earth hour really seems to me to be one of those environment-awareness-raising activities that raises my awareness of all sorts of unexpected things.

i wonder for example how many people whose lights and televisions i can see clearly from my window know that it is earth hour, but think the gesture of going dark is stupid or extreme.  i wonder what they are watching on television or what they could be talking about in their incandescent homes.  i wonder if they perhaps forgot about earth hour or if they have to be somewhere important at 10pm and can't take the time for one hour of reflection on the fate of the world.

i wonder if television media who claim to support the environment really wanted to put their backs into it, would they be willing to forego broadcasting any television at all for one hour.  or perhaps all of the cinemas could cancel the shows that run over earth hour.  there are already a number of bars and restaurants who run dark for an hour.  but to really do it right, no food should be prepared at that time (well, perhaps food cooked by natural gas), but of course drinks could be served... by candlelight.

earth hour raises my awareness that there are some people who care about a global-transgenerational problem, and there are some who do not.  the chronic conundrum for the ones seeking to improve the world through self-sacrifice and forbearance simply allow ambivalent exploiters to continue to live in excess.  while it is grossly unfair and unjust, it has also been the way that it has been since the beginning of time.  those who serve themselves first seem, and then actually do become strong quickly. while those who ration and save may outlast and endure, but only if the stronger one's don't seize what the reasoned one is saving.

and this is the same problem that applies to all precious things - fancy handbags at a boxing day clearance sale, having a high-flow shower head instead of a low-flow one, having an 8-cylinder vehicle when you only need 4, controlling all the fresh water on the planet, weapons of mass destruction, and of course, gold.  you name it.

these are the thoughts that i am having handwriting into my journal by candlelight (later to be translated for the internest).  i wonder if similar thoughts come to those people i see still watching their televisions in the surrounding buildings.  are they hearing the sound of unamplified, unprocessed sound?  do they see the absence of light generated by a regulated flow of electrons through a filament or a captured gas?  i don't see how they can - if they are thinking about what they are watching.

all this having been said, it IS encouraging to see that there are more lights off than on.  there may yet be hope for us.

- g

song of the hour for the earth: analyze, the cranberries

everyone is horrified at the global economic collapse and i am no different.

the new york times today states that AIG, one of the largest recipients of recent tax-payer bailouts is set to pay out $165 million in bonuses by the end of the day. northern trust of chicago received $1.5 billion in bailout money and laid off 450 employees, but still engaged in frivilous shmoozing by jetting clients and employees to los angeles in february for lavish "business development" involving four-star treatment, private concerts by famous popular musicians, and no strings attached.

my friend NH told me on friday after the blippy rise in market strength this last week that the system was working as it should - buyers were buying discounted stocks and profits would be made on them when they were sold and the heady game of short and long would continue as it must.

i find this position completely untenable. the argument that bonuses are contractually obliged to be paid is sickening - if there is no out for these institutions to NOT pay these monies, then they're not bonuses at all. the notion that these bonuses are required to retain the best and brightest leaders of our financial institutions is also rendered completely absurd by the abyssmal failing of the industry as a whole to self-check and self-moderate, resulting in the catastrophic consequences we see over and over and over again. the final insult to the entire world is the claim that it would be "illegal" to refuse to pay these bonuses because it would constitute a breach of contract.

that we, the normal person, and not the "masters of the universe" allow this to continue demonstrates the total lack of imagination that we have as a generation. the inability to imagine an alternative and a means to get there are hallmarks of our society. in the past, dazzling geniuses like Alexander, Constantine, Martin Luther, Napoleon, Washington, and even Lenin, Mao, or Kennedy, all had visions for a greater future full of honour, order, prosperity and freedom (albeit all through very very different means). today, billions of us sit back watching CNN and CNBC and Comedy Central waiting for the next shockwave to come and decimate our lives. every day, the machivellianism of the market system that has become woven into the thread of everything that all of us do every single day, burns our skins and poisons our lives, but we are powerless to do anything about it.

especially not without any new ideas.

