It rained last week, and everybody knows what that means.

Higher prices at the pump.

We kid the regional and global gasoline pirates, but really, they're just responding to supply and demand — or at least the (highly speculative) idea of it.

Skeptics increasingly convinced that much of the global fuel supply / demand / price equation is pure fiction might take note of our corner of the world, where a pair of major fires struck production facilities not 10 miles apart.

One was the BP refinery at Cherry Point; the other, the Darigold milk depot in Lynden. Both are expected to limp along at about half capacity during several months of repairs, causing disruptions in local supplies.

Result: Local gas prices soar. Local milk prices? Steady as a grazing Holstein in Sumas.

Just guessing here: If you needed 1 percent to fuel that SUV you drive to work, the price of moo juice would be through the roof right now.

More unregulated speculation:

They Hate Us for Our Liquidity: Think those two fires were a coincidence? We're one big industrial accident at a local microbrewery away from being convinced that terrorists are after all our vital fluids.

Meanwhile, in the Desert: Your Seattle Mariners have moved .188-batting offensive sparkdud Chone Figgins to the leadoff spot in their batting order. Club officials confessed it's mostly just to get the inevitable dribbler-to-shortstop over with.

Negative Affirmation: We'd hate to prejudge the U.S. Supreme Court as it takes on a potentially momentous case that could change or reverse affirmative-action policies at U.S. universities. But they tipped their hand when they showed up to announce the hearing of the case dressed in vintage 1954 throw-back-the-clock robes.

Thank God for Small Favors: Thanks to a legal settlement, the John Edwards sex tape is going to be destroyed. (Some things, you just can't un-see.)

All According to Script: Looks like taxpayers in Sacramento are about to be suckered into paying the lion's share of a new money-sucking NBA arena to keep the Sacramento Kings from fleeing to suddenly-stalking — and highly over-excited — Seattle. Man. Who could have seen that coming?

Groundhog Day, Part Deux: Emboldened by the smattering of applause after his recent proclamation that the city will defy all known laws of physics by aiding and abetting the world's first "self-funding" pro sports arena, Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn is expected to announce plans to revitalize Pioneer Square via the installation of self-cleaning toilets. Oh, wait; we already took a bath on that idea, too.

Speaking of McGinn: Eighty percent of respondents to a KING5 poll opposed any public financing for a new arena. All together, class: What part of that do McGinn and County Exec Dow Constantine fail to grasp?

Highly Debatable: Newt Gingrich at the (thank God) final GOP debate: "When you have government as central provider of services you inevitably move towards tyranny." So that explains all that totalitarian thuggery in Sweden, Norway and Denmark.

And Finally: Gov. Chris Gregoire, D-Twice Baked, hailing the state's bumper crop of 9.8 billion pounds of potatoes, declared Feb. 21 Potato Day in Olympia. Yeah; like every day isn't Potato Day in Olympia.