During the last 24 hours sefton and I have written a really interesting (I think) story on the Morning Electroshock forum over at Everyauthor.com site.
We seem to have similar mentalities albeit different styles when it comes to writing and we have put some very exciting prose together online. Never met the guy face to face but we once spoke on the phone for 20 minutes.
My birthday tomorrow. I'm fine right now but tomorrow I'll be old! 57. What of that? Dunno. It's just a number, factors of 1, 3, 19, 57, not even prime. I'm planning to dine out at a restaurant that offers a free entrée for the B'day Boy and later go to Rosters where they donate chicken wings equal to the number of years you have managed to remain upright and breathing.
I'll try to remain sober as well.
Friday, January 16, 2009
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
2009 is a new year
I have in the past made resolutions, goals really, things I want to do, not so much the, "I want to be a better person" sort of thing.
I have set myself a goal of finding an agent to present my books to publisher's for several years and haven't done a thing about it yet. I won't waste time with soul-searching, but, at risk of annoying friends who may roll their eyes at seeing tnis one again, I will once more set that goal.
1. Get a literary agent.
2. Finish up Smiling Buddha, the novel I began in 2002 after returning from Taiwan.
3. Develop an online source of income, whether it be eBay or and MLM or an affiliate.
4. Be gone from Canada for next winter. heh.
5. Have a personal best time at Ironman Canada again this August 30th.
6. Finish the 50 day CORE challenge on Feb 13th with 500 pts or more.
I may add to this but that is good for a start
I have set myself a goal of finding an agent to present my books to publisher's for several years and haven't done a thing about it yet. I won't waste time with soul-searching, but, at risk of annoying friends who may roll their eyes at seeing tnis one again, I will once more set that goal.
1. Get a literary agent.
2. Finish up Smiling Buddha, the novel I began in 2002 after returning from Taiwan.
3. Develop an online source of income, whether it be eBay or and MLM or an affiliate.
4. Be gone from Canada for next winter. heh.
5. Have a personal best time at Ironman Canada again this August 30th.
6. Finish the 50 day CORE challenge on Feb 13th with 500 pts or more.
I may add to this but that is good for a start
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Carbon Tax? Spend it where it will have some impact: China.
If you really want a carbon tax - because it can do us some good,
if you really want that carbon tax to have some real benefits,
then think outside the box. The box being BC.
That’s right. Spend the money where it can really do us some good.
Spend it where the problem is. China.
In China they are building coal-fired electricity generation plants at the rate of two a week.
You heard me – TWO coal burning, sulfur dioxide, CO2 spewing plants each and every week!
And guess where they buy their coal?
BC. British Columbia.
We are selling them the coal to burn and the wind blows the pollution right back at us.
Studies in California show that 1/3 of the daily smog in LA is produced by China.
(We have done no such studies to date.)
So, what can we do about it?
Clearly cutting back on diesel burning transport trucks at the rate of 2% is a pathetic and useless response. And that is what the Campbell carbon tax has done. Cut 2% of trucker’s jobs. Compared to China’s daily greenhouse gas output that is the equivalent of blowing out one candle in every restaurant in BC and expecting the skies to clear.
Here’s my suggestion. Use the carbon tax collected from BC residents to buy a nuclear powered electricity generation plant – a Candu reactor, say, and give it to the Chinese.
Designed by Canadians, powered by uranium mined by Canadians – which China will buy from us (part of the deal, to offset loss of coal sales) and while we’re at it we insist that it is to be built by Canadians – paid from our tax dollars.
We say to China, “We want to give you a nuclear electricity generation plant. We’ll design it, build it and train your guys to run it. You buy our fuel rods and dispose of them properly when they’re done. That’s it.
The result will be a carbon credit the like of which we could never accumulate by cutting 10% here and 15% there and it helps our 2nd largest trading partner.
You can thank me later,
if you really want that carbon tax to have some real benefits,
then think outside the box. The box being BC.
That’s right. Spend the money where it can really do us some good.
Spend it where the problem is. China.
In China they are building coal-fired electricity generation plants at the rate of two a week.
You heard me – TWO coal burning, sulfur dioxide, CO2 spewing plants each and every week!
And guess where they buy their coal?
BC. British Columbia.
We are selling them the coal to burn and the wind blows the pollution right back at us.
Studies in California show that 1/3 of the daily smog in LA is produced by China.
(We have done no such studies to date.)
So, what can we do about it?
