Several months ago, I came down with an unexpected case of appendicitis (had surgery the day after my birthday). Since then, things have just been consistently a bit on the crazy side, and I’ve had my plate full with various things and not had much time for blogging.
The paradox of wanting to do pretty much any sort of environmental volunteer work, particularly field work in wild areas, is that you must own a motor vehicle, despite all the environmental harm automobility does. It’s particularly paradoxical if you’re like me and had already been living without a car. Which, precisely, is why I’ve fought the concept of buying one for about a year. Today is the day I’ve stopped fighting the concept.
I’m reasonably sure I made the correct decision, because a couple of weeks ago, during one of those periodic crises caused by what I fear as the imminent evaporation of my current job, my first reaction was to say to myself “You procrastinating idiot! Why didn’t you buy a truck with a camper or a camper van when your job was more secure, so you could at least spend your upcoming unemployed summer in the woods!” Not to mention how some of my Earth First! friends have bought vehicles in recent years for the purpose of getting to the woods.
Now to throw more money at getting a camper put onto it. Though a lot less more than I had originally planned on; since I’m opting for a basic canopy instead of a more elaborate (and heavy, and fuel-economy-sapping) pop-up camper.
One thing I’m looking forward to is purely personal — using The Paradox (which is the name the truck is probably going to be called by) to get away to the coast on weekends during the upcoming grass pollen allergy hell season. I’ll actually be able to spend significant parts of my late spring weekends outdoors for the first time in two years.
Even though my job didn’t evaporate a few weeks ago, it’s going to do so in the not-too-distant future, for no reason other than I’ll probably end up making it evaporate by resigning. Politely and on good terms, of course — no sense in burning bridges.
I’ve come to increasingly realize that Portland represents stagnation and lack of needed growth for me. I’d really like to be doing some sort of botanical field work, but my ability to do so here is seriously limited by both an environment (thanks to man-made grass-seed farms) that is actively hostile to my doing so during precisely the most important part of the year for botany, and by a state higher education system that doesn’t serve my needs.
By contrast, most of western Washington (with the exception of the little sliver of it just across the river from Portland) has air with blissfully low levels of grass pollen. There’s also not one but two excellent alternative state colleges in western Washington, which cut out a lot of the bullshit inherent in formalized education. That’s important, because I’ll probably need a BS in botany or some other natural science to get the sort of job I want. Have I mentioned yet that both major Oregon universities are in a part of the Willamette Valley that gets even worse grass pollen levels than Portland?
The bottom line is that Oregon simply does not serve my needs as well as Washington does. I realized this before I moved back to Portland, which is part of the reason I had such misgivings about doing so two years ago. Some very good friends thought I was nuts, because Portland is a much better match for my Bohemian side. And, in fact, Portland is. The rub is that’s a relatively minor, superficial, subcultural issue compared to the incompatibility between myself and my career.
As much as I dislike how dysfunctional Seattle can be, I’ll be able to botanize to my hearts’ content on weekends in May and June, and I’ll be establishing a Washington residency which will serve me well when the time comes to enroll at Evergreen or Fairhaven. And, who knows, I might just luck out and find one of those rare jobs out of the Seattle metro area.
Exhibit A, which should win a Lame Liberal Argument of the Month Award.
Really, now, what’s wrong with protesting an inevitable future problem? Are not foresight and planning generally considered to be part of wise action?
Isn’t the real issue the bald hypocrisy of the majority of those protesting? They voted for Bush twice (despite his administration’s record deficits) and supported — celebrated, even — the murder of non-white non-Americans. And now they want us to believe that suddenly they’ve become born-again fiscal conservatives who are so sensitive about oppression that mere higher taxation is utterly intolerable. Yeah, right.
With the exception of the few Libertarians in the that crowd, their actions today, combined with their past actions, show just how utterly reprehensible and morally depraved the vast majority of the conservative movement is. They had no problem with deficit spending for the purposes of imperialism and greater power for their own movement, yet cannot stand it for any other reason.
But the majority of the liberals are unable to perceive that. Doing so would first of all mean questioning the moral certainty of their own social vision. It also paints a far darker picture of the opposition they continually cut deals with than one of mere silliness and ineptitute, which in turn might lead to questioning those means of action, means liberals tend to cherish and idealize as much as they do their social vision.
