Nimium boni est, cui hinil est mali

[degringolade]

Romanticism / Gustave Dore/ Paradise Lost

The day today was longer than the day yesterday, granted not by much, but enough.   That simple fact is keeping me going.  I am sitting down, drinking a pot of tea and ignoring the smallish pile of laundry in the corner.  Just can't quite bring myself to do it.  I am sorta OK with that. 

Spent yesterday with the young men, listening to the travails of young men.  I am not worried.  They are, but that is the way that it should be when done properly.  They are both thinking things through and setting up their experiments in an appropriate manner.  I sure as hell don't want to prejudice their research. 

I will probably do a bit of hanging around today.  I am pulling more music into Ogg Vorbis format so that I wall have something to listen to in my van, down by the river.  The current total is 821 pieces, with just over 3gb of dataspace and two days and seventeen hours of playtime.

Screed:

So, I have been giving serious thought to not quite going vegetarian.  That fucking Greta kid has got me a thinking. 

Look, whether it has been categorically proven or not, there is sufficient evidence that the anthropomorphic effect of carbon in the atmosphere is a serious candidate for the driving force behind what appears to be aberrant and geologically rapid climate change.  Now, comfortable people living their middle-class lifestyle, carving their leg of lamb might well take umbrage, but they are betting on the empty chamber in this little game of Russian roulette.  The same can be said concerning the folks living in C-suites and folks with outrageous investment portfolios. 

But, all that being said, I can't really go the Greta route myself.  First problem is my lack of billionaire backers, the second is my lack of outrage and teenage angst.  Can't pull that one off.  It can be argued that I am part of the problem, and that my come to Jesus moment is too little, too late.  So, in the manner of all repentant sinners, my only hope of salvation is to change my ways and do my act of contrition.  

Now, since Christianity is no longer an option, I have to find other ways to effect change in my life.  So I took a look at how the simple, almost unthinking parts of my life tie into the problem  The first and obvious one is "Bessie", my 1999 Chrysler Town and Country.  Bessie is a good girl, and does the job she was designed to do quite well, but what she farts out of her tailpipe puts any Guernsey to shame.  Right now she is in a "too used" mode because of the holidays, but I still live in the USA in 2020 and going without a car is difficult for a 66 year old man, so I use Bessie less than 250 miles a month until I figure out a means of transport/cartage that will provide utility at a lower cost/impact.

The next is eating, and that will be the driving force behind the option of "almost vegetarian"   I am researching now, because while I am fairly certain that eating meat is a pretty big problem here in the USA for a number of reasons, and cutting back is a sensible approach, I have no intention whatsoever of losing my status as an opportunistic omnivore.  I have always been a heretic, and true believers who think that they have the "answer" and go to extremes to advertise their virtue are profoundly annoying to my kind.

So:  I am using a chart produced by my old buddy Lawrence and the gang at IPCC as my start point.

So, it looks to me as getting rid of or curtailing the use of Bessie is the biggest impact I can make (21.6% of total impact).  Next would be decreasing electricity and heat costs (13.5%) and I am averaging 200 kWh a month so shaving there would be kinda hard.  Food is next and that is hard to pin down a number because it is a function of agriculture costs coupled with transportation.  I am arbitrarily setting a value of 15%. 

So, taking all of this into consideration, and after eating a gummie bear or to to enhance enlightenment, I am going to come up with a plan for a frugal opportunistic omnivore.

Comments

Spring is right around the corner

[mschmidt]

Germany was having trouble, what a sad, sad story
Needed a new leader to restore its former glory
Where, Oh where was he? Where could that man be?
We looked around and then we found
The man for you and me
And now it's..

Springtime for Hitler and Germany
Deutschland is happy and gay
We're marching to a faster pace
Look out, here comes the master race

Springtime for Hitler and Germany
Winter for Poland and France
Springtime for Hitler and Germany
Come on, Germans, go into your dance

I was born in Dusseldorf, and that is why they call me Rolf
Don't be stupid, be a smarty, come and join the Nazi party

Springtime for Hitler and Germany
Goosestep's the new step today
Bombs falling from the skies again
Deutschland is on the rise again

Springtime for Hitler and Germany
Uboats are sailing once more

Re: Springtime is the right time

[mschmidt]

Need I say no political message intended.

Spring is a time of hope; that is the message.

If there were to be a political message, it would be that getting large groups of humans to sing a song usually indicates that something really corny, or something really violent and stupid is about to happen.