Doing My Part To Be "Green"

Today I single-handedly saved the environment. Well, okay that's a slight exaggeration of the facts, actually it took two hands. And like many of my proudest accomplishments, it took place in the bathroom.

Do you want to know what I did in the bathroom? (You're not sure, are you?) Well, I made a breakthrough in the area of hand drying. There has been much debate over whether using paper towels or a hot air dryer is the most "environmentally correct" method of drying your hands. I resolved this debate today while attempting to retrieve a towel from one of those motion sensing towel dispensers that worked even better than it's engineers could have imagined.

I waved my hand in front of the motion sensor. Nothing happened. The Force is NOT strong with this one. "This contraption is the worst of both worlds," I thought. "It uses electricity and leaves behind litter. What a crummy invention."

I tried to wave my hands again. Nothing happened. Do or do not. There is no try. "And it doesn't even work," I continued. "Technology is supposed to make our lives easier? If I could just pull the towel out myself, I'd be out of here already."

I waved my hands again. Nothing happened. I have a bad feeling about this. "Maybe this thing does save electricity, I don't think anyone plugged it in."

I waved my hands again. Nothing happened. I find your lack of towels disturbing. "This thing is bad for the environment and it is seriously doing bad things for my attitude."

I waved my hands again. FINALLY!! I was able to dry my hands. YAHOOOOO! You're all clear, kid. Now let's blow this thing and go home. No, no towel ever came out. It's just that all that hand waving evaporated every bit of moisture from my hands. No electricity, no waste, no litter, no nothing, just dry hands. I think Winged Lion would be proud. The ever climbing odometer on my carbon footprint was, for a few seconds, put on pause.

And then I went out into the parking lot and fired up my old Dodge, blew black smoke all over the place, and went home.

Screwing the Planet: A Global Warning

I just finished to see another movie, one that would make difficult to sleep tonight. It not an horror movie, but it does forsee a possible scenario wher Erath will be devastated. Is not a commercial movie, but a documentary, one that probably most people in USA have heard of: An Inconvinent truth, by Al Gore.

Now I know that Mr. Gore has been receiving tons of critics lately due the fact that flying is polluting and he has been doing it a lot. But that doesn't means that he is wrong. The message of his slideshow is clear, we are going straight to hell (literally) and we are running out of timeto push the brakes. No one in the planet can reduce to zero his/her environmental print (unless is dead and even then...), but can be reduced significantly, so Mr. Gore is probably compensating the CO2 from his travels by other means.

Going to the topic of the movie, probably one of the mental images that made me more sad now that in years before, was the polar bears drowning because the North Pole is close to be a large pool. Think on this, just because some Oil magnates want to change his carpet in his mansion, he made you to consume more fuel. This is in agreement with the automobile industry (at leats the american one), that says that only by manufacturing bigger cars, they can compite with other companies (which is a lie since most of american car companies are in big troubles) they can keep the economy, so they offer you only cars that can burn more fuel in one day that all of your medieval ancestor in all his life span.

So we are killing polar bears just because a bunch of fucking greed bastards want more money than they will be able to take with them to the tomb. Is that fair? And in case some of the readers don't care about polar bears, monarch butterflies or penguins, I just want to remember two things: Hurrican Katrina obliterating New Orleans and the Tsunami in South Asia (remember my last post about superstorms not being feasible? Guess what? Katrina was just the sample). If they death of thousands of people and the thousands of displaced survivors with the raising potential of new and old diseases cleaning those zones in a war-zone like scene doens't make you to change or at least consider the issue, hell is a worthy place.

Why hell? Because with the raising of the temperatures in an exponential way (more in the last generation than in all human history), that is what we are transforming Earth into. Don't let politicians to confuse you: there is a general consensus among scientifics that Global Warming is real. Politicans just want to misdirect your attention because it hits them where it hurts: their pockets.

I can go and go and go in this subject and I probably will, since is the topic of my PhD and something I take very serious. But I will save more bullets for tomorrow (when I will post some links with advices of how to reduce you environmental print). Just wanted to finish saying that we are in the last meters of a global destruction race, but we can still change the direction, we have the tools, the knowledge , we just need the will to do it.

Survival skills after a natural catastrophe

Tonight (or last night, depending of the time zone), I was watching in tv a rerun of the movie "The Day after tomorrow". That, coupled with some of the stuff I have been reading during the PhD about how pollution is changing the global weather and the balance of power and needs; and a call from my parents last week about a strong earthquake felt in Mexico, left me thinking on how it would be to live the day after a massive natural catastrophe hit the place where I was living at that moment.

I realize that the premise of the above mentioned movie is far fetched and almost impossible to occur. But they said something similar 20 years ago about the climate patterns and now we have the Niño effect. I'm not saying that a massive superstorm will occur, but one can't also say that it never will happen. There is a lot that we ignore about how our planet works and we are so ignorant and/or stubborn to realize that we are not the omnipontent owners of the blue sphere, so I wouldn't be too surprised if tragedies like the Tsunami in Asia in 2004 happen again (a tragedy of which curiously enough, several people around the world dreamed (as in a dream at night, not as a wish) days before, but that is topic for another post).

Following that trail of thought I was musing about how prepared we are or in this case I'm to face the aftermatch of a global phenomenon that change our world and civilization (could be a new Ice Age, an global rise in the temperature producing scarcity of water, the rise of the the sea level covering massive portions of continental land, nuclear winter or biological war aftermath).

Obviously depending the type of event, would be the actions to take, but I guess that the first element of a basic survival skill kit would be the will to survive. Most people that have survived accidents have stated that what helped them to make it through the ordeal was the belief that they will survive, either by the help of a superior power or by sheer strenght of character, maybe a mix of both. The second basic skill would be humility; to learn from our past mistakes, to realize that we are not alone and that we need to work togheter with other survivors. Also some basic knowledge in science and common sense would be useful. During the tsunami event in Asia, people from remote, tribal areas fared better than people from cities, due the communal knowledge, like being watchful and understanding the behaviour of animals (probably the best alarm in the planet). Mother Nature is a wise (yet rude) mistress and she provided the animals with enough common tools to survive these kinds of events. Basic science can help us to keep a average level of health and to cope with different situations (like how to insulate ourselves with makeshift elements in order to deal with a sudden drop of the temperature).

Is a fact that any hunting, survival and even combat skill might come useful (now buying the bow and that katana doesn't sound as stupid as I though first). But maybe the most important paired with the will of make it to another day, is how to be ready. I'm not saying that we need to build a nuclear shelter like during the Cold War, but just taking basic previtions that even goverments (or at least in the case of Mexico) suggest, like having the important papers (such as passports and IDs) in a safe, accesible place, getting canned supplies and emergency kits (medicines, radios, maps, torchs and other stuff) ready for any event.

That should work for the intial days, but I still keep wonder how would be the life after that. Hollywood movies portray either a grim world or a world with hope. I think that both extremes are unreal, in face of how humanity can be its better ally or its worst enemy. Culture would change and the meaning of civilization as well as our paradigms will shift to go along the new situation. Probably a return to basic ways of life would take precedent over the amenities we have grown used to.

This is such a rich topic to keep talking for days, specially when you have a vivid and overactive imagination like mine (I'm already making plans in my head of hunting with my bow and getting a street dog as companion to fence any thug). But right now, my main concern is to evaluate if I'm ready to deal with this kind of situation (specially being far away from home like now) and what I do need to improve and if my life experience and general knowledge will be enough. I guess that is time to get in shape again and get in contact with my future clan.