Rotundus.com

"They have already hit zero," said Charles de Trenck, a broker at Transport Trackers in Hong Kong. "We have seen trade activity fall off a cliff. Asia-Europe is an unmit­igated disaster." Shipping journal Lloyd's List said brokers in Singapore are now waiving fees for containers travelling from South China, charging only for the minimal "bunker" costs. Container fees from North Asia have dropped $200, taking them below operating cost. Industry sources said they have never seen rates fall so low. "This is a whole new ball game," said one trader.

...

Mr de Trenck predicts Asian trade to the US will fall 7pc this year. To Europe he estimates a drop of 9pc – possibly 12pc. Trade flows grow 8pc in an average year. He said it was "illogical" for shippers to offer zero rates, but they do whatever they can to survive in a highly cyclical market. Offering slots for free is akin to an airline giving away spare seats for nothing in the hope of making something from meals and fees.

(Excerpted from Telegraph)

If any airline out there wants to give me a free seat hopefully they'll let me know.

The monthly inflation rate passed the 50 percent mark - the threshold for defining 'hyperinflation'- in March 2007; in January 2009 the RBZ issued the world's first 100 trillion dollar note.

"Since then, it's gotten much worse," said Steve Hanke, professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, in the US, and a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, a Washington-based think-tank. The latest official RBZ figure, dating back to July 2008, put year-on-year inflation at more than 231 million percent.

In the absence of credible official statistics, Hanke developed a hyperinflation index for Zimbabwe and in an article in the December 2008 issue of the financial magazine, Forbes Asia, put the annual inflation rate at around 6.5 quindecillion novemdecillion percent - 65 followed by 107 zeros. "Prices double every 24.7 hours," he noted.

- IRIN Africa

Things don't seem quite so bad here do they?

Demands to redefine marriage to include homosexual couples are inconceivable apart from the redefinition of marriage already effected by heterosexuals through divorce. Though gays cite the very desire to marry as evidence that their lifestyle is not inherently promiscuous, activist Andrew Sullivan acknowledges that that desire has arisen only because of the promiscuity permitted in modern marriage. "The world of no-strings heterosexual hookups and 50 percent divorce rates preceded gay marriage," he points out. "All homosexuals are saying . . . is that, under the current definition, there’s no reason to exclude us. If you want to return straight marriage to the 1950s, go ahead. But until you do, the exclusion of gays is . . . a denial of basic civil equality" (emphasis added). Gays do not want traditional monogamous marriage, only the version debased by divorce.

- Touchstone Magazine, January/February 2009 issue (full article free online)

You might say Michael Nicholson has a passion for learning. The 67-year-old Kalamazoo retiree has amassed 27 college degrees since 1963, and he's not done yet. He started with a bachelor's degree in religious education at William Tyndale College in Detroit. That led to a master's degree in theology at Dallas Theological Seminary.

Since then, he has earned two associate's degrees, 19 master's degrees, three specialist's degrees and one doctoral degree. He's currently pursuing two master's degrees at Grand Valley State University, one in health administration and the other in special-education administration.

Source: mlive.com

27 college degrees and the only jobs that he appears to have held are 16 years as a substitute teacher and 11 years as a parking meter attendant.