There are really only two complaints I have lately, and I think everybody else around here has the same two:

The Weather and Gas Prices.

We're going from 60's in the afternoon to the low 30's (complete with frost and freeze warnings) by the time we wake up. The house was 61 degrees this morning because we don't have the heat turned on any more. Why should we? It's late April! Not only that, but we have one of those houses that - to get the optimum balance of heating OR air conditioning requires the opening or closing of certain vents around the house, and they're mutually exclusive to the function that you need them for. That means that if we decide that it's getting too cold in the house, we have to flip all of the vents that we opened/closed for air conditioning when it's been near 80 and house is just cooking.

And Gas Prices? Don't get me started... We're just pennies away in our area when hit hist the $3.00-mark for regular. I've been over $3 for a few weeks now using Premium. The whole situation is just pissing me off. I can't help believe that if the Iraq war didn't happen that we'd be involved somewhere on this planet with anybody that wasn't producing all the oil they could. I can't believe that we're looking at $3, with the possibility of $4 actually happening in the not so distant future.

Yes, America is addicted to oil. Yes everyone is complaining., even the damn SUV drivers which are sucking-up more gas now than 10 or 15 years ago. Are they cutting back their use? No, they're just paying more to live the American Way.

I don't know, I'm just so pissed off at a situation that has no "silver bullet", no easy fix, no short-term fix, and maybe not even a long-term fix...

...and then you hear things like an executive leaving Exxon Mobile and getting $400 million in a retirement package?

How insane has all of this become?

Wait... some details...

It's Exxon Mobil's CEO Lee Raymond.

He has called global warming a hoax.

His total compensation package is worth $398 million. That brought his total compensation during his 13 years as chairman to $686 million.

Last year Exxon Mobil had a world's record profit of $36 billion. Profit. It is now the largest corporation in the world. That retirement package is only, what, 1 percent of profit?

C'mon, how 'bout taking one for the country and doing something with gas prices?

Now, admittedly, back in 1999, when Exxon acquired Mobil, oil was at $10/barrel. Looking through my gas records (I only use Mobil gas, and yes, I have records going back that far), the year started at $1.19.9 in January and ended at $1.53.9 in December (with the initial big jump in February/March), a steady rise all year for Premium grade.

$1.19. Ah yes, I remember those days...