January 31, 2008 - Boneless Thursday returns. This week I had 6 Asian Zing and 4 Sweet Barbecue. Flavor was lacking this week, especially in light of how much sauce they put on the wings last week. My head started feeling a bit foggy today and I am developing a sore throat. When I got home, Mike came over and we played a round of disc golf at Taylor. I threw a +3. We stopped at Surf and Turf for some steaks and then went home and cooked them up. Every time I make the prime filet from Surf and Turf I say it was the best one I've ever cooked, and I felt like it was the best ever tonight. They're just so good, there is no way I could resist cooking one of these up. I wasn't feeling very good so by the time 8 PM rolled around I was in bed sleeping with the puppies. Ellie was still at school when I went to sleep. Continuing on the "Global Warming" lesson, we've so far talked about macroscopic thermodynamics, glaciers, water level, the heat energy trapped and being released in the Earth, and localized temperature profiles. Now I think we need to start putting a few of these concepts together and making some cases for or against global warming. We can estimate the amount of energy that is bombarding us from the sun every day. The amount of energy changes from month to month based on the angle that the sun is hitting the earth, but it is generally a HUGE amount of energy. On the other side of the equation is the amount of energy being released from the Earth by human (drilling, refining, driving, burning coal, etc) and non-human (volcanos, forest fires, earthquakes, etc) efforts. Although it might seem like a lot of energy, compared to the energy we receive from the sun, it is microscopic. On a global scale, we are not releasing nearly enough energy to warm the planet beyond what the sun already does for us. This leaves two situations to consider. One, does the energy from the sun fluctuate enough to cause variations from year to year? Two, do the localized effects of energy release and all its byproducts (energy to power our cars and appliances, smog, pollution, etc) have a net positive or net negative effect, and can the negatives be reversed in an economically feasible manner?