Rigs Don't Matter -- Finally, After A Decade Of Pointing This Out, Someone Is Now Tracking Frack Spreads Vs Production -- December 12, 2021

Link here. 

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There's Not Enough Oil

Doomberg, "the gold rush."

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Nor Are There Enough Chopsticks

I can't make this stuff up.

My wife and I took Sophia to her favorite sushi restaurant last night. Her parents were going to an "office" Christmas party. Sophia's favorite sushi restaurant is a very, very high end restaurant (for us) but it's literally out our back door -- we can walk to it. 

 

It's a wonderful Japanese restaurant. Without tip, for the three of us, the dinner came to $85, almost on the nose. Before this "transitory inflation"  the meal for the three of us might have run $65, although we had not been there in such a long time it's hard to tell.

May and Sophia had only water. I had an incredibly good drink -- the drinks were not priced on the menu, so I assumed my drink would have been in the $15 range. I was surprised to see it was $9.00. Generally speaking, $8.00 is the going price for drinks for restaurants we visit (which is now very, very rarely), so $9.00 was a pleasant surprise.

 

One could tell the restaurant was slightly understaffed but not by much.

The restaurant has, of course, nice, one-time use chopsticks. Fancy but not incredibly fancy. 

I never, never, never eat sushi or any Japanese meal without chopsticks. They did not give us chopsticks, just a fork. 

We asked for chopsticks; normally the server carries dozens in their apron pockets. Our server did not. She went back to get us three pair. When she returned with the chopsticks, she explained that there was a shortage of chopsticks -- I kid you not. 

Knowing that Sophia would either not use her chopsticks or could share mine if needed, we offered to give back one of our  three pair of chopsticks. The server was very grateful and took the chopsticks back.  

A shortage of chopsticks. That cargo ship must still be anchored off the coast of southern California. 

Which reminds me: my wife and I have any number of really, really nice chopsticks, more decorative than functional. But from now on, I'm going to carry several pair of chopsticks when we go out to eat. I'll just keep them in the car. In fact, I might also bring our decorative soup bowls.

Sukiyaki, Kyu Sakamoto

Isn't this something? Even without knowing the words, one just knows this is an incredibly sad song. 

It begins:

I look up when I walk
So that the tears won’t fall.
Remembering those happy spring days,
But tonight I am all alone.