[GlacierBobby]

“Evans turned the ignition of his Prius and it hummed to life. He was pleased to have the hybrid; the waiting list in Los Angeles to get one was now more than six months. He’d had to take the light gray one, which wasn’t his preferred color, but he loved the car. And he took a quite satisfaction in noticing how many of them were on the streets these days.
He drove down the alley to Olympic. Across the street he saw a blue Prius, just like the one he had seen below Margo’s apartment. It was electric blue, a garish color, He thought he liked his gray better. He turned right, then left again, heading north through Beverly Hills. He new there would be rush hour traffic starting at this time of day and he should get up to Sunset, where traffic moved a little better.
When he got to the traffic light at Wiltshire, he saw another blue Prius behind him. The same ugly color (I like the colour). Two guys in the car, not young. When he made his way to the light at Sunset, the same car was still behind him. Two cars back.
He turned left, toward Holmby Hills.
The Prius turned left, too. Following him.”

To read the rest see the novel “State of Fear” by Michael Crichton

 

[DaveT]

It was so cool that the BGs were driving a Prius.

 

[hyperion]

And the "State of Fear" premise in Michael Creighton's book is that there is no evidence of global warming!

 

[spindoc]

And the "State of Fear" premise in Michael Creighton's book is that there is no evidence of global warming!

And pretty well documented, too.

 

[tochatihu]

state of fear

Not surprisingly, Crichton's book as generated a lot of controversy. One might start here:

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=74

DAS

 

[hyperion]

"Real climate" is really interesting but as full of questionable hypotheses as the Creighton book. Creighton although he wrote it first, wrote in the style that Dan Brown used in the Da Vinci Code. When he expounded fact, he backed it up with postnotes which did bring you to supposedly assumptions of experts in the field. Unfortunatey for every expert there is another with an opposite view.
Sort of like "are there weapons of mass destruction or are there not!" It was one heck of an entertaining book, and I thought, "well written." The movie rights were immediately sold but so far I've seen no mention of one being made. I guess the industry would rather spend it's bucks remaking classics like "The Pink Panther" which our local TV news critique called a "stinko of the first class," and she normally likes Steve Martin.

 

[HunterGreen]

“Evans turned the ignition of his Prius

Turned the ignition?

 

[drash]

Hyperion, if you're recommending it I'll break out my gift cards for B & N and grab it. Thanks.

 

[spindoc]

“Evans turned the ignition of his Prius

Turned the ignition?

Yeah. That's a howler!

 

[hyperion]

Drash, if you are looking for a good book Creighton's is really interesting even though fiction, however the best book I have read in the past year is Vince Flynn's "TERM LIMITS" which is in paperback now and will give you a nice warm feeling about politics in Washington today. This one, they would never dare make a movie from even though Ophra's book club rated Flynn as last years best author (or something like that)
Only trouble is, this book will keep you up till two in the morning.
Oh heck, while I'm at it, let me throw another title at you. Nelson DeMille's book "Up Country" which is presently being filmed in Vietnam with John Travolta playing the same person he played in "The General's Daughter."
Although fiction, DeMille spent several years in Viet Nam in the service and writes as it was and is today. A lot of "history" here as well as a great plot! (but then again, another 2 am job.) If you know little of Viet Nam this will bring you up to date as Brown did with Da Vinci.

 

[Sanny]

I just finished reading Memoir of a Geisha. Excellent book - I recommend it. Don't know what they did with it in the film, but the book developed the characters beautifully.

Oh, even though it was set in Japan, there were no Prii in it.

 

[drash]

Thanks guys,

I have some serious reading time potential ahead of me with the upcoming traveling schedule.

 

[mrv]

“Evans turned the ignition of his Prius

Turned the ignition?

According to http://www.crichton-official.com/fear/index.html and under the "Book" tab, the original hardcover was printed in Dec. 2004.

There's nothing saying that the author wasn't referring to a NHW11. Standard ignition key there. For many of us Classic owners, same waiting period (although maybe shorter).

 

[ChuckK]

Unfortunatey for every expert there is another with an opposite view.

This is exactly what Exxon-Mobil and the other companies who have spent millions of dollars on the global warming disinformation campaign want Americans to believe. It is the same strategy that the tobacco industry employed successfully for many years. Pay off a few scientists, propagate many scientific-sounding proclamations from "think tanks," and make the public believe that scientists are divided.

Nothing could be farther from the truth. The peer-reviewed scientific papers on climate change are virtually unanimous that the climate is changing rapidly and that it is primarily caused by our fossil fuel emissions. (Read any issue of Science or Nature to verify this.) We have trapped air bubble samples from ice core records giving atmospheric CO2 content that now go back 650,000 years. The CO2 content varied over that period of time from about 180 parts per million to a maximum of 300 parts per million in very gradual 100,000 year cycles. (Temperature variations, deduced from oxygen isotope measurements, were lock-step with the CO2 variations. This works both ways. Increases in temperature release more CO2, and CO2 increases cause higher temperatures.) From a CO2 level of 280 ppm in 1800, it has rapidly shot up to 379 ppm today and is rising at the incredible rate of 2 ppm per year. The temperature is rising with it, as it always has.

 

[Susan5s]

Sanny wrote:

Oh, even though it was set in Japan, there were no Prii in it.

The film had it set before and after WW2, so there wouldn't be any Prii.

Susan

 

[Sanny]

Sanny wrote:

Oh, even though it was set in Japan, there were no Prii in it.

The film had it set before and after WW2, so there wouldn't be any Prii.

Susan

Yah, so? Still should be Prii!! They should be everywhere. Decorated with cherry blossoms.

 

[niomeka]

Crichton... ugh. His basic formula is to latch onto issues he knows nothing about, and then concoct the most absurd tales. Jurassic Park? What a silly book. Pulp fiction dressed up with a little pseudo science. I don't understand why people read such books, just get Buck Rodgers or Lord of the Rings or such, and disabuse oneself of the pretense it has anything to do with reality.

If he wrote a book about cars, it would probably involve cars obtaining sentience due to "smart" technologies and then taking over the world, or something similarly nonsensical.

 

[DanMan32]

We need to plant more trees to convert the CO2 to oxygen.

 

[hyperion]

My goodness niomeka. Did you ever wonder why Creighton has been a best selling author, top screen writer, and successfull movie producer for the past thirty plus years. He is a Harvard graduate and a medical doctor "to boot" He may have been one of the first of the Hollywood crowd to have purchased a Prius.
Honestly now, have you ever read one of his books or is this your imagination also? Maybe he too has some sort of an agenda!
.
.
.
I agree Dan and try to plant at least one new tree a year.

 

[drash]

Unfortunatey for every expert there is another with an opposite view.

So true. It's what keeps us entertained. Without this, newspapers (and news "analysts") might vanish. Heck I can give a non-expert opposite view with the best of 'em, just ask sanny.