DAILY DIRT: Hold on to your wallets, those gas prices will soon be rising

So is the pain at the proverbial pump … Welcome to today’s three thoughts that make up Vol. 918 of The Daily Dirt.

1. Brace yourself, it’s coming.

“It” is a much higher price for gasoline, if energy analysts are correct. Oil prices continue to rise, thanks to the obvious and familiar — Russia’s dislike for the West’s ongoing interference in Ukraine and the usual powder keg that is always engulfing the Middle East. 

Parts of California are already paying more than $6 a gallon. In Arizona, the pain at the pump is now more than $4 a gallon, and the remainder of the nation is projected to reach at least $5 a gallon this summer.

Heading into the weekend, the average across Illinois was $3.99, with a high of $4.26 in and around Chicago. In Adams County the average this week has been $3.88. In Northeast Missouri, the norm has been around $3.35.

The cheapest U.S. is currently found in Mississippi ($3.29), Louisiana ($3.36) and Texas ($3.38).

2.  There couldn’t be a more fitting name for a baby born during the recent solar eclipse than the one in Mansfield, Texas.

Sol Celeste Alvarez was born at 1:04 p.m. Monday at Methodist Mansfield Medical Center, just half an hour before the start of totality.Sol is the Spanish word for sun.

Even more fitting is the fact that Sol’s older sister is named Luna, the Spanish word for moon.

3. This week’s celebrity birthdays include:

• Former MLB star Pete Rose turns 83 on Sunday. For crying out loud, put Pete in the Hall of Fame. He’s paid the price for his alleged mistake(s). 
• Actress Sarah Michelle Gellar will be 47, also on Sunday. She made “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” tolerable.
• Singer Bobby Vinton reaches 88 on Tuesday. He was known as “The Polish Prince,” and enjoyed some major hits in the 1960s, including “Blue Velvet”.
• NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar turns 77, also on Tuesday. I would wager some of today’s young fans do not know he was once Lew Alcindor prior to changing his name.
• Another Tuesday birthday finds former NFL coach Bill Belichick turning 72. I wonder how different modern-day NFL history would have been if Mr. Personality had not been fired as coach of the Cleveland Browns in 1995.

Steve Thought O’ The Day — My all-time favorite female singer, the late Dusty Springfield, would have been 85 on Tuesday. She died at age 58 in 1999, following a lengthy battle with cancer.

Steve Eighinger writes daily for Muddy River News. Pete should have blamed his interpreter.