While shopping for wedding rings for my husband and myself, palladium made my short list, but in the end, something stuck in my craw. I'm the type of geek that likes to learn the gory details, for better or worse, and just had to read the Wikipedia entry for this metal I had seldom heard of save in the commodities page.

Turns out palladium is mined heavily in Russia, where the politicians manipulate the price on the world market to benefit Russia. The same can be said of platinum, by the way. Well, that's a huge problem for me, because Russia is not playing nice with the gays right about this time. Gays are being scapegoated and prosecuted just for being gay. It's not right, and I don't want any of my gay dollars going to Russia if I can help it. For that reason, I opted for another metal, one that Russia hasn't cornered, good old-fashioned gold.