the dust settles …

Hello again, it’s been a while since my last blog entry. At that time Zoom airlines had just gone south and our plans to go to France had all gone bust leaving us in a real fuzzle. We had deposits made we couldn’t recover, sold most of our stuff, an offer on the house, the lot.

Well now it is almost a month later and things have settled somewhat. We lost the money for the airline tickets (or looks good as anyway), lost the deposit money on the rental in France, didn’t sell the house after all and have decided to stay in London … sort of. In the end a bit of R & R (Renovation and Retail Therapy) eased the blow. So we have spruced up the basement to a nicely finished family area, replaced the furniture with some nicer newer bits. In lieu of moving to France we will be taking longer (up to a few months) vacations to choice spots (like warm beaches in the middle of winter!). Looks like it will be a fair trade so far. Everyone is calmer, cooler, my son has returned to University to do more of his courses, our contract work has continued without break (as it would have had we moved) and I am enjoying not working 9 to 5, commuting 100KM to work and explaining to my bosses why I prefer to be barefoot. All in all it looks like things will work out. Everything happens for a reason, I guess France was not the answer we needed at this time, maybe later, maybe somewhere else. I let the universe decide.

House of cards …

Have you ever seen a house of cards collapse? It is coming up to Thursday (tomorrow) and I can tell you this time last week we had it all but this week? Naught. Last Thursday we where set to retire to France on September the 5^th (two days from now), we had sold the house, sold most of the furniture, arranged distance courses for Matthew, bought airline tickets, paid a deposit on the property in France and rented transport at that end. It was all arranged, when we arrived in France, we would have enough savings left to carry us should something go horribly wrong. What we didn’t figure on was that the airline might go bust before we left, taking all our careful planning with it. This week we have no airline tickets, a several thousand dollar hole in our savings, a lost deposit on the France rental property and no immediate travel opportunities since airfares seem to have suddenly gone skyways. Acquiring new tickets to France (or any other destination involving airline tickets) would eat up so much of our savings that we could not recover should something go wrong, which it is now evident that it can. So we have naught. The only good news so far was that the France car rental company has returned the $65 deposit on the car rental. The only advice we have received regarding our Zoom Airline tickets is that we probably will never see that money again so don’t bother chasing it. Ditto for the deposit on the rental property. As for the sale of the house, there is no easy way to back out of it (we were not particularly attached to it having decided to give it up for France *but* we do need a place to live) as the sellers have few rights in this case having signed the agreement of sale. So we are scrambling for a place to rent before the closing and trying to pick up the pieces as well as can be. It is amazing however how totally knackered life has become because of the failure of Zoom Airlines, a factor out of our control and so utterly unexpected. A meteor strike in the middle of London would have been less devastating! Watch this space, I’ll let you know what’s happening when the cards cease falling down around us.

shoes? Not!

Do you remember when you were young, how you ran barefoot in the summer? Feeling the grass on your feet, the texture of warm pavement? So why are you wearing shoes right this moment? Is it because (almost) everyone does? Because the rules (what rules?) say you must? Because your boss says you must? Because the sign at the entrance says you must?

It’s probably for all of these reasons and many more myths that need to be forgotten, changed or unlearned. The truth is going barefoot is incredibly natural, more healthy for you and puts you in touch with your environment like few other experiences can. Wearing shoes cramps the feet, affects your posture, promotes athletes foot and a host of other nasties, costs more and is not particularly eco-friendly.

Going barefoot in the modern world is unusual perhaps (given our social mores) but is not particularly hazardous. Many of us work in offices, retail establishments, at home, schools and universities where the greatest hazard is having someone wearing oxfords stepping on our toes. There are lots of places where the hazards of the environment call for some sort of protection for your feet, factories, construction and overheated kitchens come to mind. However in general going barefoot is not hazardous at all. There are in fact no laws that prohibit going barefoot in any retail establishment, restaurant, office or while driving. Individual stores or establishments may well choose not to serve you if one is barefoot, that is their choice (to give up my sale) just as my choice is to go barefoot.

In the modern profit oriented materialistic society that we live in, even the big name athletic shoe makers have discovered that there may just be something to this barefoot thing and have started marketing “barefoot” sneakers. These are shoes that are more ergonomically designed to match walking barefoot, doing away with raised heels, arch supports, thick rubber soles and such. Seems like an ok way for the sneaker makers to get in on the game I guess but why not do away with the sneakers all together and go barefoot? I will be I assure you.

