(Side note: Costco stocks one or more Kashi cereals. They may or may not be vegan, but they seem entirely inedible to me. Kashi used to make one of my all-time favorite cereals, Chocolate Pillows, but they discontinued it back in 2004 or so.)

(Side note #2: Anyone want to invest in my new cereal, ‘GoRegular Cardboard Crunch’? It’s all natural, vegan, low in fat, sodium and sugars, and high in fiber. AND it’s made with 100% post-consumer recycled material!)

Anyway, out of desperation, I finally got around to looking at the “Premium” Post Raisin Bran. The box design is different from the supermarket version, and states that the product is “made exclusively for Kirkland Signature by Post”. The ingredients looked acceptable, so I took some home.

What a difference! It’s not heaven by any means, but it IS what I’d always imagined that raisin bran was supposed to taste like. Here’s a comparison of the ingredient lists:

POST RAISIN BRAN:

Whole grain wheat, raisins, wheat bran, sugar, corn syrup, salt, wheat flour, malted barley flour.

KIRKLAND SIGNATURE PREMIUM POST RAISIN BRAN:

Raisins (raisins, glycerin), wheat bran, whole wheat flour, cane sugar, malt extract, whole grain barley flour, molasses, grape juice concentrate, caramel color, salt, vanilla flavor, mixed tocopherols (natural vitamin E), and ascorbic acid (natural vitamin C) for freshness.

Maybe someday Post will decide to integrate its multiple Raisin Bran personalities into one, and non-Costco members will get the chance to taste the better version for themselves.

The auction listing kept all bidder info private, and the seller promised that the socks were seriously worn and smelly. “In fact,” she wrote, “I’m wearing them right now.”

Uh-oh. Could it be? Could there possibly be smelly sock fetishists out there? I typed “used socks” into the search field. Sure enough, 155 matching auctions came up. Of the ones that I checked, all kept their bidders’ identities private.

Next, I Googled “used socks”. Yup. “usedsocks.net” shows a beautiful woman in a bikini and proclaims “This is my personal website where I am selling my used socks.”. “usedsocks.org” features a sex blog and foot photo gallery. Poco Panties cashes in with used panties, bras, lingerie, clothes and… socks.

And no, I’m not linking to these people. Find them for yourself.

But the proof that this thing has gone (somewhat) mainstream is the eHow tutorial. No, I’m not kidding. You, too, can learn how to make a profit selling used socks. Of course, you have to be a young, attractive female who doesn’t have a problem with putting suggestive photos of yourself online. Or you can do it through Ebay, where the photos tend to be more tame.

Since I make my living as an internet researcher, I come across fetish trends on a regular basis. I pity the young teen who types something like “intercourse” into Google Images and tries to learn about sex through the resulting photos. They’ll be left with the impression that making babies requires two men, one woman and several very flexible orifices. Or one woman who has (apparently) no internal organs, and one very large sex toy.

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if someone travelled back in time and tried to show a group of 19th century men some modern day porn. Remember, back then, you were one lucky dude if you caught a glimpse of some woman’s ankle. I think seeing a woman stuff a football up her behind (yes, it exists) would make them drop dead on the spot. Their brains would explode.

Even today, most of the world’s population would be unable to comprehend what the hell they were seeing. And if they were able to wrap their heads around it, their most likely reaction would be outrage. We in the western world have become desensitized to over-the-top images of sex and violence. The clash of cultures is often a clash of the overprotected versus the overstimulated. We would do well to remind ourselves of that from time to time.

In 2009, Taiwan’s birth rate stood at 1.0 births per woman. This is well below the replacement rate of 2.1.

Why do they want more babies? They need workers to replace their aging workforce.

As any population scientist can tell you, the higher the education level of the female population, the fewer children that they’ll have. Given that the human race is way, way past our carrying capacity (the number of individuals that can be fully supported by available resources), falling birthrates are a very good thing. Furthermore, one must wonder how the highly-educated single women of Taiwan feel about this unwelcome intrusion into their personal lives by their government.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Committee for Refugees & Immigrants reports that, by December 2008, there were almost 2.7 MILLION people seeking refuge worldwide. That number continues to grow at a terrifying, heartbreaking rate as violent conflicts, natural disasters and disappearing resources make more of our world virtually uninhabitable.

My advice to Taiwan? If you need more workers, accept more refugees. Leave your happy, single women alone. And thanks for having a low birth rate!

Let’s support education for females worldwide, so that this wonderful statistic spreads.

This affects the 2007WFP, the 2407WFP, the 2005WFP and others. If you contact Dell directly about the problem, you’ll get answers ranging from “Maybe you can get a local place to fix it.” to “Please RMA the stand to us and we’ll replace it for you.”.

Avoid the hassle. The problem is easy to fix. Just press down on the top of your monitor *before* you press the button, then move it back upwards. Viola!

Dell does have a nice tutorial explaining this (sorta kinda), but good luck finding it through a search engine.

Apparently, this rubs reality the wrong way, because it fights back by frequently mocking ‘The Onion’. I came across this example in my tiny local paper’s ‘Looking Back At 2009′ news roundup:

From the North Lake Travis LOG

PV councilman walks out of meeting

POINT VENTURE, April 9–Councilman Ron Hruby walked out of the Point Venture Village Council meeting Monday after Councilman Ed Stuart’s animal control report took longer than Hruby believed was necessary.

“Your three minutes is up.”, Hruby said, pushing back his chair and throwing down his pen. “Someone come and get me whenever he’s done.”

But animals ended up being a major concern for residents in attendance at the meeting, who expressed interest in addressing deer population control, coyote relocation programs, rabies shots for domestic animals and how to dispose of animal carcasses.

Gosh darnit, why couldn’t that all be addressed in 3 minutes?! I wonder if Hruby will be reelected…