Of course taxes and intrusive big governments are oppressive. So are militaries, police, jails, corporations, and wealthy, privileged elites. Dealing with all of these simultaneously isn’t precisely simple or easy, but it doesn’t mean the professed concern of the “tea parties” is wrong. The issue is that the openly-professed concerns are obviously not the actual concerns of the movement organizing the demonstrations.
And, finally, ya gotta love the veiled homophobia implicit in mocking the conservative protesters as “teabaggers.”
Go here.
If you get a big circle-with-a-slash (like I did at first), no, that’s not because you’re violating copy protection. It’s because their site is lame.
I first thought I was running afoul of some copy protection program, probably because I don’t subscribe to that site. Then a thought crossed my mind: could they be so lame as to add a JavaScript onmouseover action that displays the circle-with-a-slash, because if one does that, the user can’t right-click to save the cartoon? Indeed, they could.
Just move your mouse to the periphery of the window (or out of it entirely), and the cartoon appears in all its glory.
Not only does it interfere with legitimate viewing of their site (to reiterate, I had almost given up and closed the tab to it), it also fails utterly in its goal of preventing unauthorized copying. In under a minute, I was able to make a copy of the allegedly-protected image in not one but two completely different ways.* (It wasn’t even remotely difficult to do.)
It all brings to mind the Jargon File’s definition of copy protection: “A class of methods for preventing incompetent pirates from stealing software and legitimate customers from using it. Considered silly.”
* Don’t worry, ambulance-chasers: I’ve already deleted both copies. I had no interest in pirating that cartoon, only in proving to myself how unbelievably lame your client’s site is.
As predicted, my job has now evaporated.
Unexpectedly, it happened as a result of being laid off due to the recession. I didn’t have to resign, so I can collect unemployment insurance, which will make the transition to a new job in a new city all the easier.
Thank you, universe!
PS — Just in case the CEO reads this, it wasn’t him that I had any problems with. It was someone else, with whom I interacted on a much more frequent basis.
(Which, while not an absolute certainty, is pretty darn likely at this moment, and I certainly hope it happens.)
People change, their needs change, cities change. And people learn new things about places after they live there a while. It all means that the place you once were enthusiastic about moving to might eventually be a place you resent living in.
I’ve read blogs from folks who have stayed too long in a place that no longer suits them well. And then continued to stay. The resentment and bitterness builds and builds, while any outside observer is screaming “get out already”.
I’m not to that state yet with Portland. I merely realize that, all things considered, it is not a good place for me. There’s still a great deal I appreciate about Portland, but no matter: I know that overall, I’ll be better off to the north, even if it means living in Seattle once more, a place with more than its share of dysfunctionality.
What’s changed since 2001? Let me list the ways:
Meanwhile, Seattle has in the past few years matured quite a bit politically. The populace has started to distrust the city leaders which have mismanaged affairs so badly; as a result, a citizen’s revolt has blocked an attempt at yet another stadium boondoggle, and another one has almost managed to block a new freeway boondoggle (and probably will succeed in blocking it). A consensus has emerged that traffic has reached the point where a regional rapid transit system is a necessity. This consensus crosses the ideological spectrum, with even politically conservative suburbs voting in favor of continuing to build light rail after the initial segment is complete.
Sure, I’ll miss having the woods at my door. Seattle has no equivalent to Forest Park. But, overall, I’m better off there than here for the next few years. When I’m really itching to experience some aspect of Portland, it will be an easy train ride away. And — who knows — I may luck out and find one of the few jobs in western Washington that’s not in a major metropolitan area.
Since I’ve lived there twice before, I can be quite sure of this, too. There will be few or no “hidden surprises” like the one I ran into on my bicycle that first May in Portland. And it’s very nice to be leaving on an overall good note, instead of a bitter and resentful one.
* No, I’m not exaggerating. Some Seattle side
streets are paved with a type of asphalt that has not been commonly used
since the 1920s. Cratered with potholes and spanned by gaping
cracks, a ride on one of them is as rough as a ride on an unpaved, abandoned
logging road.
† Also not an exaggeration. Most of the Old World
species used as lawn grasses whose seeds are grown in the Willamette
Valley rank among most allergenic of all grass pollens.
‡ I’m not exaggerating here, either.
Link.
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