Happy barefooting!
Additional Reading:

New York Times article

Wikipedia says …

Vibram barefoot shoes

Running barefoot prt.1

Running barefoot prt.2

clothing optional …

Remember when you were young and you and your friends ran to the library to look at the pictures in the National Geographic’s? The ones showing the African or South American or South Sea Island natives in the all together?  I was reminded of this strangely enough by a radio news story about a German dude who was arrested for hiking in the Black Forest in the nude and was subsequently allowed to go to serve his sentence in the nude, ostensibly because he was a naturist. In remembering the N.G. pics, then as now what struck me most about them was not the naughty bits on display but the complete nonchalance and candidness of the pics. Those natives thought nothing about being in the buff, weren’t really displaying their naughty bits because no one in their society had spent 10000 or so years telling them they were naughty.

The incident in Germany, which reminded me of the N.G. pics also reminded me of a vacation I took a few years back to Panama and the nude beach I frequented there and further back in the stores of my memory a vacation I took with some friends in college to a naturist resort up near Ottawa. In both cases one shed their clothes at the entrance and thought nothing of it. At the beach were people of all sizes, shapes, colors, walks of life. Trouble was, we were all exceptionally equal there. We all had two arms, two legs, 10 fingers and toes and a few naughty bits (only considered naughty because we been told that for a few thousand years).  Nobody walked up and down the beach in total arousal, ogling the opposite sex, passing any kind of judgment related to appearance. Everyone was there to enjoy the sunshine, lounge about, read a book, swim in the ocean (an incredibly exhilarating and natural feeling, swimming naked in the salt water of the ocean).  It was the most natural thing in the world, put you in touch with the environment in a way that can never be matched when clothed and no we weren’t eaten alive by mosquitoes and black flies.

Recall the huge fuss and kerfluffal a few years back when a few women in Ontario chose to go topless in summer? There were court cases, media coverage and outrage on all fronts, it was going to be total anarchy they said. Why?  Because it’s taboo for women to go topless that’s why. No one blinks an eye when a man (good looking and muscled or 450 pounds ugly as all get out) goes topless, funny that. Mostly it’s because we equate nudity with sexuality, believe that the moment someone get naked (or even partially so) we’re all going to lose control, get aroused and do the things that everyone knows should be private. Truth is that is not so however.

Remember that vacation at the naturist camp I mentioned? I was in my last year of college in those days, so I was young (compared to my age these days) but still old enough to see the truth before me. The resort we stayed at could have been mistaken for any posh resort or KOA campground you care to mention. There were people playing tennis, lounging by the pools, kids canoeing in the lake, playing Frisbee. There were two major differences however, first there were no clothes to be seen anywhere, second there was no way to tell (by looking at the people there) who had arrived in the Mercedes 450SEL and who had arrived in the Ford Maverick. Everyone at that resort was just that, themselves, equal and any shape, size, color you could imagine. Couldn’t tell how rich how poor, what religion, what preference they were. They were just people, no taboos, no naughty bits, no embarrassments, no judgments.

So why do we wear clothes?  In the beginning way back when we were less civilized (some might argue that point what with modern wars, prejudice and inequalities) we wore clothes to keep us warm, keep the dudes in the next cave from bashing our heads in, to show off our hunting prowess and maybe attract the good looking girl on the other side of the cave. Funny how little things have changed over time? Modern clothes are the costume of society, the badge of office, the suit of armor for the business world. Kids can’t be cool if their shoes aren’t Nike, their jeans aren’t DKNY. You can’t be a professional if you’re dressed in a t-shirt and shorts. You can’t be better off than the Jones’s if you shop at Wal-Mart instead of Neiman-Marcus. Oh and don’t forget, you can’t display any of the naughty bits; we’ll all lose control of ourselves.

Global Warming and Environmental (dis)Honesty

A few weeks ago I published a note here about the environment, big pollutive cars and a number of other concerns. The current buzzword in everybody speeches these days is global warming however. It seems that the popular belief is that we (that is mankind) is having a disastrous effect on his environment, creating far too much greenhouse gases, warming the earth and causing the weather patterns to destabilize into chaos. That’’s the party line, Al gore promotes it, David Suzuki endorses it, Richard Branson has a web site ( Flick off ) counting down the seconds till disaster strikes. Is that the truth though?

 

I have been reading this week a series of articles published in the financial post that are interviews and comments from leading scientists who dispute the claims made about global warming. The “deniers” they are called, because they don’t pull the party line and jump straight on the global warming bandwagon. These scientists are not saying there is nothing to worry about, that we should go on polluting, driving fuel inefficient cars, wasting energy or any of that. What they are saying is that the science of global environment modeling is incredibly unsettled, far from perfect and doesn’t support the claims of the party line. In many cases scientists comments are misconstrued, quoted incorrectly or out of context, statistics are used selectively by non-statisticians in order to make a supporting case. The doomsayers are saying the answer is correct so we’ll make the science fit the answer because the consensus says so. Science (as Michael Crichton has said) is not about consensus, it’s about finding the truth of some fact or refuting it by some eveidence.

