von Koehler
** In Timeout **
....what follows is the first installment of a fictional representation of how Peak Oil
will effect America. Please note that this is only a conjecture, not a specific prediction.
Thanksgiving 2005.
It was a bit of a struggle but the family had their traditional Thanksgiving dinner after all, he thought. The meal was costly, but he wanted to preserve the feeling that things will continue as in the past. Thank God that a new interest payment only credit card came though the mail; the grocery stores had long ago accepted plastic for payment. The next time we refinance the house, I just have to add it to the total. Again, he mused. Lately there's been more and more fiction between him and his wife about money, or more accurately, the lack of it. But they both didn't want their kids to know about it, but it was a problem that was getting harder to pretend didn't exist. Just this evening his daughter brought up the topic of her old car, that the mechanic had warned her that her tires were bald and needed to be replaced. Great, he thought, there's an easy $400 gone, quickly followed by, Where's the money going to come from? Everything was
going up in price, groceries, electric, you name it, except for his paycheck. He even had to adopt the Gas Company's monthly year round budget plan after getting that whopping $600 heating bill for last February.
Gasoline was now $3.25 a gallon. It had creeped up by a dime or so it seemed every week. He reflected how when he was his daughter's age, and got his first car, a beater really, gas was a whole ****ing 35 cents a gallon. He and his buddies would scrounge the sofa in their college dump for loose change. It seemed that they were always broke but gas was so cheap that it never crossed their minds to question why. They were far more interested in who they were seeing at the time. Boy, he wished he still had that old '65 Chevy; he had gotten laid for the first time in its back seat. That seemed like yesterday; only a hundred years ago from his present reality. He was rudely awaken from this silent and most private of his cherished memories. His wife was bitching about the cost of food, especially vegetables and meat. She had just bought a whole roasting chicken, on sale for $15! Christ, he thought, are chickens becoming extinct or what?
Both he and his wife had good jobs, careers he corrected himself, and over the past decades they had made some good moves. With the birth of their son, they bought their first house. Next his wife started to work and they could then afford some luxuries. His wife's parents helped out with the first down payment, a fact which they never failed to mention in the years to come. Prices steadily climbed over the years, as more and more new subdivisioins sprouted up from the farmland around the edges of the city. Cars made it possible to flee the conjestion and "undesirables" of the city. Farmers liked to joke that their last crop, houses, paid the best. They were playing a money game, of buying up from their previous house to something always bigger and bettor. They always stretched themselves financially when they made that next purchase and it had paid off. He really couldn't take credit for making such great financial scores; the general economy over time had bailed them out. Their equity had grown, tax deferred, with each house purchase and resale. What's the point of saving a few bucks each paycheck when their house was steadily increasing in value every month? All they had to do was make the monthly mortgage payment, just one more bill along with the car payments and crewit cards. The kids grew up in a good school district, and the truth was that they enjoyed a good suburban lifestyle.
His son had just graduated from college this June, and had a whopping $30,000 in student loans to prove it. Trouble was, there wasn't much of a job market for pysch majors. The government kept annoucing that the unemployment rate was up slightly to only 6.1% but he doubted it. Worries about his own job were becoming harder and harder to push to the back of his mind. The sales department was perennially optimistic; privately the salesman complained how lousy their sales and commissions were. When companies got into financial trouble, or just plain needed to boost profits to keep their stock prices up, they resorted to mass layoffs. No about question whether someone was a good worker or not, management needed personal to fill their body count. The economy was reeling from higher energy costs, something the govewrnment economists always dismissed in their monthly reports as being somehow separate from the "core rate" whatever the hell that was.
Some companies were effected only to the extent that their higher utility bills impacted their bottom lines. Others were not so fortunate. The colossal jump in natural gas prices forced the fertilizer industry to basically bail out of the US market. Hence forth, it was imported from overseas. The plastic industry was also hit hard. Car companies were having a terrible time maintaining their sales steady, even with zero percent financing or no payments for an incredible twelve months. They adopted a "throw shit on the wall and see if it sticks" approach to financing. Nearly anyone could be put behind the wheel of a new car; if they didn't make the payments the car could always be repro'ed. Pump prices had finally reached the point where some new car buyers opted for smaller cars delivering better mpg. It was a source of contention between him and his wife what to do about her Ford Expedition: the gas costs were simply becoming too high to drive it, but they still owed big bucks on it. She wanted to keep it, since they couldn't sell it for what they still owed on it she argued, and besides, she felt "safe" in it. Toys are hard to give up, who wants drink beer again after sipping champagne? he thought.
What his family didn't know, nor cared about, was that during their Thanksgiving dinner, Peak Oil had occurred. Beginning with a chancy first drilling in Pennsylvania back in 1859, the oil era had completely transformed humanity. Now in 2005, worldwide production of that magical black elicsior had peaked, and from that point forward would always be in decline.
Everyone's life was about to change.
