MEMORIAL DAY

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GAS PRICES COST AN EXTRA 168 PER MONTH

From the AP.

here's less money this summer for hotel rooms, surfboards and bathing suits. It's all going into the gas tank.

High prices at the pump are putting a squeeze on the family budget as the traditional summer driving season begins. For every $10 the typical household earns before taxes, almost a full dollar now goes toward gas, a 40 percent bigger bite than normal.

Households spent an average of $369 on gas last month. In April 2009, they spent just $201. Families now spend more filling up than they spend on cars, clothes or recreation. Last year, they spent less on gasoline than each of those things.

Jeffrey Wayman of Cape Charles, Va., spent Friday riding his motorcycle to North Carolina's Outer Banks, a day trip with his wife. They decided to eat snacks in a gas station parking lot rather than buy lunch because rising fuel prices have eaten so much into their budget over the past year that they can't ride as frequently as they would like.

"We used to do it a lot more, but not as much now," he said. "You have to cut back when you have a $480 gas bill a month."

Alex Martinez, a senior at Arcadia High School outside Los Angeles, said his family's trips to San Francisco, which they usually take once or more a year, are on hold. As he stopped at a gas station to put $5 of fuel in his car — not much more than a gallon — he said the high prices are crimping social life for him and his friends.

 To help you grasp the numbers that means you would spend an extra $2,016 USD per year on gas. So what could you do with an extra $168 USD per month? What could you do with an extra $2,016 USD per year to spend?

ROBOTECH 20th ANNIVERSARY SOUNDTRACK IS SOLD OUT IN THE ROBOTECH.COM STORE

ROBOTECH.com is reporting that Robotech 20th Anniversary Soundtrack has sold out in the Robotech.com store. This was the final production run of the popular soundtrack that was compiled in commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the original Robotech television series.

ROBOTECH CONVENTION TOUR IN TWO CITIES ON JUNE 10-12th

The weekend of June 10-12 will be a bust one in the Robotech franchise as the Robotech Convention Tour will be at two conventions that weekend.

 Jun.10-12 : Project A-Kon 22, Dallas, TX

 

Jun.10-12 : Anime NEXT, New Jersey 

 Footage from the documentary and the animated project will be shown at both A-Kon and AnimeNext. You can find out how to register for the conventions at the links above.

ANIME NEWS NETWORK ANNOUNCES NEW JOB OPENINGS

Anime News Network is seeking to fill some job openings. Here is quick overview.

OpenX Expert

Anime News Network is seeking a PHP programmer familiar with customized OpenX environments.

News Intern

Anime News Network is seeking news interns for the Fall semester (Sept 1 to Dec 31, 2011) to work with ANN's news team and earn valuable on-the-job journalism experience with a professional publication.

BSD Guru Wanted

Do you know BSD like the back of your hand ? Can you optimize Apache webservers running on FreeBSD 6 in your sleep ?

If you are looking for a way to start a career in the Anime Industry these openings are a great start.  

CLICK HERE TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THESE JOB OPENINGS

NAN DESU KAN RASIES $13,440 USD FOR QUAKE RELIEF AND ANNOUNCES FIRST ROUND OF GUESTS - SETS ATTENDNACE CAP AT 7,500 PEOPLE PER-DAY

From AnimeNewsNetwork.com

Nan Desu Kan (NDK) is proud to announce the success of NDK's Rave2Save, a one-night-only fundraiser to benefit the Japanese Red Cross. The event raised a total of $13,440, which includes the dollar-for-dollar match by the Rocky Mountain Anime Association (RMAA), the parent nonprofit organization of NDK.

 The packed atrium at Nan Desu Kan

The 15th NDK is Sept. 9-11, 2011 at the sold-out Denver Marriott Tech Center. NDK will welcome back voice actors and fan favorites Todd Haberkorn, Patrick Seitz and Chris Cason, as well as Kevin McKeever, Steve Yun and Tommy Yune with the Robotech Convention Tour. “In 15 years, we've grown from a small festival held in a student union to becoming Colorado's largest convention,” said Amanda Liebermann, executive director. “The first round of people we're announcing this year have become part of NDK's heart and our family.”

                    [snip]

The Robotech Convention Tour will make its annual stop in Denver with Creative Director Tommy Yune, Webmaster Steve Yun and Marketing Coordinator Kevin McKeever. Additional guest news, including Japanese guests, is forthcoming. NDK's venue, The Denver Marriott Tech Center, is already sold out for 2011. To help ensure the comfort of NDK attendees and the quality of the convention, NDK will be enforcing an attendance cap of 7,500 per day.

“This will be our first year with an attendance cap,” said Liebermann.

 The packed Robotech panel at Nan Desu Kan

“This decision was not made lightly, but we are determined to keep our small-convention feel despite our growth. An attendance cap will ensure NDK's quality for years to come.”

Information on the attendance cap and overflow hotels is available on http://ndkdenver.org.

  A good trend in the convention world in the past few years  has been the rise of the fall conventions. Nan Desu Kan, New York Comic-Con and the Long Beach Comic-Con all take place in the fall and have really helped balance out the year or con goers.

It's tough for people to appreciate via the photos on Facebook but these shows are HUGE! They are often just packed with people wall to wall and its a good time of year to do con going. I enjoy conventions in the fall and Nan Desu Kan is a great one to go.

GAS PRICES FALL

From the Detroit News. 

A week before Memorial Day and the start of the summer driving season, Metro Detroit motorists are paying less to fill up at the pump.

On Sunday, the average for a gallon of regular gasoline in Detroit was about $3.86, according to the AAA Daily Fuel Gauge Report.

