So there I was, driving down to my local Target store. It has two entrances from the road, the main entrance, and the driveway in the back of the store. When I’m coming from the my house, I normally take the back entrance, as it’s closer than the more commonly used main one, and I don’t have to contend with the traffic in the front of the store.
IRVING — ExxonMobil, the Irving, Texas-based company, posted the largest corporate profits in U.S. history. Its earnings of $39.5 billion for 2006 on revenues of $377.6 billion exceed the previous record of $36.13 billion in 2005, also posted by ExxonMobil.
“If money is your hope for independence you will never have it. The only real security that a man will have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience, and ability.”
—Henry Ford
DEARBORN — Ford announced recently that it had losses of $12.7 billion for 2006, its largest loss in history (although still far below GM’s 1992 losses of $23.5 billion).
“The average human has about one breast and one testicle.”
–From Statistics 101
(If you’re one of my anal-retentive engineer friends, please don’t e-mail me about that last quote. I know that men technically have breasts as well, even if they’re not the pert, firm type—unless we’re talking about Ricardo Montalbán’s. The statement is meant to be humorous—you know, like a joke.)
After many years, Michigan has changed the design of its main license plate. Gone is the blue background with the white text. This has been the only license plate from Michigan that I can remember. In the 1970s, the blue was a very dark blue (maybe it was black—the past used to be black and white, you know), while the most recent blue is Lake Superior blue.
[Update 2007-01-16: Added photo slide show of auto show models.]
I’ve been going to the Detroit auto show almost every year that I’ve been in Detroit. Its official name is the North American International Auto Show (NAIAS), but since most Americans can’t find North America on a globe, I’ll refer to it as the Detroit auto show. Most Americans probably can’t find Detroit on a map either, but at least they think it’s the capital of Michigan.
I consider myself to be a gentle, easy-going, control-freak type of person with compulsive-obsessive tendencies. In general, as long as you do as I say, agree with all of my opinions, and have the same interests as I do, we’ll get along just fine.
I’m really just an ordinary, normal guy. I work, I pay taxes, I have a wife and a daughter. And I have simple needs—I just want to drive like Speed Racer all the time, but I would settle for people getting the heck out of my way. I could to do this more often if it weren’t for all those people on the road.