Flavius Aetius
will effect America. Please note that this is only a conjecture, not a specific prediction.
Thanksgiving 2005.
It was a bit of a struggle but the family had their traditional Thanksgiving dinner after all, he thought. The meal was costly, but he wanted to preserve the feeling that things will continue as in the past. Thank God that a new interest payment only credit card came though the mail; the grocery stores had long ago accepted plastic for payment. The next time we refinance the house, I just have to add it to the total. Again, he mused. Lately there's been more and more fiction between him and his wife about money, or more accurately, the lack of it. But they both didn't want their kids to know about it, but it was a problem that was getting harder to pretend didn't exist. Just this evening his daughter brought up the topic of her old car, that the mechanic had warned her that her tires were bald and needed to be replaced. Great, he thought, there's an easy $400 gone, quickly followed by, Where's the money going to come from? Everything was
going up in price, groceries, electric, you name it, except for his paycheck. He even had to adopt the Gas Company's monthly year round budget plan after getting that whopping $600 heating bill for last February.
Gasoline was now $3.25 a gallon. It had creeped up by a dime or so it seemed every week. He reflected how when he was his daughter's age, and got his first car, a beater really, gas was a whole ****ing 35 cents a gallon. He and his buddies would scrounge the sofa in their college dump for loose change. It seemed that they were always broke but gas was so cheap that it never crossed their minds to question why. They were far more interested in who they were seeing at the time. Boy, he wished he still had that old '65 Chevy; he had gotten laid for the first time in its back seat. That seemed like yesterday; only a hundred years ago from his present reality. He was rudely awaken from this silent and most private of his cherished memories. His wife was bitching about the cost of food, especially vegetables and meat. She had just bought a whole roasting chicken, on sale for $15! Christ, he thought, are chickens becoming extinct or what?
Both he and his wife had good jobs, careers he corrected himself, and over the past decades they had made some good moves. With the birth of their son, they bought their first house. Next his wife started to work and they could then afford some luxuries. His wife's parents helped out with the first down payment, a fact which they never failed to mention in the years to come. Prices steadily climbed over the years, as more and more new subdivisioins sprouted up from the farmland around the edges of the city. Cars made it possible to flee the conjestion and "undesirables" of the city. Farmers liked to joke that their last crop, houses, paid the best. They were playing a money game, of buying up from their previous house to something always bigger and bettor. They always stretched themselves financially when they made that next purchase and it had paid off. He really couldn't take credit for making such great financial scores; the general economy over time had bailed them out. Their equity had grown, tax deferred, with each house purchase and resale. What's the point of saving a few bucks each paycheck when their house was steadily increasing in value every month? All they had to do was make the monthly mortgage payment, just one more bill along with the car payments and crewit cards. The kids grew up in a good school district, and the truth was that they enjoyed a good suburban lifestyle.
His son had just graduated from college this June, and had a whopping $30,000 in student loans to prove it. Trouble was, there wasn't much of a job market for pysch majors. The government kept annoucing that the unemployment rate was up slightly to only 6.1% but he doubted it. Worries about his own job were becoming harder and harder to push to the back of his mind. The sales department was perennially optimistic; privately the salesman complained how lousy their sales and commissions were. When companies got into financial trouble, or just plain needed to boost profits to keep their stock prices up, they resorted to mass layoffs. No about question whether someone was a good worker or not, management needed personal to fill their body count. The economy was reeling from higher energy costs, something the govewrnment economists always dismissed in their monthly reports as being somehow separate from the "core rate" whatever the hell that was.
Some companies were effected only to the extent that their higher utility bills impacted their bottom lines. Others were not so fortunate. The colossal jump in natural gas prices forced the fertilizer industry to basically bail out of the US market. Hence forth, it was imported from overseas. The plastic industry was also hit hard. Car companies were having a terrible time maintaining their sales steady, even with zero percent financing or no payments for an incredible twelve months. They adopted a "throw shit on the wall and see if it sticks" approach to financing. Nearly anyone could be put behind the wheel of a new car; if they didn't make the payments the car could always be repro'ed. Pump prices had finally reached the point where some new car buyers opted for smaller cars delivering better mpg. It was a source of contention between him and his wife what to do about her Ford Expedition: the gas costs were simply becoming too high to drive it, but they still owed big bucks on it. She wanted to keep it, since they couldn't sell it for what they still owed on it she argued, and besides, she felt "safe" in it. Toys are hard to give up, who wants drink beer again after sipping champagne? he thought.
What his family didn't know, nor cared about, was that during their Thanksgiving dinner, Peak Oil had occurred. Beginning with a chancy first drilling in Pennsylvania back in 1859, the oil era had completely transformed humanity. Now in 2005, worldwide production of that magical black elicsior had peaked, and from that point forward would always be in decline.
Everyone's life was about to change.
Flavius Aetius
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The signs are up and we aren't listening......our kids and grandkids won't have the choice.