Many Americans – and others throughout the world – seem to love shrimp, not as “pets” but as food. There are countless ways to serve shrimp, hot or cold, in varied cocktail sauces (can you beat remoulade?), casseroles or … – the recipes seem endless.
But nobody wants to eat shrimp tainted by oil – you know, the kind of oil that comes from oil wells, like the runaway well in the Gulf of Mexico that caused so much trouble recently.
Fortunately, the leaking well seems to have been stopped – after losses totaling billions of dollars. Late-summer tourists are returning to Louisiana and other Gulf Coast states. And, yes, some people are ordering shrimp in Gulf and other restaurants – reporting no oil-taste taint.
The shrimping industry is very important economically, not just to the locals who make their living netting huge quantities of the delicacy (“Shrimp boats is a-coming,” as the memorable song says), but also to shippers and restaurateurs and many others in related businesses.
The oil well spill has cost lots of dollars and much inconvenience to many, not just to people in the oil business, beach hotels, etc., but to many others. Our economy is a complex, far-reaching interrelated marvel. In some ways, the Gulf oil spill surely will affect “you.”