I too grew up on game shows in the 70s. I'm not sure if they were really better or if it's just nostalgia. But I too loved Match Game and the Liars' Club which was a similar sort of show in many ways with semi-celebrities BS-ing with each other. And I am very surprised no one has brought back Treasure Hunt, although there's no way it could live up to its 70s predecessor. I suppose Deal or No Deal is a similar sort of game but it really isn't nearly as interesting. It's like the difference between the Chuck Woollery version of Wheel of Fortune where they had to go shopping with their winnings and buy things like ceramic dalmatians for $49 and what that show became when it was all just about cash. It's just boring.

It will be interesting to see exactly what Obama says to this right wing audience. Is he going to pander in their direction? Or will he challenge them and their dogma? I have to say that wile I like Obama's charisma, his religiosity does give me pause.

The rains and floods are hitting hard all over Asia. Thailand had severe floods in 1995 followed by several years of pretty bad droughts. This year was more and more flooding.

And the Philippines has been hit by several strong Typhoons this year and they are trying to recover at the moment from mud slides and floods.

Of course as populations rise more and more people and their homes are in harm's way.

The problem with the schedule in the NHL now is too many games against the same teams. The Leafs played the Sens 4 times in the first month of the season. It's a good rivalry and all, but there's no reason for scheduling like that.

And the Western teams really are at a travel disadvantage due to the number of teams on the east coast. Having Vancouver in the same conference as Detroit or Dallas or Columbus means lots of long travel for their conference games. Even within their division it's a long way from Vancouver to Minnesota or Anaheim to Dallas. While in the east the Rangers and Islanders and Devils all drive across the street to play each other 8 times. All the teams in the east are in the same time zone.

I guess all sports have stupid schedules like this though. The only other sport I follow closely is soccer, and MLS has a totally idiotic schedule of their own. These schedules create lots of inequalities since teams never play each other an equal amount of times and some teams get to play more games against bad teams while others get stuck with harder games against better opponents. All of that skews the standings to make they pretty much meaningless, especially when you are awarding league-wide trophies for teams with the "best record" or most points.

The NHL Center Ice package is totally worth it as far as I am concerned. If you buy it at the start of the season it's "only" $139. But you get pretty much every game. And the great thing is you get to see the Canadian production and announcers for most of the games involving Canadian teams and the whole Hockey Night In Canada broadcast on Saturday night. It just all sounds and looks better with their broadcasters than the crappy FSN-x local US broadcasts.

I'm not sure it matters that a US carrier is on this route or any other. US international airports are full of carriers from around the world these days flying routes from our country to places all over the world. And as others have pointed out they are doing it with much more in the way of comfort, amenities, and politeness of air staff than the US carriers do or can. And with the big global alliances you can even collect FF miles into your US account by flying on the foreign partner lines.

However it's not just he US carriers that make you keep the window shades closed except take off and landing. I flew Thai Airways JFK-BKK and we had to keep the shades closed. The staff certainly enforced this, and anyway people were trying to sleep at various times and it was always daylight outside on the way to BKK, so keeping the shades closed was a necessity. Of course on the way back it was dark for most of the trip though...

If there was traffic to support more routes to sub-Saharan Africa and money to be made I'm sure the airlines would be all over it. Routes to Asia seem to be expanding thanks to more long-range aircraft and the demand for seats. It is a business after all.

The WP's curmudgeon columnist Marc Fisher also has a blog about this subject today. He claims he tried CF bulbs but couldn't see when he used them. The comments posted by readers basically tell him he's a moron.

I like the CF bulbs I have been using. I just wish they made a bulb with the right shape to fit into my floor lamp. The base needs to be fairly long and narrow and all the CF bulbs I have seen are too squat between the screw connector and the start of the bulb. I will definitely check out the site you cite though.