This past weekend we went to a beautiful waterfall. There were lots of trees overhanging the water. We climbed out onto this trunk for a photo. I’ll have to post some more pictures in upcoming days. It was amazing. If you come visit, I’ll take you here, too. Well, unless you come in the winter. Then, you don’t get to come. It would be cold.
From my balcony, I can see the ocean. Actually, its a small straight with hills on the other side of this stretch of sea. Cruise ships frequently pass at night with lights blazing. During the day, I can watch the ferry boats and small fishermen pulling in their catch. I wanted to share this great view of ocean with all of you, too!
Wait a second…. you can’t see the ocean anymore. They’ve turned on the coal furnaces and the subsequent belching smoke has obliterated my view. In case you’re wondering, the ocean is usually right after all the buildings stop. If you sqint really hard, you can see it and the hills behind it. I guess I’ll have to wait until March to watch the ships off my balcony. Until then, I’ll go out onto the balcony once a week to throw water on my potted plants and then run back inside before the sulphuric stank makes me sneeze again.
Dark clouds billow across the town. The smell of sulphur permeates the air. Eyes begin to water and people begin to sneeze. The cold weather has arrived and in responlse, the many landlords and homeowners across town have turned on the coal-burning furnaces. If the smell hadn’t already warned me that coal season had begun, the sights outside my window would have confirmed it. Yesterday was supposed to be a warm and sunny day. Yet, as I opened my curtains I saw nothing but low, hanging smog. Because we sit up on the hill, I could see the bright blue sky above these clouds. But, the people down in the center of town wouldn’t be able to see the blue. For the rest of winter, it will be gray in our city.
For many of you who regularly read the mabBlab, your skies are going to be grayer in the future as well. Texas is planning 18 new power plants over the next 4 years to meet increasing energy demands. They have chosen to build these plants to be coal-burning. Four of these plants are in McClennan county. Seven of them surround Waco. I’m sure that the news and the papers are full of articles on these plants and the controversy that surrounds them, so I won’t reiterate that. Let me tell you instead what you will have to look forward to if these plants are built: air pollution, smog, a terrible stink (worse than a paper mill), terrible effects on the environment, and a definite drop in your quality of life. Sure, your city won’t be completely covered over like mine is, unless you live right next to one of these plants. (Or if you’re surrounded by seven of them.) These plants will affect the entire state in ways you won’t see: sulpher dioxide, air-borne mercury, nitrogen oxides, and carbon dioxide levels will skyrocket.
Please protect your air! Please speak out against these plants! There are other technologies available that burn coal at a much safer and less-polluting rate, but for various reasons, the government won’t listen. (That’s mostly because there’s about $132,000 in reasons lining the pockets of Rick Perry right now.) They claim that Texas must build these plants quickly and cheaply to meet demands. The wise and prudent move would be to spend a bit more now to build safer, better plants for the future. Your energy needs are not worth the damage these plants would cause.
If you’re not familiar with this battle for your clean air that is going on around you, here are some links that you can follow to learn more. Then, choose to act. Otherwise, you too can expect the smell of sulpher in your gray skies. I’ve selected articles from a variety of local and national sources. If you want to find more, search for “Texas Coal Plants” on any search engine and you’ll find a wide variety of articles to provide any answers you need. Then, act.
Inside my house at this moment I can smell the coal burning outside. I never want to encounter that in Texas. Trust me, neither do you.
Articles:
U.S. Coal Plant Boom Poses Big Questions — Fox News
Critics Blast Texas Plans for New “Dirty” Coal Plants — National Public Radio
Is Coal Golden? — From TIME.com
Guest Column: Coal, Nuclear Not Worth Wattage — From Waco Tribune-Herald
Harmful Effects of Coal Burning — From Wikipedia
Well, my hubby returned today from his trip to the country out east. They had a great time. He’s been telling me stories for about 8 hours straight and hasn’t finished them all. He said the people were wonderful and really welcoming. In short, it was a really great trip!
No real news today. I’m still here in the Big City, hanging out with my friends. I’ve heard from my hub and he’s doing well. I’m sure he’ll have a lot of stories to share when he gets back. As for me, I’ve been staying busy meeting friends, making danish, playing with Emma, and having good girl time.
Tonight I got to see a friend who used to live in the city where I live now. My friend Ruth joined me so she could meet her as well. This friend grew up in Sea Town. She finished school there and even went to the university there. Then, she graduated and got a job in the Big City. She went from a town of about 100,000 on a good day to a town where 100,000 new people move there every day. The official population for the Big City is 12 million. I, and most everyone else, thinks that’s bunk. I wouldn’t be surprised if 15 million people lived here. There’s 100,000 people living in this neighborhood I’m staying in. All tightly packed in and surrounded by traffic and bus exhaust. So, I think it goes without saying that she’s a little stressed right now. She’s having to learn what it’s like to survive here. It’s something like a girl from a small town in Wyoming moving to New York City. Yeah.
