Math and Mapping talk, on a Friday? Unpossible!

I came across this site about a half hour ago, with maps showing gas prices across North America. Now, as fate would have it, my mother and I were discussing the gas prices and were wondering who actually paid more for gas, us or the Americans. This was spurred on by a report on rising gas prices we saw on the news. So we both did a little bit of conversion in our heads, and both came up with similar numbers saying that we payed a noticable amount more than our American friends.


So, when I got to this site and saw these maps, I was quite surprised. Not only did it blow my conceptions out of the water, it appeared that not only do we pay less for gas, but our highest prices seem to match their lowest prices.

I began to question my math skills, which I haven't really needed to use much since 1st year physics. So I broke out the old pencil and paper and did some math, using the average U.S. and Canadian prices noted on the site:

Avg US Price: $2.860/gallon
Avg CDN Price: 106.461/L

Converting their price to CDN dollars:
$2.86/gallon * exchange rate = CDN$ 3.17194/gallon

Then converting to litres (1US gallon = 3.785L):
CDN$ 3.17194/ 3.785L

Simple division gives us:

CDN$ 0.838/ 1L

Well, isn't that interesting. On average, not only do we pay more for gas, we pay over 20 cents per liter more per gas. So, undaunted by the map maker who should probably have syncrhonized the colour ramps he used to symbolize the maps, I needed to find out why we paid more. The answer, it seems, is simple...and is very Canadian:

TAXES!

It turns out that (on average) 32% of our gas price is taxes. I figured it was probably around 15%, so that's a bit of a shock.

Source

So, that must be the culprit...until I saw that the average gas tax in the U.S. is ~40%.

Source

So, using those tax figures, we pay ~72.4 cents/L before tax, whereas in the states they pay ~50c/L before tax. FIFTY CENTS PER LITER?

So, I'm at a bit of a loss. The way I see it, we either pay more for the crude oil (which doesn't make sense since it's a commodity that's traded globally, so should have a constant price), more for refining, more for distribution, or we give more to the retailer. But I'm done looking up statistics for the time being, except for one last one:

In the UK, the prices work out to around 2.00/L, so it could be worse :)

Survivor: Race Wars

Well, that's the idea anyway:

Linkage

The new Survivor season is going to split up the cast into tribes according to race. This should be some interesting train wreck TV...maybe it will generate some interest in a show that's past its prime, though.

I haven't really payed much attention over the last few years, I can typically find something better to do for an hour. However, the train wreck factor here may be too much for me to resist.

Google SketchUp

So I'm lurking in a forum somewhere yesterday trying my best not to do any actual work, when a poster mentions "Google SketchUp". Now, I thought I was quite the Google junkie, as evidenced by the fact that I use Gmail, Google Calendar, Google News, have a custom Google homepage/RSS reader, have experimented with Google Pages and Google Spreadsheets, rely on Google Maps for directions, and spend far too much time playing with Google Earth than one person should (although, to be fair, Google Earth is basically the definition of my field of interest: computers and geospatial technology brought together).

So how is it that there was a Google tool that I hadn't heard of before? Especially because it's not a new tool, it's been around for a little bit. I check the homepage for Google SketchUp, download it, and am immediately blown away. Within 10 minutes, without having read any documentation, I had created a three dimensional model of a house from scratch. Now, granted, I have no immediate use for this tool, but it would be wicked for anyone who does design work. I have no idea how precise it is or anything, but simply as a conceptual modelling tool, it's very powerful. Check it out.

Why didn't I think of that?

I just read that some guy in Tennesee wanted to have his middle name/nickname added to the ballot on the U.S. elections in November. It seemed like a good idea, as some others had been allowed to put their nicknames on the ballot. However, the courts seemed to have a problem with his nickname. I mean really, it's not like it stands out or anything:

Bob Smith
Willie Jones
David "None of the Above" Gatchell

Now that's a smart idea...it only works if his name is last on the ballot though :)

And as a sidebar to this, why are the American campaigns so friggin long? I've been seeing these damn ads on tv for what seems like months, and there's still another 2-3 months to go!

They need to adopt the Canadian system: six weeks from election call to election day. End of story. No campaigning before that, period. It makes politics much easier to deal with during election time.

AirTap

Any music lover will appreciate this (I think). I know my fellow guitar players will :)



BTW, the guy's name is Erik Mongrain, he's got more videos on YouTube as well as a website if you want to see/hear more.

I Love Double Standards

I was just listening to the radio, and there was a commercial talking about what to do to make things easier when travelling at the airport this summer. They were going through things like not bringing knives and things like that, which is good info.

Then he said, "and remember, always be polite".


















Let me regale of a story from my recent trip to Quebec. We're on our way back from Quebec, arrive at Metro, and go to clear customs so we can get into the U.S. In the customs area, there are signs with big arrows leading to two different lanes, one for Americans, and one for visitors. We, not being American, go into the visitors line. Being a flight from Canada, it's about a 50/50 split of people being visitors and American. There are 5 lanes open for Americans, and 2 lanes open for visitors, but that's beside the point. We're standing in our nice long visitors line, when this customs lady (and I use that term loosely) bellows out "You at the back of the line, over here!". She was telling us that she wanted us to come over to the American lines to make things move faster, but the way she said it, it was like "Why the hell did you go to that line???". Hey dingus, that's what the sign said, don't yell at me because I did what you said.

You all have guns, so I'm going to do whatever the hell the signs say. It's not like we went in the wrong line, we went where we were supposed to. You get what you give folks. I'm curtious to these people because they have a tough job (although this lady's only job seemed to be to yell at the people in the "wrong line"). But if you yell at people who haven't done anything wrong, you should be quite willing to get a snarky response. "Always be polite" my ass.

STOP IT!!!!!

Why are news outlets allowed to espouse theory as fact???

Temperatures are reaching triple digits across the country and air conditioners are working overtime. They are also injecting additional carbon into the air, a gas known to insulate the planet and contribute to global warming.

Yes, the emphasis is mine, but hey, I have a response: YOU DON'T KNOW THAT, AND NEITHER DO I! NO ONE DOES! I'm all for clean air, and doing whatever we can to keep the air clean and breathable, but let's not present theory (well grounded, well researched theory, but still theory) as fact!

I think this post needs a dose of the flying spaghetti monster:

Global Warming and Pirates

So there, I'll get off my soapbox now.

This is getting ridiculous

What the hell is with this heat? The temperature today is expected to be 37 C. With the humidex, it's going to feel like 51 C!

51 freaking degrees! Before I left the house this morning I filled my water bottle. I put 6 ice cubes in the bottle and filled it with cold water from the pitcher in the fridge. I went outside, had been out there for about 2 minutes, went to take a drink, and the ice had all melted. I've got a 10 minute walk to the school, and I was beading with sweat by the time I got here. I think the "world jump day" people had it right.

Damn the geological processes warming up the earth!
Damn all the pollution that causes the smog!
Damn the sun!
Damn August!

Bring on fall!