The Price of Gas Around the World....

I have been breathing a sigh or relief lately.  I managed to get rid of my Jeep and get into a
Toyota Corolla.  And just in time because the price of gas is getting higher and higher every day.  This is not to say I don't mind paying for gas now, but if I were still in the Jeep, I honestly I don't know how I would keep from going broke. 

Is it just us?  Are we the only ones being strangled at the gas pump?  What does the rest of the world pay for gas?

Netherlands	Amsterdam	$6.48
Norway	Oslo	$6.27
Italy	Milan	$5.96
Denmark	Copenhagen	$5.93
Belgium	Brussels	$5.91
Sweden	Stockholm	$5.80
United Kingdom	London	$5.79
Germany	Frankfurt	$5.57
France	Paris	$5.54
Portugal	Lisbon	$5.35
Hungary	Budapest	$4.94
Luxembourg		$4.82
Croatia	Zagreb	$4.81
Ireland	Dublin	$4.78
Switzerland	Geneva	$4.74
Spain	Madrid	$4.55
Japan	Tokyo	$4.24
Czech Republic	Prague	$4.19
Romania	Bucharest	$4.09
Andorra		$4.08
Estonia	Tallinn	$3.62
Bulgaria	Sofia	$3.52
Brazil	Brasilia	$3.12
Cuba	Havana	$3.03
Taiwan	Taipei	$2.84
Lebanon	Beirut	$2.63
South Africa	Johannesburg	$2.62
Nicaragua	Managua	$2.61
Panama	Panama City	$2.19
Russia	Moscow	$2.10
Puerto Rico	San Juan	$1.74
Saudi Arabia	Riyadh	$0.91
Kuwait	Kuwait City	$0.78
Egypt	Cairo	$0.65
Nigeria	Lagos	$0.38
Venezuela	Caracas	$0.12

Kind Words..........

Today I was running errands.  I dropped off my daughter at her father's to celebrate Passover.
On the way home I swung by Massachusetts General Hospital to pick up my mother's prescriptions from the hospital pharmacy.

For whatever reason, her prescriptions were not ready and I was told to come back in 10 minutes.  Normally I would be a little annoyed, but it was a nice day out and the cafeteria has really good smoothies.

I took a little pit stop in the ladies room.  While I was washing my hands, the woman next to me looked in the mirror and said, "Oh...this wind is not good for my hair!"

She was a very lovely older woman.  She had an accent, I am guessing she was from Ethiopia.  She was impecably dressed and her hair looked windswept.

I said, "You hair looks great!  Windswept hair is very in fashion right now!"

She laughed and then looked at me and said, "You are a good person.  You say things
to make people happy!  Because of you I will have a good day today."

I have to say, it kind of took me by surprise.  How many times do we keep our mouths shut and let the opportunity for a kind word pass us by?  And how many times do we forget to thank someone for their kind words when we do get them? 

She wasn't the only one who had a good day.  Her kind words to me put a spring in my step.
And it reminded me of a beauty tip Audrey Hepburn once gave, "for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness."

You don't understand? Well, allow me to explain....

"It is difficult for me to understand how it was possible that priests betray in this way their mission ... to these children."

That is what Pope Benedict XVI said.  He said he didn't understand.  This makes me very angry! It makes me angry for several reasons. 

First, for a long time, I was trying to be a good Catholic.  I was born, I was baptized, I went through many of the sacraments, I "strayed" from the church and I was trying really hard to be a good Catholic again.  And then my trust in the Catholic church was shattered.  By who?  Well, by the Catholic Church itself. 

There are MANY reasons that I am angry with the Catholic church.  Their view on gay marriage, birth control, women in the priesthood and a whole bunch of other stuff I won't bore you with.  My main reason is this.... not only were children being abused by priests, but these priests were being protected by the Catholic Church.

Now, let's really look at the statement:

"It is difficult for me to understand how it was possible that priests betray in this way their mission ... to these children."

Well, there were priests who were pedophiles.  They took advantage of their position.  What I am not hearing is any admission of guilt, any contrition for protecting these pedophile priests.  I think a few mea culpas are in order here.  I can only speak for the Boston Archdiocese, but when they found out there were pedophile priests within the flock, instead of turning them over to the police, they were just quietly sent away to another parish.  They provided these priests with fresh new victims.

I don't care if you wear a collar around your neck.  I don't care if you took a whole truck load of vows.  If you raped a child, then you should go to jail.  If Joe Shmow down the street rapes a child, he should go to jail.  I don't see why priests are any different. 

If the Pope is interested in healing wounds.... I have a suggestion.  (And again, I speak for those of us in Boston.)  Give us Cardinal Archbishop Bernard Francis Law!  Send him back to Boston and stop giving him sanctuary like Quasimodo in Notre Dame!  That man knew there were priests abusing kids and did nothing.  Even worse than nothing...he was ok with just shuffling them around to new parishes so they could abuse more children.  And when the shit hit the fan, he boarded a plane to the Vatican.

Let's just keep something in mind....Pope Benedict is not some new guy who had this thing fall in his lap.  He was a trusted advisor to Pope John Paul the II.  He knew this was going on before he became the Pope.

Bernard Law protected pedophile priests, the Vatican protects Bernard Law...its like some kind of sick circle.  Pope Benedict XVI is the head of the Catholic Church and he says he is ashamed. 

He should be.

Hey Harvard!! I Want an Apology!!

As I have mentioned before.  From time to time, things fall into place in my life.  All the bills are paid.  No one is sick.  Job satisfaction is running high.  Things look rosey.  When this happens I find something to bitch about because I am just happier being bent out of shape about something.

I was thinking the other day about how lucky I am to live in Boston. (Granted I live in a burb now, but I was born and raised in Dorchester, yes, I'm a Dot Rat.)  When you live in Boston, you live among some of the best hospitals in the world.  You are within reach of some of the most historic places in the country.  You are a stones throw from top level universities. 

I started to think about all these colleges and universities, Boston College, Boston University, Tufts, Emmerson, Wellesley, the University of Massachusetts (I went to UMass Amherst) and of course Harvard.  Hmmmm...Harvard.

From time to time my department has an intern or two from Harvard.  The majority have all showed up with an unbearable sense of entitlement.  I have caught Harvard interns rubbing their school in the faces of other interns that might go to state schools or just another school that isn't Harvard.  Gotta say it really pissed me off because I went to a state school and I feel I got a prefectly wonderful education thank you very much.

So if these INTERNS have such a huge sense of entitlement, imagine some of the Alumni.  Keep in mind, I am not saying ALL Harvard interns and alumns are jerks, but I've come some Harvard alumns and interns that just leave me baffled.  How do you carry around such a huge ego without a hernia.

So I started to think about some famous Harvard Alumns:

Jeffrey K. Skilling - This former Enron CEO is a graduate of the Harvard Business School.

Paul Bremer - This captain of industry was supposed to bring order to Iraq, instead he made everything worse and misplaced 9 billion dollars.  He is a graduate of the Harvard Business School.

George W. Bush - Need I say more?  He is a graduate of the Harvard Business School.  Do we see a trend here?

Cardinal Archbishop Bernard Law - This "man of God" protected pedophile priests.  Instead of turning them into the authorities for child rape, he just moved them to other parishes, so they could rape other children.  He is a Harvard graduate and currently hiding out in the Vatican.

Alberto Gonzalez - Do we need to go into this?  He has a Harvard Law degree.

The Unibomber - enough said.