Andrew's Sprocket

a gear for all facets of life

Welcome to another installment of Recession Blues. With the cost of energy going up we must look to our old ways to take care of many tasks. Recently I have noticed that the solar dryer or clothes line, for you pre-electric dryer generation, has come out of the nostalgic closet. There are many indicators of a recession and sometimes you see things that are the exact definition.

You know you’re in a recession when…

Condom on the Clothesline

Condom on the Clothesline

Yes, when you see condoms on a clothes line. Does it get any worse. Now I’m not sure how many times you can recycle a condom but I would think you could substitute clean plastic, maybe even ziplock, sandwich bags before…Ok, I’m cutting this off right now.

Speaking of recycling, I get tired of sorting my recycled crap and have even gotten a notice from the recycling company when there is cardboard in with my beer cans. Actually it was a threat, they stuck the note to my bin and said next time we won’t pick this up. To hell with it all then. It’s not like I’m reaping any of the profits. There is technology out there for a omniscient recycling system. The company is a publicly traded company by the name of Startech, that makes a machine, a plasma converter, that essentially recycles every piece of garbage you throw at it. This could eliminate land fills as mentioned in the PopSci article. So why doesn’t every down have one of these? I am guessing the initial cost puts it out of most small towns reach but I’m not sure. My town will have one. I’ve heard they sold a bunch to Korea to get rid of chemicals and other warfare that the US left other there after the war since there wasn’t any other way to disposed of the materials. Maybe we can sell a bunch to Irag…

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The price of everything is higher today than ever before and we can attribute that to the fact that petroleum is at an all time high and why shouldn’t it be, our Commander and Chief is an Oil man and we are at “war” with the country that supplies it to us. Thank God we are not at war with Mexico, what would happen if the price per barrel of refried beans rose 45% in the past year. I think we would eat less refried beans is what would happen. And the price of a Mexican Pizza at Taco Bell would almost be out of reach.

All of this is a precursor to the next war. A war between neighbors in suburban American towns. The bike peddlers verses the gas guzzlers. The clothes line dryer vs. the AC sucking dryer. The solar enthusiast vs. the grid drawing energy hog.

“Go Green” and “Reduce Your Carbon Footprint”. We are already hearing this in the news, the TV ads, the damned media and soon the government will tax us for not complying.

BLAH!

Addition July 17th 2009
It is official, Websters has added carbon footprint as a noun defined as
“the negative impact that something (as a person or business) has on the environment ; specifically : the amount of carbon emitted by something during a given period”
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/carbon+footprint

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