also what would happen if your house were not wired in parallel?

Vitually all circuits are a combination of series and parallel connections.

If your house was wired in series, then unless you had every light and appliance in the house turned on at the same time, none of them would work.

Here is a simple oscillator circuit diagram.
http://www.javed007.co.uk/circuit/2mhzosc.jpg
You can see that it is not simply series or parallel, but a complex combination.

A little question here Pete (let's say I've forgotten quite a lot of my Electronics subject...)
What would capacitors and inductors do in DC circuits? Energy storage? Or what?

And to comment on Pete, yes, not all circuits can be described as series or paralel..... I know this one electronics problem about calculating the total resistance of a circuit which is shaped as wire-only cube, and the circuit cannot be changed into a series or paralel circuit....

curioucity,

Can you show what the "wire-only cube" circuit look like so I can try to start thinking?

how about applying electronic formulas to other things, such as the economy?

i have heard it applies the same, almost to any subject, as long as you know what's what.

thats what a good formula should do, be universal in scope.