Around here the corn burning stoves went into houses like crazy. Corn seems to burn well, much less work than wood, little mess left for cleaning out. Takes small amount of corn to keep the WHOLE house warm. I was rather surpised at how enthusiastic the new owners are over corn stoves. Transportation may not be the whole cost, but tractors are fueled with gas and oil, to work the soil and bring in the crops. Tractors are not especially efficient in fuel usage, cost a bunch to produce those crops. Costs that farmer has to pass to buyers so farmer can at least pay his bills. Hay is supposed to be costing more, I know the truck to go get it runs on fuel that has more than doubled in cost since last year. Much equipment is diesel powered, even costlier than gas. Diesel has always been cheaper to produce, now they just WON'T produce it, keeping cost high. Bush and his Oil friends are making plenty of money. Keeping cost of doing business for truckers very high. Consumers pay that extra. I don't know if Ethanol is going to be cost effective as a fuel. We have a local plant being built 5 miles away, 60 new jobs in a very hard hit job market area. Everyone is excited, but for corn fuel to be useful, it can't cost more to produce than it costs to sell. At least the farmers can sell their product, so many were just losing money planting corn. Prices just never got where you could turn a profit. I buy our grain, mixed at a local mill. No commercial bagged food for the animals so I am not seeing those costs. We use quite a bit of corn in the horse feed, prices seem to be staying higher than other years. I think the oats come from Canada. Not sure why they are not local, we do have oat production. Dry dog food prices are higher, even on the junky stuff. Again, I would point at mostly fuel prices to raise a crop, then transportation to get products to market.

Well DB, You seem to have captured the gist of the artical without admitting ignorance. I gave you the source yesterday, but you refused to read or admit that when I said I "read", and the key word was "read" an artical posted by a local news source, "pricing for TXU was over 16 cents per kw". You either missed or ignored the other value that I claimed was in a December bill. a period several months before current price reductions. Now as to your claim? Aren't you leaving off the surcharge from this claim? You must be a shill for TXU also. But I guess you have the right to be selectively stupid. Wake up and smell the kilowatts. Or are you too befuddled to think simple thoughts. As to the hundreds of billions of losses that Texas has been forced to pay for. TXU sold several companies during the last 3 years, that lost billions of dollars. One that supplied a majority of French customers power (France), one that supplied some English customers (England), and a wopping utility that supplied either Australia or New Zealand with power. Also they lost very heavy with Lone Star Gas that became Atmos (N. Texas). Do you wish to debate this claim also?

Thanks so much for this info. Happyladi, that is SO helpful! I like to hear of first-hand reports from someone who has actually had the ReStor lenses. On the web, I have found more comments of dissatisfied results than good ones, although I think people tend to report back more if they are unhappy. I guess millions of people have accommodated to reading glasses, so I can, too. All my life I have had to contend with my nearsightedness. My array of eyewear is mind boggling. Regular glasses, prescription sunglasses, contact lenses, readers for over the contact lenses and regular sunglasses for over the contact lenses. Plus, carrying contact lens solution, lens container and my regular glasses just in case I need then while wearing my contacts. I had to wear contacts while skiing because the goggles didn't fit over my glasses. On the other hand, when snorkeling the water magnifies things so I could see fine without glasses. Of course, I had to have glasses handy for when I got out of the water!! For those of you with good eyesight, count your blessings!

Around here, every time the rates increase our mailman takes a couple dollars from his own pocket, buys a bunch of penny stamps, and uses them to bump up the postage as needed for a month or so, until the new rate sinks in. He's saved me from having bills, letters, or cards returned for insufficient postage more than once! Sometimes the guys on the front lines have more sense than the bosses ... probably true in every industry.