Clearly cutting back on diesel burning transport trucks at the rate of 2% is a pathetic and useless response. And that is what the Campbell carbon tax has done. Cut 2% of trucker’s jobs. Compared to China’s daily greenhouse gas output that is the equivalent of blowing out one candle in every restaurant in BC and expecting the skies to clear.
Here’s my suggestion. Use the carbon tax collected from BC residents to buy a nuclear powered electricity generation plant – a Candu reactor, say, and give it to the Chinese.
Designed by Canadians, powered by uranium mined by Canadians – which China will buy from us (part of the deal, to offset loss of coal sales) and while we’re at it we insist that it is to be built by Canadians – paid from our tax dollars.
We say to China, “We want to give you a nuclear electricity generation plant. We’ll design it, build it and train your guys to run it. You buy our fuel rods and dispose of them properly when they’re done. That’s it.
The result will be a carbon credit the like of which we could never accumulate by cutting 10% here and 15% there and it helps our 2nd largest trading partner.
You can thank me later,
Sunday, November 2, 2008
NaNoWriMo has begun
I have begun writing a new novel. This morning I put down 2k or so and enjoyed the 3 hours I spent at the keyboard.
It is set primarily on an island in Mexico where I went on vacation last February for two weeks.
Everywhere I go I am studying the environs for a setting for a novel of some kind, maybe a suspense thriller, maybe a love story, maybe SF, I never know at the time, but it makes me pay attention to details like the boats, the people, the vegetation. The latter is a problem for me because the names of plants always escape me and it is hard to research them from a distance.
Bander
It is set primarily on an island in Mexico where I went on vacation last February for two weeks.
Everywhere I go I am studying the environs for a setting for a novel of some kind, maybe a suspense thriller, maybe a love story, maybe SF, I never know at the time, but it makes me pay attention to details like the boats, the people, the vegetation. The latter is a problem for me because the names of plants always escape me and it is hard to research them from a distance.
Bander
Monday, October 20, 2008
New Monority Government
Okay, the conservatives got re-elected as another minority government and the world didn't end, not yet anyway.
The dollar is falling, the price of oil is falling as are other fuels, natural gas, gasoline, but diesel is in short supply in some locales in Canada and trucks are sitting idle. Our food chain is 3 days to a week in Canada. If the trucks don't roll the food doesn't arrive.
I remember reading Paul Ehrlich's book in 1978 or thereabouts: The End of Affluence. It rings eerily true still in light of some recent developments.
Ehrlich pointed to various problems, the one week food inventory and the vulnerability of the banking system to a credit crisis being just two of them.
I await further developments, while I think about gathering some nuts and berries for the larder.
The dollar is falling, the price of oil is falling as are other fuels, natural gas, gasoline, but diesel is in short supply in some locales in Canada and trucks are sitting idle. Our food chain is 3 days to a week in Canada. If the trucks don't roll the food doesn't arrive.
I remember reading Paul Ehrlich's book in 1978 or thereabouts: The End of Affluence. It rings eerily true still in light of some recent developments.
Ehrlich pointed to various problems, the one week food inventory and the vulnerability of the banking system to a credit crisis being just two of them.
I await further developments, while I think about gathering some nuts and berries for the larder.
Monday, October 13, 2008
Canadian Election Tomorrow
Looks from the polls like another Conservative government for the next 4 or 5 years.
The Greens & NDP are squabbling over who cares the most about the environment. Voters seem to be leaning towards whichever party thay think will protect their money the best. The urge to self-preservation for the short term, the immediate future, is the strongest motivation.
It irritates me no end that they twitter about a carbon tax and a cap & trade program as if this is a realistic solution The irritation stems from their attitude that Canadian voters are too stupid to know the difference or that neither plan has a hope in Hell of succeeding. And that they are probably right about how ignorant your average joe is. The government ought to know since they were part of the conspiracy to keep the masses poor and ignorant in the first place.
Deplorable efforts at making the schools effective or maintaining conditions where teaching professionals could make them more efficient, miserably low expectations of performance and shocking rewards system for underachievement all resulting in masses that are too incompetent to compete on a world stage, & too stupid to realize that they have been duped by the elite & betrayed by their elected representatives at the expense of the well-to-do classes.
I probably won't bother watching the election results sham tomorrow, since Canadian TV is banned from reporting the results in the East before polls close in the west, but American stations will carry the news anyway, besides isn't there the internet? We will read election results in Newfoundland immediately the polls close on some Newfy's Blog 3.5 hours before polls close in Vancouver.
