Another Winter Storm and Toyota Tries to Save Face

So it is supposed to get colder as the day goes on. It is in the forties right now, but it is supposed to drop to 35 degrees by this afternoon. There is also a possibility of snow. This is so much fun. I have not seen this kind of weather since we moved up here. It is unusual. I love the cool weather. It’s better than the months and months of hot weather we had in South Florida. Lets cross our fingers that we get more snow.

I saw a commercial last night for Toyota. It had a couple stating they had driven Toyotas all their lives and have never had a problem. They said they respected a company that said they were trying to fix the problem with their cars and that their next car was going to be a Toyota. I think Toyota is going to have a very hard time coming back from this. There are so many people who are trying to turn their Toyotas in for new cars. Ford and Chevy are offering cash back for those people who turn in their old Toyotas. By the time everything is over, I think Toyota might be forced into bankruptcy, or at least downsizing their company. It is a sad, sad thing.

Cash for Clunkers: A Good Thing or Bad? While it Lasts, The Government Pays for Your Car… Partly

I almost wish I needed a now car. This deal that the government is offering Americans is almost too good to be true. They are offering up to $4,500 for people to trade in their old beat up gas guzzling cars and trucks for fuel saving hybrids and other fuel efficient cars.

They budgeted 1 billion dollars for this program. Apparently that was not enough. The entire amount had been claimed within 5 days of the start of the program.

Now the Government is working quickly to give the program $2 billion more to keep it going. I think this is a good thing. It is getting people out there to buy cars. Dealerships are making great offers for people to come out there to buy new cars. My local Kia Dealership is offering its customers up to $10,000 (including the government’s $4,500) to trade in their clunkers.

I just don’t think this $2 billion is going to last very long. It might last another 10 days, but I think there is a chance it might go faster than that because of all the publicity this program has been given in the last few days. If that money is claimed quickly, I don’t think the government will put too much more into the program.

My other thought is like most other segments of this bailout plan, people are going to uncover a small percentage of dealerships who have found a way to milk the program in an unethical way. There will be some kind of scandal and people are going to become outraged. I could be wrong. We will see what happens.

My Review: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (Major Spoilers)

I saw this movie late. I was able to borrow it from a family member. I heard all the reviews and went it in not expecting very much. Everyone I talked to who had seen the movie said that it lacked something to be desired. Now that I have seen it I will put it up there with the release of Star Wars episode one.

I was disappointed for about the first twenty minutes. When they threw Indiana onto the ground and he stood up not quite completely strait, I just had to laugh. The jokes I heard about Indiana Jones and the Geriatric Chronicles seemed right on the money. He just seemed too old for the part. He seemed to really struggle to make things happen. Every stunt he did seemed unrealistic.

I thought the atomic bomb was kind of pointless. Yes it was the infancy of the nuclear age and the imagery was awesome, but it seemed that the only reason they added the nuclear explosion was to draw attention; a kind of wow factor. There was no real reason for it. It didn’t really lead into the story. It didn’t even hold a key to what the story was about. It was just there; a reason to lock Indiana inside a refrigerator and send him tumbling down a hill away from the explosion.

The villainess was kind of wimpy. Her second in command was more like the kind of villain I like to see Indiana go up against. She seemed a little unsure about herself. Every time Indiana got close to her trying to steal the treasure back, she got this frightened look on her face. She just wasn’t the hard, Russian enemy I expected to see him go up against.

I liked the idea of the aliens. I know there were a lot of other people who didn’t like this idea. It was the nineteen-fifties though. People of that time were looking for UFOs. They were expecting to see aliens. This episode tried to explain area 51 and what we did with the crashed spaceship. It was also a small tribute to Stephen Spielburg, being a number of his movies had to do with aliens. There was a small tribute to George Lucas as well, when Indiana said the favorite one-liner, ”I have a bad feeling about this;” Stripped strait out of Star Wars.

Thought the killer monkeys and the quicksand were kind of pointless. Both of them had very little effect on the progress of the story. The monkeys attacked and then were never seen again. At least with the killer ants, the power of the crystal skull came to light. As for the quicksand, the only reason for it was to make sure they were captured again while giving the couple a little bit of time to talk.

Where’s the city of gold? They made all this hype about how they were going to find a city of Gold when they returned the skull to its rightful place. I saw a little gold on the pillars but there was defiantly a lack of gold throughout the city. If they had only showed a beautiful golden city, the last scene would be more powerful. Oh well.

I enjoyed the movie. It would be a great flick to rent or borrow from a friend, If you go in not expecting much, you will at least have a good time. I will give it 2.5 stars out of 5.