 

The deniers claim that the present global warming is most probably due to solar activity (and a lack thereof) which has been shown to be linked to warming and cooling cycles throughout earth’s history. Such activity has been the cause of mini-iceages and warming trends that were very similar to the present rise in temperatures that the global warming people claim is all down to man and his fiddling. The deniers claim that the global weather patterns are just one part of a massive dynamic system that is the universe that we live in and that it seems just a little arrogant to think that man (even the several billion of us that there is) moving about on this dust speck in this great universe should have such a global effect. They also note that Mars, our closest neighbor, a planet with not one person nor one mole of greenhouse gases is going through an exactly similar warming trend as earth now is. Imagine that, global warming on Mars.

 

Another factoid put up by the believers is the warming of the oceans, the melting of the ice caps and the Antarctic ice sheets. However the true science for the last 50 years shows that the Antarctic has cooled by several degrees over the last 50 years and that the ice sheets seem to be growing not shrinking. How can this be if global warming is so rapidly melting the ice caps? Alice would say it’s curiouser and curiouser.

 

Now you might get the idea from this note that I am now against the believers who say that global warming will be the death of us all. However that is not true at all, I am one of the uninformed at the mercy of the media and their spin doctors. It is nigh on impossible to get a true view of what is actually the situation here. The media is firmly behind the believers, the schools are firmly behind the believers (many play Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” movie with no counterpoint view and no counter discussion), dissenters seem to be quietly silenced ( the deniers claim that research grants, grad students, tenure and other perks are quietly delayed or even denied if they publicly dissent). The deniers claim the believers are manipulating the science to fit there claims, ignoring the bits that don’t fit, making claims with no basis and no evidence to back it up. The believers claim that the deniers are sticking their heads in the sand, making false assumptions, ascribing too much credence to outside factors, manipulating the science in their favor and generally don’t understand the big picture. How does one who is not a scientist or a politician get to the true view of things? The media? Can’t go there, already we know they are biased, promoting a particular view based more on profit, political leanings and popularity than the truth, the environment or your health and welfare. The scientists? Which ones, the naysayers or the doomsayers? I just recently learned that those funky little fluorescent bulbs that David Suzuki promotes have mercury in them, are incredibly toxic if broken, can’t just be put in the garbage bins (destined for the local landfill) and (in my experience at least) are not as bright, not exceptionally long lasting. So you can’t believe the media, can’t discern which of the scientists are right (and not manipulating (instead of reporting) the facts) and most certainly can’t trust anything a politician says. I guess that leaves the companies, corporations and others trying to market (for a profit) environmentally friendly products. You can always trust someone trying to turn a big profit. Right!

 

Seems the best we can actually do is to try to promote (by our purchasing patterns) environmentally better products ( at a reasonable cost), promote by our vote and our donations to our favorite schools more (more truthful and unbiased) study of the problems and all of the mitigating factors involved. We all should read, investigate and (be allowed to) speak out on both sides of the debate equally. Profit and political gain should not be a part of the investigations, of the science of global warming and environmental good sense.

Turning 50

Well I have just turned 50, think of that! When I was just a sprout I couldn’t believe I would ever be an adult and do adult things, life was all summers and rules dictated by my parents. Each spring just like Douglas Spaulding (Dandelion wine – Ray Bradbury for those who haven’t read this fabulous story) I would nag my mother for that new pair of sneakers full of running and fresh cut grass, daisies, tree climbing and skinned knees.

 

Half a century later more or less I am now the parent, my children and grand children hitting me up for sneakers, summer togs and concert tickets. They say I am getting older, though most days I don’t feel it. Like my children, like I have all of those past years, I still go out in spring and get my new sneakers, reverently retiring the old. I have more creaks, and cracks, certainly I am aging but growing old? Never. Life, living and summer still flows in these old veins.  I am just as active now as I was when so long ago I was 11 standing on the edge of summer, if a little less frantic. Summer doesn’t rush by (though it always ends too soon!) so much as saunter by full of freshness and life, each summer full of new experiences, new adventures even now after having seen 50 of them.

