Author: Dick

If you read, hear and/or watch the news these days you might get the impression that America is in the midst of a major riceless crisis. Big retailers such as Sam’s Club and Costco have restricted rice sales although those restrictions would hardly affect an American family of four or even an illegal immigrant family of 21 to a household.

It, a supposed shortage of rice is all “rice fluff,” says the article below from Texas AgriLife Extension Service writer Kathleen Phillips:

COLLEGE STATION – Reports about shortages of rice in the United States probably apply only to several imported varieties, and definitely not to the domestic supply of the popular grain.

This week’s news that two large box retailers in the United States were limiting customer purchases of rice was shocking in a nation where food shortages are rare.

Retailers Sam’s Club and Costco reportedly limited bulk sales of some varieties of rice – all of which are imported from other countries – in some stores across the nation, according to the Associated Press.

But the reason behind the limits and the facts about rice supply aren’t in sync, according to Dr. Mark Welch, Texas AgriLife Extension Service agricultural economist.

“Rice markets have been roiled by reports of trade restrictions by large rice exporting countries India, Vietnam, and Brazil and reports of rice rationing in the U.S. by major food retailers Sam’s Club and Costco,” Welch said.

Rice supplies are at relatively low levels, but the surge of panic buying and rapidly escalating prices is not supported by supply and demand fundamentals, he noted.

“Rice is an important staple in the diets of over half of the world’s population. Any price increase on persons with limited economic resources is a hardship,” Welch said. “The recent surge in prices has severe consequences for those who struggle daily for adequate nutrition.”

Welch said per capita consumption of rice has not increased in the last several years. Demand for corn and soybeans is increasing largely due to biofuels and feed use, but wheat and rice demand are basically unchanged.

Welch pointed out these facts about the rice supply:

– People in the U.S. eat about 4 pounds of rice a month. That’s a total of about 10 million hundredweights a month in the nation.

– The U.S. has about 104 million hundredweights in supply right now – a 10-month supply.

– And the new U.S. crop will be harvested beginning in September, only about five months from now, and should replenish supplies.

Down here in Texas Rice Country, people aren’t in much of a panic either. A Beaumont (Texas) Enterprise article today noted that local rice growers are getting calls from folks whom they had not previously heard but otherwise the domestic rice supply seems to be in a pretty good condition.

Still, when you hear the words “food shortages” bandied about it kind of leaves an unease with you of the type one feels when they walk through high weeds after seeing a sign that says: “Watch Out For Rattlesnakes.” With the price of oil and gasoline through the bazoonga (whatever that is) and inflation rearing its ugly head and talks of that dreaded “R” word, recession, one gets paranoid about practically every little thing. Paranoid? I’m not paranoid. Who thinks I am paranoid? Oh my.

With knowledge that the domestic rice situation is stable at least for now maybe we can sit down this evening with a good old bowl of rice and not worry too much that we need to start hording our food supply. Of course, I will be eating a baked potato.

Just a short missive to wish all a Happy Earth Day. Go out and play in the earth. Enjoy the earth, enjoy the Earth, enjoy Eartha, if ya got ’em. As for me, I will go green by needlessly spending money on some thing or the other. Otherwise, I’ll stay off the highway and conserve my energy. Oh here is an article about comics banding together for Earth Day.

Greetings from the “Oldest Town in Texas.” That would be Nacogdoches, what I call my “second hometown,” since I spent more than 15 years living there in three different lives. Well, one life but three different … whatever. I am in town on business. That is much better than saying I am in town goofing off, which is what I am doing right now although officially I am taking a lunch break.

The past weekend was rather turbulent for me and it appears my attempt at a romantic relationship at age 52 has hit the rocks and left me … whatever. Whatever is kind of the mood I am in today. That is why it was nice driving up here to Nac on a cloudy Monday through the pine forests of East Texas, alone with my thoughts and hearing a few good country songs on the radio. Country music, not always my favorite but sometimes is, owes much of its origins to the blues. That is why country can make you feel better when you are down because your woman cheated on you. Ditto the blues. Don’t ask me how that works. You hear something depressing and it is supposed to make you feel better. I suppose it is because misery loves company, or so goes the saying.

Oh well, I mustn’t tarry too long here in the Nac PL. I got a few places to go before I have my appointments for work. Hope the drive back to Beaumont is just as serene, perhaps a bit happier.

My friend Bruce and I were discussing the use of technology — particular the utility of blogging — last evening during a long-distance chat. Bruce was traveling the Great Trail of Broken Tail Lights that is North Central Expressway to the north of Dallas while I was waiting in my Upper Texas Coastal city for my girlfriend to cease being pissed off at me for a few minutes for whatever was my latest transgression. Ah love. Ahem.

I told Bruce that I felt newspapers — in their true newspaper fashion — tend to overdo blogs and technology. The philosophy of most newspaper executives is similar to that of a substance abuser. One pill works, so a whole bottle must work even better. So goes newspapers whose publishers and ad director and editor who feel blogs are the greatest thing since sliced cheese so a whole lot of blogs and techno-hooey will bring sunshine into their readers’ lives and every news exec will get a raise hereafter. Hereafter, of course, their reporters’ old ’92 Accord or ’90 Sentra leaves a tailpipe or a universal joint in the newspaper parking lot. And so it goes.

Today I read of a study that shows newspaper blogs are not significantly increasing public discourse in political matters. That is not wholly an unexpected finding as far as I am concerned. In fact, despite an increase in blog readership in larger newspaper sites:

” … the results of our study call into question whether newspapers are wasting valuable staff resources. The time it takes a reporter to post a blog entry that attracts 10 or fewer comments could be time better spent in other areas. Newspapers might consider spending staff time monitoring blogs as sources of news rather than trying to re-create the blogosphere on their Web sites.”

To a former newspaper reporter, that too is not a significant revelation. That even though newspaper editors will always find a way to piss away their valuable staff resources one way or the other. Three years since I worked full time as a newspaper reporter and I feel like I kicked the habit. Unfortunately, I haven’t been freelancing as much as I would like either.

Take it or leave it, I thought I would throw in a little inside baseball about newspapers and why blogs aren’t enough to save the might ink-stained wretches from the ruin of techno-bulls**t.

Something went awry with the turkey stew my significant other cooked last night so she is apparently trying it again. In the meantime, it is almost mid-afternoon and I am hungry once again, thus I think about those street vendors one would find up and down Magsaysay Drive in Olangapo, Philippines, when I visited there numerous times as a sailor back in the late 1970s.

Specifically, two meals on a stick could be easily found there. One was barbecued hot dog on a stick — kind of like a corn dog without the corn meal wrapping. The other stick meal was monkey on a stick, which tasted either like pork, chicken, frog or one of the Donner Party, depending upon how much you are into evolution.

Here is a monkey meat on a stick recipe I found. It is geared toward pork but if you happen to raise your monkeys to eat — you sick f**k — then I suppose you could substitute. I don’t know if there are any places in America you can get good monkey meat but I suppose if it was in Arkansas it would be served with a high heapin’ o’ cole slaw on top. Oh well, petit!