well, i've got one. for a start, i would pass an omnibus bill, much like the ones that facilitated trillions of dollars of tax-payer bailouts, to TAX THE FUCK out of all executive bonuses for any institution that received a taxpayer bailout to the tune of, oh, let's say 100%. too harsh?  alright, maybe they should pass a different bill that makes it illegal to NOT DONATE that entire bonus BACK TO THE INSTITUTION who paid it, under penalty of say, death - such activity is absolutely legal and well within executive authority to enact.  if the "best and the brightest" don't like it, then they can quit their jobs and go find another one at... oh? what's that?... OH!!! wait a minute! all those other banks and insurers are GONE. well, i guess you had better be thankful that you HAVE the job that you HAVE, just like everyone else on Main Street, you simpering jackasses!

- g

song of the day for hating the fuck out of sodding madoff motherfuckers: far too frail, skinny puppy.

it's true that i look to technology to solve many of my day to day problems.  for example, i've moved across the country many times in my adult life and easily the biggest chore for me is moving 40 - 50 boxes full of heavy heavy books to each new home.  technology mentioned to me that it has some kind of solution to storing huge (and heavy) amounts of information in electronic format, so thought i might listen to what it had for me today.

in the past month, amazon has re-introduced its main contender to the eBook arena (an arena that consists of approximately one other contestant - the sony eBook reader) - the Kindle 2.  my initial impression of the kindle 1 was that it was the lamest piece of technology that you could possibly get for $500.  it only did one thing (display ebooks), and it looked like it was designed in the 1980s using 1980s technology.  it was awkward and clunky and defended its amazing awkward-clunky-crapulence by claiming to offer an experience that was most "book-like".

anyway, first-generation failings aside, the new kindle looks a lot slicker and almost reminds me of those cool PADD things they had on the next generation + star trek series. i went to amazon.ca to look into downloading some environmentally friendly, highly-profitable-to-amazon electronic books, but was dismayed to find that this service was not available in the Canadian store?!?!  so fine - i can just go to the american store and ... oh! no.. wait... oh what's this?  in order to download my digital book, i need to first register my kindle or iPhone with Amazon.  alright!  well, at least we're getting somewhere!  i just happen to have an iPhone right here... eBooks are forthcoming!!!

leaving aside for a moment the realization that anyone might want an eBook to read on a laptop or a netbook or even a crackberry and that amazon's delivery method totally ignores that market, this should be a relatively straightforward step.  after all, i had to wait a year for the iPhone to come to Canada, but now that it is here, there's the apple AppStore and i can get all the same stuff here for the iPhone than anyone can get in the states, right?  as lex luthor likes to say, "WRONG."  can't get the iPhone kindle reader for the iPhone (or the kindle for that matter) in Canada.

so i see that i now have two options.  i could  start maliciously downloading pirate-scanned-OCRd copies of books and uploading them to my iPhone via the absolutely free application called Stanza that takes seemingly any text or RTF or ePub document and renders it very passably in eBook fashion on the iPhone. no authors or publishers get paid, but the content seems to be readily available and i get my reading material integrated in my phone/email/digital camera/personal music device for the subway.  however, as a rule, i dislike piracy so nix to that.

the other option i have is to go to Shoppers Drug Mart and get a prepaid Mastercard gift card and register a second iTunes account with a fake US address - maybe the White House's address will work.  it should because in the five years or so that i've had my iTunes account, i don't think apple has ever sent me a single piece of mail.  this will allow me to download the kindle app to my iPhone (as well as a ton of other great iTunes store content that i can't get in canada) and THEN i can legally download licensed versions of the electronic books that i would like to read using my iPhone while i am riding in the subway for an hour each day.

this seems like an awful lot of frustration to avoid packing and unpacking books between moves.  and then there's the niceness of the experience of going to the bookstore, roaming around the shelves gazing over the marvel of tens of thousands of covers , looking to make that connection with your next read, and then lovingly turning pages, folding dog-ears and scribbling notes in the margins.  like louis CK points out, these are amazing times, and it is probably more important to be amazed at the things we do have!

- g