Washington Post: Marvin Odum, president of Shell Oil, was attending a meeting of the parent company's executive committee in Singapore when word trickled in that an exploration well drilled in Alaska's Chukchi Sea - the crowning step in a multi-year $7 billion quest - was a dry hole. Maybe not bone dry. In a recent interview, Odum wouldn't say. But in the oil business glossary, a dry hole is one that can't pay off commercially, and Shell's hole definitely qualified. The parent company, Royal Dutch Shell, abruptly...