It was great to see her today. She was so cute. Even though I used to live here and Ruth has lived here for over a year now and we are way more familiar with this city than she is, she still was playing the “hostess.” She asked her co-workers for restaurant recommendations. Then, she took us to some pretty random spots. We ate at a dive called the Bambi Cafe. No, it didn’t have girls named Bambi in it. It was named after the little deer (which is a boy, interestingly enough). Who knows why this random hamburger cafe is named after a cute little cartoon deer? Their specialty (which we did NOT try) is the wet hamburger. Yes. Wet. They make a hamburger, soak it in some type of garlic sauce, and keep it in a steam case. I think this was invented one day when the cafe owner realized that if he made a bunch of hamburgers in advance and got them wet, no one would know they were old. If he called it a specialty, people would eat them anyway. I opted out of the Wet Hamburger and went for a plain cheeseburger and an Atom. That’s their other specialty. It’s a fruit smoothie. But, we couldn’t identify all of the fruits in it. I think they use whatever fruit they could find. And carrots. We were sure there were carrots, bananas, kiwi, and apples in it for sure. My friend thinks there were melons in it, too. Who knows. But, it was good. And, although it was wet, it was supposed to be wet, so I didn’t mind.
After this, she walked us down the busiest street in the entire Big City. This is kind of like Times Square. She was trying to find a cafe she’d been to once. But, it was really cold and this cafe was on the roof. And, she wasn’t sure she could find it. So, when I told her that I knew of a place, she said “Really? Let’s go there instead!” very readily. I think she was relieved to let go of hostessing duties. After all, the poor girl has only been here a month. We went to a cafe called Barcelona that, in addition to desserts and tea/coffee, serves pizza. That’s right. Barcelona. Pizza. Central Asia. None of this matches. I guess that’s what’s supposed to be fun. We had dessert, drank tea, and talked awhile. I would have liked to stay longer, but we knew that the last bus to this part of town was leaving in a few minutes, so we had to run.
So there you go… typical evening in the life of mab. Good friends, wet hamburgers, okay desserts, and talking a lot. The best news is that Ruth and my friend seemed to hit it off. I hope that they will get to keep hanging out.
I went to visit a friend yesterday and told her all of my woes with Cicero the Cyst and Tyrone my Mighty Mighty Thyroid. She is a nurse who works part-time in a hospital. She also agreed that the doctor who said that my thyroid wasn’t acting up enough to be treated could be wrong. Yes, my numbers may fall into the subclinical (or small) problem range, but my symptoms sho’ didn’t feel subclinical. Well, my nurse friend took me to her hospital today and got me in to their head doctor. (I love their system of relational connections over here!) He looked at my scores, did a brief exam, and said “Yo. This ain’t subclinical.” (Or something like that…. it’s translated.) So, he put me on happy pills. Hopefully this will fix all the problems.
So, there you go. Tyrone is Mighty, Mighty after all.
Another fun fact: My nurse friend is Sweedish. Every time I see her, she teaches me a Sweedish word. But, only really really really important words. I can now say coffee break, feet, and dog. Today I learned the word for “feeling active or energized.” It’s pigg. That’s right. Pigg. She told me that she hopes I will feel pigg after the medication therapy kicks in. For many reasons and on many levels, this makes me laugh. I thanked her for taking me to the doctor who listened to me and gave me good treatment so I could feel pigg again. Then, I ate more cookies. I think that’s called being a pig, not being pigg. I’m easily confused, I guess.
May you all be pigg today. And, should you encounter a nice, warm, fresh-from-the-oven chocolate cake, may you be a pig as well. Now, here’s a little health-related comic that made me a bit more pigg today:
I’m heading out of internet contact for a night. I say that as if I’m continually connected to my computer and always respond to my e-mails quickly. Hah hah hah. I have some unanswered e-mails from April in that there inbox. They’re practically antiques, you know.
Right now I’m watching Baby Einstein. No, it’s not to increase my mental capabilities. It’s because Baby Emma was watching it. But, now she crawled out of the room. So, I’m left alone watching it. I hope none of the neighbors can see through the windows. They might wonder. I’m not sure if you’ve seen any of these videos, but they’re actually really simple. They’re just toys. Usually mechanized toys. Like a black background and then a toy dog comes rolling across the screen. Or someone throwing a ball back and forth. (But all you see are their hands, never a grown-up’s body.) It’s incredibly simple. I think anyone could totally do this at home and avoid paying money for the videos. I’m baffled at how this is supposed to be educational. But, Emma loves it. Except the part with the lava lamp. You have to fast-forward through that. She really hates the lava lamp. I guess this guarantees she won’t be a hippie.
Now, I’m off to pack and do my hair and get in a taxi and head to the ferry!
Well, my husband is on a trip today. He’s visiting a nearby country helping a friend with work stuff. And the only clue you have about his whereabouts is in the title. Your prize for figuring it out: I don’t know. I’m fresh out of Hittite Fertility Goddesses.
I’m chillin’ in the Big City with my peeps. Right now we’ve been in a Gilmore Girls marathon. This is something we do whenever someone comes back from the States with the most recent season on DVD. Ok, well, the most recent season that has been released. We’re on season 6 right now (that’s stuff from a year ago). If any of you watch this show regularly, do NOT post a comment telling me what happens in any future seasons. I’ll be highly peeved. You think I’m kidding.