Geoff
The Greens & NDP are squabbling over who cares the most about the environment. Voters seem to be leaning towards whichever party thay think will protect their money the best. The urge to self-preservation for the short term, the immediate future, is the strongest motivation.
It irritates me no end that they twitter about a carbon tax and a cap & trade program as if this is a realistic solution The irritation stems from their attitude that Canadian voters are too stupid to know the difference or that neither plan has a hope in Hell of succeeding. And that they are probably right about how ignorant your average joe is. The government ought to know since they were part of the conspiracy to keep the masses poor and ignorant in the first place.
Deplorable efforts at making the schools effective or maintaining conditions where teaching professionals could make them more efficient, miserably low expectations of performance and shocking rewards system for underachievement all resulting in masses that are too incompetent to compete on a world stage, & too stupid to realize that they have been duped by the elite & betrayed by their elected representatives at the expense of the well-to-do classes.
I probably won't bother watching the election results sham tomorrow, since Canadian TV is banned from reporting the results in the East before polls close in the west, but American stations will carry the news anyway, besides isn't there the internet? We will read election results in Newfoundland immediately the polls close on some Newfy's Blog 3.5 hours before polls close in Vancouver.
Geoff
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Any carbon tax in Canada is a waste of time..
as long as gas flaring continues in the oil producing industry.
"Gas flares emit about 390 million tons of carbon dioxide every year, and experts say eliminating global flaring alone would curb more CO2 emissions than all the projects currently registered under the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism."
- from http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12175714
Should I stop driving my 3-cyclinder Suzuki hatchback to work even on cold, rainy days, instead riding my bike 25kms one way to cut down the size of my carbon footprint, and pay a carbon tax of 2.5 cents a litre of gasoline to my provincial government while they do nothing about the gas flaring going on around the world "because there is no local demand for the natural gas to make it economical (read "profitable") to the oil companies?
"Oil is a mainstay of Nigeria's economy, and the government acknowledges that the oil industry still flares 24 billion cubic meters of gas a year, enough to power a good portion of Africa for a whole year."
(or enough to power all of British Columbia for 5 weeks!)
Gas flares burn in Nigeria adjacent to houses that have no electricity. Why? because the residents are too poor to be able to buy the electricity in the first place. Why? because the oil revenues from the industry that is killing them are not shared by the citizens of the country:
"In the areas close to the gas flares, medical staff report treating patients with all sorts of illnesses that they believe are related to the flames: bronchial, chest, rheumatic and eye problems, among others."
Instead, the ruling junta lines their own pockets corruptly with millions from the profits of allowing the Oil Corporations to drill there, flaring off gas in contempt of Government regs. banning the practice.
The oil is shipped to Europe and the US market to power SUVs, power plants and generally to support the developed lifestyle of the first world.
What do I say? It's a dog-eat-dog world and we are winning the fight?
I don't see the green revolution succeeding, at all, ever.
Bander
"Gas flares emit about 390 million tons of carbon dioxide every year, and experts say eliminating global flaring alone would curb more CO2 emissions than all the projects currently registered under the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism."
- from http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12175714
Should I stop driving my 3-cyclinder Suzuki hatchback to work even on cold, rainy days, instead riding my bike 25kms one way to cut down the size of my carbon footprint, and pay a carbon tax of 2.5 cents a litre of gasoline to my provincial government while they do nothing about the gas flaring going on around the world "because there is no local demand for the natural gas to make it economical (read "profitable") to the oil companies?
"Oil is a mainstay of Nigeria's economy, and the government acknowledges that the oil industry still flares 24 billion cubic meters of gas a year, enough to power a good portion of Africa for a whole year."
(or enough to power all of British Columbia for 5 weeks!)
Gas flares burn in Nigeria adjacent to houses that have no electricity. Why? because the residents are too poor to be able to buy the electricity in the first place. Why? because the oil revenues from the industry that is killing them are not shared by the citizens of the country:
"In the areas close to the gas flares, medical staff report treating patients with all sorts of illnesses that they believe are related to the flames: bronchial, chest, rheumatic and eye problems, among others."
Instead, the ruling junta lines their own pockets corruptly with millions from the profits of allowing the Oil Corporations to drill there, flaring off gas in contempt of Government regs. banning the practice.
The oil is shipped to Europe and the US market to power SUVs, power plants and generally to support the developed lifestyle of the first world.
What do I say? It's a dog-eat-dog world and we are winning the fight?
I don't see the green revolution succeeding, at all, ever.
Bander
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