A few things happened in 1972 that were of no significance to anyone but myself that year. But I thought I'd share them with you anyway. First off in the early Summer of that year my Dad purchased the family's first color television set. In fact full network broadcast color TV had been a seven or eight year going concern, before anyone in my family could see NBC's peacock, or The Wonderful World of Disney's "Tinkerbelle" in all their colorful glory!

The Fall of 1972 had three things happening to me. First in September I started my freshmen year at Grace Davis high school in Modesto, CA. In October of that year I turned fifteen years old. And somewhere around that birthday, CBS television aired the first broadcast of the now classic Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall and Kim Hunter science fiction movie "Planet of The Apes". 

I've often thought back with more than a little fond reminiscence about that chain of events. If one had to weight  6 or 8 years before having access to a color TV set, just as long as he got it before "Planet of The Apes" first aired, the timing couldn't  have been more perfect! Of course you'd have to be the avid/rabid science fiction and fantasy film fan that I am to understand where I'm coming from. But if you're not, mores the pity.

Also sometime during 1972 this nation's minimum wage jumped from $1.65 to $1.70 per hour. Just out of curiosity I used my favorite online inflation calculator to see how much of this nation's 2008 currency it would take to buy what $1.70 could buy in 1972. And this is the result of that conversion: 

What cost $1.70 in 1972 would cost $8.66 in 2008. 
Also, if you were to buy exactly the same products in 2008 and 1972, they would cost you $1.70 and $0.34 respectively. 

And that's using 2008's currency to do the calculations! This means that this nation isn't only heading towards that dreaded "Hyper-Inflation Spiral", we are teetering on the very edge of it's "event horizon"! 

On an almost completely unrelated note, yesterday (Monday; 12/21/09: 4:35 PM) when I started to "revamp" this web page, I had just finished watching for the third or fourth time, a TV-LAND rerun of the ninth episode of the fifth season of "The Andy Griffith Show". This particular episode was entitled "Opie's Fortune", and it first aired on November 16, 1964. 

I'm sure all of you who are as big a fan of TAGS as I am, will know this episode's plot forwards, backwards and sideways. On his way home from school one day, Opie finds a man's coin purse with fifty dollars ($50.00) cash  inside it. Opie gives the lost coin purse to his Paw to hold in the sheriff's office for seven days. 

The week comes and passes, and Opie "finally" gets all of his dough and promptly spends ten dollars of it on a new fishing rod and reel. Then of course the old codger that originally lost the purse shows up, Opie gets a refund on his fishing tackle and gives Andy back the $50 to give to the old man. 

It's the classic "Hollywood" "All's Well That Ends Well" ending. But it's also one of the many facets of this TV series that endears itself to the hearts of tens (if not hundreds) of millions of fans from all around the world.

Then I got to thinking, just how many 2008 dollars would it take to buy what fifty 1964 bucks could buy way back when! And using the same inflation calculator that I used above, this is the answer I got:

What cost $50.00 in 1964 would cost $343.53 in 2008. Also, if you were to buy exactly the same products in 2008 and 1964, they would cost you $50.00 and $7.46 respectively.

It'd almost be funny if it weren't so goddamned pitiful! - Cary