A lot of people do not approve of Gilmore Girls. They consider it to be lowbrow, girly, chick-TV. That is because they have not watched it. I really dig this show and I usually don’t dig TV. At least, not that much. I can watch it, but I’m intensely critical of it. This show, while not perfect, at least keeps me interested in an all-day marathon. And anyway, what other TV show has us Googling Birkin bags and Paul Anka? We’d stay up and finish out the last 8 episodes tonight, but we have to have some motivation to get out of bed in the morning. We figure that if we watch all 6 discs right away, we’ll be able to turn our minds and attention to better things the rest of the week. We’ll see.
I am now going to sleep. Well, I’m going to try. I’ve eaten a lot of pizza and chocolate, and drunk a lot of coffee today. I’m not sure I’m feeling so good. But, I will try valiantly to sleep a long, long time. And, then I’ll wake up and eat more food and drink more coffee and watch more Gilmore Girls. Now, this is what I call a retreat!
As any faithful mabBlab reader knows, I like podcasts. I like them because they keep me connected with the English-speaking world. I like them because all I can get on my tv are shows about men trying to reconcile with their mom’s coffin or women being forced to marry someone else and then their true love shows up so they jump off a low bridge and disappear. I like them because there’s information and entertainment to help me on bus rides around the city. And, I like them because they’re cool.
Or so I thought.
There’s one podcast I found early on. It was from a guy who is quite a wordsmith. He put together comic or thought-provoking stories each week. They were funny, they were bright, and they were very, very cool. I went to this guy’s website to check on his cool factor before totally committing to being a podcast listener. There was only one picture of him — and it was done in a cool, artsy manner, with him looking out from behind a camera. So, all I could see was a squinty eye and dark hair. This picture, along with all of his cool graphics and esoteric podcast name, declared him cool.
Until today. Until he decided to do a video podcast.
He came on the screen and I thought: Dude, you can’t be funny. You don’t have a chin and your nose is oddly shaped. And your eyes weren’t squinting because they were looking through the camera. You were just squinty. In fact, I used to think you were the kind of dude that lived the cool life of an advertising and free-lance writer in the greater Los Angeles area who spent his evenings in cool jazz clubs listening to the latest experimental trombone/violin jazz duos and hanging out with truly cool people. But, instead, apparently, you hang out at science fiction conventions.
My thoughts immediately changed about his work. I began to rethink everything I had heard. I began to re-judge his performances based on this new nerd persona instead of the cool-artsy-photo-taking-smart-podcast-making-funny man. And then I realized what I was doing. Why is it we judge peoples’ perfomances based on appearances? The humor factor of his work has not changed. All of the times I replayed and replayed certain stories and giggled each time is not undone by his squinty eyes.
And, so what if he isn’t cool. So what that he would have been at the same lunch table I was at in high school. (Maybe. I might not have let Mr. No Chin sit there. I was quite an intellectual snob. I apparently still am some sort of snob.) But, who really decided that not having a chin automatically makes him uncool? Or that his presence at various science fiction conventions also disqualifies him? Who invented cool? And, I’m not at all talking about Jessica Simpson kind of cool. Or anything that my former 2nd graders considered “awesome.” I’m meaning people who are hip, trendy, and yet really intellectual and exclusive in their nerdiness, but who know that deep down inside, they are sooo much better than the Jessica Simpson, Guess-wearing jeans crowd. Because we’re smarter. (Wow. If that isn’t snobby, I don’t know what is.)
All of this taps into some thoughts I’ve been having lately. Thoughts about this here blog thing. Thoughts about what people will think if I post this or that. Or thoughts of high-minded superiority when I read this or link to that. Or thoughts of inferiority because my blog readership is down. I don’t want to talk frankly about life over here because I’m not sure who is reading this and I’m not sure how to talk about my life, my job, or my heart. Like seeing this man’s video podcast changed how I viewed all of his previous podcasts, I don’t want anything I do to fit me into a stereotypical mold.
The thing is, I know for many people I already live in that mold. And, it’s not a very cool one.
The point of these ramblings? I think I realized in a way I haven’t realized before how much appearances matter and yet how little they should. I would be a fool for changing my opinions about this podcast just because his picture doesn’t fit who I thought he was. And, whether or not I or anyone else change my opinions, it wouldn’t really matter to him. At least, it wouldn’t change his value. Same for me. Whatever anybody thinks of me doesn’t matter. How you view me is unimportant. My worth and value don’t fluctuate with my blog stats. They are fixed.
So, take this as a prep or a warning or a trailer of sorts: I think I’m going to start writing about more things. Not just the funny crap that happens every day, but what I think and believe and do. Some things may tick you off. Some of you may say: “Forget it, I’m not reading this any more.” Some of you may change your opinons of who I am for better or worse. But, I am choosing not to care. I am choosing to remember where my value lies.
The mab Blab 