 

On this birthday, the day that always marked the beginning of summer adventures for me, I did something that mostly was for me, an affirmation of spirit that has guided me, formed me and been a part of me for many many years. I got a tattoo, on my arm, not the usual skull and cross bones or “I love Molly” or flames but something much closer to my heart, simpler yet full of the meaning of life, my life. It is a string of characters, kanji characters, each one a word, each one a virtue I have always lived by. They are in fact the Kanjii that states the Bushido code, the warriors’ code. Honor, Honesty, Sincerity, Courage, Compassion, Loyalty,  Courtesy. Who could disagree with such virtues? I literally do wear my heart on my sleeve, or in this case my arm.

 

Is this the start of a mid life crisis? Is the next step a shopping trip for chains and a corvette? No chance! More like a simple statement of what really matters. Life is for living, aging doesn’t mean getting old, slowing down or abandoning vim and vigor. Aging is the gathering of experience, the adventure of living, the treasure of sharing all of life with the ones you love most of all, your wife, your children, your grand children. In 50 summers I have gathered many adventures, many experiences, all of them treasured, stored away in my mind, just as Douglas once did, to be brought out in the dead of winter to warm the heart and your feet wrapped in those heavy oxfords. I am 50 going on … well some younger age perhaps, many more summers  to come, many more adventures to come. Now where have my sneaks go to …

commentary to my last post

My last post was an expression of the horror and shock I felt at the events that unfolded at Virginia Polytechnic yesterday. I have little doubt that these events will spark more talk about gun control both in the US and here in Canada so I’ll add my two cents worth. In the US one of the most overused arguments against gun control are the lines in the constitution that state every citizen has the right to bear arms. When those lines were written, the US was a much different place, still a forming country. The statesmen who wrote them were I am sure considering times of war and invasion, not while attending college and University.

Another much over used argument is that of home defense. A few years back I received a catalogue from a US based home defense outfit that was addressed to a previous occupant of my current residence. You would not believe what it was possible to order from this catalogue, everything from a small hand gun to a large automatic, from a fully non-metallic glock ( a hand gun that will easily pass through metal detector gates) to a fully automatic assault rifle to a belt fed 50 caliber machine gun! What do these home defense companies anticipate? That a navy seal team will be invading your house? It’s ridiculous to think that such items could possibly be legitimately owned by normal citizenry.

How is it possible that we can allow such businesses not only to exist but to thrive? Is there any reason (reasonable or otherwise) that I might give the authorities so they would let me go hunting with an AK-47? Shooting gophers with a 44 Magnum autoloader? No! Banning all hand guns from citizenry most likely wouldn’t get rid of all gun crimes since criminals can always get a gun, however it might make it a lot more difficult for a despairing student to carry to loaded handguns (and extra ammunition) in a college and kill more than thirty students. As for assault rifles, belt fed machine guns and 75 caliber sniper rifles, no member of the citizenry should ever be able to own guns such as these, they belong in the hands of the military and other authorities (that’s a rant for another day).

Now some, like sport shooters would balk at the thought of banning hand guns. I would say, too damn bad. Contrary to what the NRA might say, “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people”, I would say that it is people carry guns that kill people. No citizen ought to be able to carry a gun anywhere. Sport shooters can have their guns “checked” and locked up at the gun club, useable only at the gun club, never leaving the premises. Those few who still go hunting should have to register and check in their guns with the local police (or RCMP?) only retrieving them on presentation of a valid hunting license. No exceptions. Criminals will always have guns, eventually they will meet their fate, citizens should not have guns. My two cents.

Mourn for the fallen and their families

As I sit here and write this my heart is heavy with sadness, my mind reeling with horror and shock for the families, friends and victims of the tragic events that unfolded yesterday at Virginia Polytechnic. Today there are thirty families just beginning to realize that their sons and daughters who were away at University will never be coming home.  I can not imagine the paralyzing  unspeakable horror they must be suffering. My son is 20, attending college in our city and will be going to University in the fall, I am in a semi-public staff position at a local University. Both of us could be caught, trapped in similar events were it to happen here. The thought of my son being in such a situation, not coming home is just unimaginable. This is such a brutal, senseless crime that it will strike fear and uncertainty into the hearts of every University and college student and every parent of a student wherever they are. We can not begin to imagine what despair or insanity might drive one of our fellow students to consider, plan and then carry out such  a murderous rampage. Time may well dull the sharp edge of pain and horror of this event but it will never go away, never be forgotten by these thirty families, by the many more friends, colleagues and people whose lives were impacted by it. My heartfelt sympathy goes to everyone affected by this crime in the hope (vain though it may be) that no one else need suffer such a thing again.

read a great story lately?

Read a great story lately? A short while ago I posted a blurb about reading and READING, about reading the words and reading the story. Well what makes a great story? Is it winning a big prize like the Pulitzer or the Nebula? I don’t really think so.