That's a drop from the $4.08 average a week earlier, and far from the highest price — $4.23 — recorded May 4.

The falling prices, which reflect a national trend, are a result of several factors — including crude oil prices and less unrest in the Middle East in recent weeks, said Nancy Cain, a spokeswoman for AAA Michigan.

"Right now all the forces are combining to help the prices become lower at the pump," Cain said Sunday.

Statewide, the average price for a gallon of gas on Sunday was as low as $3.78 in Traverse City and as high as $4.08 in Marquette, according to the fuel gauge report.

The average U.S. price of a gallon of gasoline has dropped about 9 cents over the past two weeks.

A gallon of regular gasoline at about 2,500 filling stations nationwide averaged about $3.91, according to a survey by Trilby Lundberg, a California-based fuels analyst.

Prices fell last week as economic reports indicated the U.S. economic recovery is sputtering and fuel demand may decline.

This is welcome news just as we are about to hit the start of the summer convention season. While gas prices have a way to go to reach levels they were at in the beginning of the year  the prices are moving in the right direction.

Yet gas prices this high are still a problem.

Retailers are carefully watching their receipts this weekend amid signs that higher costs for raw materials and sluggish consumer spending may be hurting the recovery. 

The uncertain outlook has helped push stocks down nearly 300 points in three weeks, but with gasoline still close to $4 per gallon and food prices high as well, some merchants are doing very well indeed.

CBS News correspondent Seth Doane reports that for the tenth month in a row, consumers are opening their wallets. For example, at the "Fairway" grocery store in Manhattan, Manager Rick Garcia says shoppers are back.

"This is actually the business to be in, because everybody has to eat," Garcia said. 

While the grocery business is great for sellers right now with food prices up six to seven percent nationwide, shoppers like Jane Aschular say they have no choice but to spend more. Her bill was $40 dollars higher than usual.

"Prices have really jumped just in the last few weeks...we've been shopping here for ten years and I just know the prices of everything and they're noticeably different," Aschular said.

Roughly 70 percent of the U.S. economy is driven by consumer spending, but a closer look at the numbers reveals that, these days, people are spending more on what they have to buy - necessities like groceries and gasoline.

If you are spending more on necessities like groceries and gasoline you are going to have less to spend on leisure items. It's why high fuel and food prices can affect so much more than food or fuel.

ANIME NEWS NETWORK HAS A MANGA REVIEWER POSITION

AnimeNewsNetwork.com has a job opening for a manga reviewer.

Anime News Network presently has an opening on the editorial staff for a freelance manga reviewer. We are searching for an experienced writer who is intimately familiar with and passionate about manga, someone who is open-minded enough to embrace everything the medium has to offer and provide a strong point of view and thoughtful analysis.

If you really want to get into this business it might be a good start. 

ROBOTECH CONVENTION TOUR AT ANIME CENTRAL THIS WEEKEND

Harmony Gold's Steve Yun will be at Anime Central in Chicago for a weekend full of Robotech news and fun anime panels! 

Steve will host the world famous Giant Robot Rumble and the Anime Girl Fight (these are panels that are quite fun) Also footage from the Robotech Documentary and the animated project will be shown at the Robotech panels.  

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION ON ROBOTECH AT ANIME CENTRAL

OIL PRICES FALL...BUT GAS IS SLOW TO FOLLOW

From ConsumerAffairs.com

Crude oil prices were trading lower in early Monday trading, boding well for consumers praying for relief at the gas pump. But how quickly that relief comes is far from certain.

The retail price of gasoline continues to fall, though not very fast. The national average price of self-serve regular was down about a half-cent today, to $3.955 a gallon, according to the daily AAA Fuel Gauge Survey.
It peaked May 5 at $3.985 a gallon and has fallen a fraction of a cent nearly every day since.

While that is good news that oil is falling and the Federal Reserve QE2 is ending everyone has a question.

Where are the lower gas prices?

So, why haven't gas prices at the pump fallen faster? Because traders still have one more fear – the rising Mississippi River that threatens to flood refinery-rich Louisiana. A Maryland wholesale distributor cited the floods last week in justifying an overnight 25 cents a gallon hike in fuel prices, a move that triggered Attorneys General investigations in both Maryland and the District of Columbia.

If gas prices continue to fall at the current rate they will still be substantially higher than they were year ago when the summer convention season begins in mere weeks. Unlike 2008, when gas prices spiked to over $4 USD per gallon,  unemployment is substantially higher now than three years ago. It will be interesting to see if this has any impact on anime convention attendance.

MOSPEADA COMPOSER TO HOST CONCERT FOR EARTHQUAKE RELIEF

 
According to ANN, Mospeada Composer, Joe Hisaishi will be holding several concerts for earth quake relief. 

Composer Joe Hisaishi will hold concerts in Tokyo, Osaka, Paris, and Beijing this June and July to benefit the reconstruction efforts after the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake (Higashi Nihon Daishinsai) disaster. The concerts will feature Hisaishi's soundtrack work for Studio Ghibli, director Takeshi Kitano, and others, as performed by a 250-person orchestra and chorus. As the music is played, famous scenes from the films will be shown on a giant screen.

TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES UPDATE: POST RESTORED!

I've been trying to log into both The Reporter and BankofKev blogs snce 2 p.m. yesterday and was unable to due to blogger service issues. It also appears that one of the posts on The Reporter was eliminated when they "fixed" the problem.

This post is not even in my drafts so it appears it is gone forever.

UPDATE: The post has now been restored! YAY!