I tell ya, there's something about a week that goes from sweater weather to ninety degrees, that really makes you refocus on global climate change. (Add a little potential pandemic, and you have the makings of an awesome weekend.) Seems appropriate, as last week was Earth Day, and all. And with all the attention on the environment, many people were focusing on something I hadn't heard about until Bill Maher mentioned it a few weeks back.
It turns out, there's a pile of garbage in the Pacific Ocean that's twice the size of Texas. And it going to stay there, just past forever. It's called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, and it's got marine life for thousands of miles switching to an all-plastic diet. This series of videos on the subject is really interesting and disturbing, all at the same time. Makes you want to never use another plastic product again. But unfortunatley, that ain't happening.
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If it helps, I do separate my thrash for recycling. And when I buy food/drink that comes in plastic/aluminium packages, I always take my trash home, so I can adequately dispose of.
There's a special truck that gets only recyclable trash in my neighbourhood. And also I stock the used oil to send to recycling facilities too.
In the other hand, there's a river that crosses my town and you can cross it side-to-side in some parts, walking on the water, JChrist-like, due to the amount of plastic bottles.
At least I know I'm not sending my thrash there.
And I know it looks like those management course motivational histories, but when my wife and I moved into the house we're living now, we looked on the internet to see which day was the selective garbage collecting day. Our neighbours started to ask why we were putting the trash out in a non-trash-truck day.
After some explanation, one of our neighbours started doing the same in the next week, and then another, and another, and so on. Now, after 2 years that we started doing that, we can see 10 or 12 of our neighbours doing the same. And some of them asked their relatives that live in other neighbourhoods to do the same. Not too much, but it's a start.
I never believed when I read all those texts saying that you can start a change by changing your habits first. Now I can see it works.
And as I commute to work walking, sometimes I see people throwing thrash from the car's windows, and sometimes people that are walking do the same, and they drop their trash on the floor even noticing that there's a garbage can 100 meters ahead.
It pisses me off badly.
I burn all of my papers and plastics in a burn barrel out on the ranch.
I burn coal to heat my house.
My truck has dual exhaust with the catalytic converters removed.
My carbon footprint is similiar to that of sasquatch.
I don't buy all that B.S. about humans having something to do with global warming.
All of those douche bags like Al Gore and Barry Soetoro that talk a big talk don't believe it either.
Hell Barry burned over 9000 gallons of fuel flying to Iowa in Air Force One to make a speech on earth day about earth day.
You are a fool if you think you can do anything about global warming.
I do think a person shouldn't litter. That is bad.
Seriously Jellio. You are as big of a hypocrite as anyone else. YOU INVENTED GUMMY LIGHTS! The most environmentally unfriendly light on the market today.
Dude, most people are happy with just plain florescent lights. You have to mass produce ozone-unfriendly plastic covers on lights that burn 15 times more energy than one comprable light source.
That tells me you don't believe the global warming crap either.
Actually, the LEDs in our gummilights use a fraction of the power used by standard incandescent bulbs to produce the same amount of light and last up to 25 times as long. Not sure where you're getting your info.
And of course I believe climate change is occuring. But I have heard some scientists say that it already may be too late to avert drastict changes in the environment, which may be coming as soon as 15 - 20 years from now, so maybe you're right about there being nothing we can do about it. I'm choosing to believe we still can help.
LC, that's a very cool example of how one person can mae a difference. Thanks very much.
By doing my part I'm compensating Dave's footprint. That makes us even... hahahah
I think we should recycle, conserve energy, etc ... whereever possible because it is the responsible thing to do for our children and future generations. But, I don't believe that we all have to sacrifice a comfortable life to do it; so whatever one has to do to strike their own balance between the two is fine with me. I don't want anyone telling me how to live. In return, I won't tell anyone how to live either.
To think that anything man has done could invoke a global warming or global cooling cycle is laughable. We should be responsible so as to not exasperate the trend, but whatever cycle is currently in play was destined to occur whether we were here or not.
the captains monologue in eleven was great, my favorite of them, i like 12 too