Having a quiet day mostly at home. They started making rather dire predictions about the price of gasoline going up dramatically with hurricane Rita in the Gulf of Mexico, so I filled up my Jeep yesterday at $2.50/gallon. When Bill got home from school today I took his little truck in to the same gas station and it was $2.73/gallon. And there were lines both days. The only other time I have seen a line at our corner gas station was when the power went out in a big chunk of the eastern US and Canada a couple of summers ago, and that station was one of the first in the Detroit area to get its power back. Even if Rita spares the oil refineries, there might be shortages because everyone is so freaked out by the news reports of $5/gallon gas that they are topping off their tanks, just like I did. But what can you do? I need to make sure I have gas -- I have no public transportation to get to work, and I work in a hospital. I have to make sure that I have gas.

The cold is better today. Still sniffling, but drinking tons of hot mint tea has helped a lot today.  I should have been planting flowers, but decided to spend most of the day doing quiet things, resting, and drinking hot tea instead. With this new hurricane, I need to try to get and stay healthy in case I get sent somewhere down south.

I did go grocery shopping, which is always interesting. It is still September, and the store is filled with Christmas products.  Is that weird or what???????????

I cannot even bring myself to watch the news today. After Katrina, I cannot stand to watch the possible devastation and suffering from Rita.  I should watch it, since I might go down there -- but I just cannot stand to watch it today.

I was thinking earlier that the some of the earliest national issues I can remember as a child are the end of the Vietnam War and Watergate. My poor children will remember September 11 and Katrina (maybe Rita).  I got the end of a war. They get the beginning of one. I got a bloodless political corruption scandal. They get unfathomable suffering and dead bodies floating in the water.