards into the grocery store and push
a cart 100 yards out of it.

And before you attribute this to some flaw of the American character be
aware that he was one of the German "paper clip experts" who developed the
first jet aircraft and long range missiles and still spoke with a
noticeable German accent.

--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

On 26 Dec 2006 13:38:09 -0800, "
wrote:

Oh, and BTW, my 2wd standard cab shortbed Chevy pickup is small enough,
nimble enough, and handles well enough to avoid idiots on the road.
The fact that it is large enough and stout enough to provide protection
should one of said idiots manage to somehow launch him or herself
UNAVOIDABLY into my path of travel is merely a bonus.

I had a 91 F-250 that wasn't nimble.
It was hit hard enough to send it to the body shop six times, always
on the other driver's insurance company's dime (I was lucky; they
always had insurance).
Only once was in the front; that by a driver who ran a stop sign. The
other times were either into the sides or back. Hard to avoid someone
who simply changes lanes into you, or doesn't stop, or just turns left
into you after making eye contact.
It never had a dent caused by me, though.
They seldom launch themselves into my path; they come in from the side
or rear, instead. :-(
--
Bill Funk
replace "g" with "a"

On Tue, 26 Dec 2006 20:56:54 -0600, Ron Hunter
wrote:

I visited Philly, once. Got out of town as fast as my rented car would
carry me, then avoided the city when I returned to the airport. How CAN
you stand the smell?

The smell comes from Jersey.
:-)
--
Bill Funk
replace "g" with "a"

On Wed, 27 Dec 2006 10:48:14 +0000, Laurence Payne
lpayne1NOSPAM@dslDOTpipexDOTcom wrote:

On Tue, 26 Dec 2006 20:09:17 -0800, "William Graham"
wrote:

No, but their needs require the use of a car at all hours of the day and
night......Lets put it this way.....If I had to do without a car, I wouldn't
have four cats, I wouldn't have either photography or trumpet playing as a
hobby, and my life style would have developed in a totally different
direction from the way it has developed......I am now locked into an
individual transportation system, whether gasoline oriented or not.......

OK. We'll let you have one then.

All these people who argue as if their personal needs and preferences
are in the slightest relevant..... you've gotta laugh!

Are you saying that personal needs and preferences don't count?
That everyone should somehow conform to some norm?
--
Bill Funk
replace "g" with "a"

On Tue, 26 Dec 2006 20:52:12 -0600, Ron Hunter wrote:

Roger wrote:
On Tue, 26 Dec 2006 20:58:03 +0900, "David J. Littleboy"
wrote:

"Philip Homburg" wrote:
David J. Littleboy wrote:
*: Cars are dangerous and expensive (at the least; breathing gasoline
fumes
can't be good for one). And one can buy a lot of camera equipment for the
price of a car.
However, often a car is the most convenient way to get all that gear to
where you need it. :-)

It's not only convenient, here in the states with wide open spaces
it's a necessity. Howeve I have found that for trips it is cheaper to
rent a car than drive your own unless your car is paid for and has a
lot of miles on it.

Going from Michigan to Denver is cheaper to fly my own airplane
compared to driving. Coach class commercial flights are cheaper yet
and by far the cheapest was to rent a car.

I can hire a cab for a day for many more days than I have days to go out
shooting on the money I save not having a car. (Not that I've ever done
that, since public transportation here is flipping amazing, but it's on my
list of things to try for rural locations.)

I could also legally rent a car, but that wouldn't be a good idea (I've
never driven in Japan, and only drove for a year in the US and converted my
US license to a Japanese one).

David J. Littleboy
Tokyo, Japan

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

A commercial flight, booked months in advance can be much cheaper for a
long trip, say Dallas to Toronto, than driving and staying in hotels,
eating at restaurants. Unless one is fond of camping out, travel by car
can cost a lot more than just wear and tear on the car and gasoline.
I prefer to fly, and then drive a rented car, or more lately, just go on
a cruise, and leave the driving to the captain.

Care to run the numbers for us?

Personally I can toss a lot more gear in the trunk and the back seat than
the airline will let me carry without a surcharge.

--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)