A great story has a bit of magic in it that appeals to you personally, maybe to everybody on some level. Read harry Potter? I would bet you have, in fact I would bet that just about everyone has read Harry Potter, it’s a great story. The Harry potter books have been read by just as many adults as children, think of that. Here’s a story about a group of kids going off to school to learn to be witches and warlocks, hounded by a really evil dude named Valdemort and having adventures of all sorts. Doesn’t really sound like the type of book an adult might read does it? But it is. The book appeals to kids of all ages, to adults to almost everyone. The series of Harry potter books has put the READING back in reading, it’s agreat story.

Lord of the Rings us a similarly great story, millions of people, adults, kids whole families have read it and continue to read. Many like myself have read it many times. It’s a great story, a rollicking adventure full of baddies, goodies, dragons, great evil and great triumph. Lord of the Rings appeals to all ages and is a timeless story, still fresh every time you read it.

A great story however is not necessarily one that appeals to all ages all of the time however, it is one that appeals to you, the reader in a special way. When I was 10 (and that was a long time ago I assure you!) I read a book given to me by a grade school teacher who thought I should read more, that book was Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury. This was the story of Douglas Spaulding and the adventures he experienced over a summer. This is a great story and a book which has stuck with me all these long years. In one passage Douglas is explaining to a shoe store owner why he need a new pair of sneaks ( Cream-Sponge Para Litefoot Shoes!) for the summer. Hear are the words of Douglas Spaulding:

But Mr Sanderson, but – asoon as I get those shoes on, you know what happens?

what?

Bang! I deliver your packages, pick up your packages, bring your coffee, burn your trash, run to the post office, telegraph office, library! You’ll see twelve of me in and out, in and out, every minute. Feel those shoes, (Mr Sanderson having been convinced to dawn a pair of Cream-Sponge Para Litefoot Tennis Shoes) Mr Sanderson, feel how fast they’d take me? All those springs inside? Feel all the running inside? Fell how they kinda grab hold and can’t let you alone and don’t like you standing there? Feel how quick I’d be doing things you’d rather not bother with? You stay in the nice cool store while I’m jumping all around town! But it’s not really me, it’s the shoes. They’re going like mad down alleys, cutting corners and back. There they go!

The passage goes on but you get the point, Douglas has saved all winter to visit the store and get his new pair of Cream-Sponge Para Litefoot Tennis Shoe, to shed his winter Oxfords and go bounding across new grass. It’s the first day of summer. It was a great story 40 years ago and i must have read it 50 times since then. Every year round about the first day I go and by my pair of summer shoes, shedding my winter oxfords for sneaks, not the Cream-Sponge Para Litefoot Tennis Shoes (never could find a pair!) but new sneaks none the less. To me that is a great story.

A great story is a bit of magic woven by a special type of magician who captures a bit your soul in words and transports you to places you could never reach by any road on a map. They create a magical place you can go to that may be in this world, may be in the far reaches of space or the depths of fantasy. They carry you away, bring you back and stay with you al your days. There si nothing quite so enjoyable as a great story unless maybe it’s new sneaks. Which reminds me I must be off to hunt down my new pair of Cream-Sponge Para Tennis Litefoot Shoes.

the environment, health and all that

Have you ever wondered about this modern environment we live in? I have. Something like two hundred years ago when my great great great grad father came to this country there was no electricity, no smog and no one even had a word for microwaves, radar and electromagnetic pulses. two hundred years before that, this continent didn’t even have much of the disease’s, germs and bad breath imported from settlers from Europe.

These days we hear a lot about “organic” food grown without pesticides, insecticides and all the rest of the genetically enhanced, chemically purified mumbo jumbo that goes into most crops and livestock. I am a vegetarian (still eat dairy, eggs and some fish though) and I try to eat healthy, limiting fats and such. However more and more often I feel it is a losing battle and a false economy. In the modern world, this one where we rise every morning and go to bed each night, we are bombarded every moment of the day by all manner of things totally foreign to the natural environment of our distant ancestors. Every day we are subject to microwaves (radar, cell phones, TV, radio, satellite), smog and bad air from cars, trucks, planes, industrial pollution, noise pollution, and about a zillion other things that never occurred naturally a few hundred years ago.

Scientists, politicians and industry would have you believe that all this has no effect on us, that global warming is a hoax and that the 40 million barrels crude oil spilled into the sea by the latest busted tanker will all dissapate and be absorbed by the environment. Well here’s the wake up call cause we’re the environment, us and the 47000 species of animals that share (now 46999 species as one goes extinct every few seconds) this planet. We’re the ones absorbing the spills, the pollutants, the microwaves and whatever else we have added to the air, water and soil around us.

There is no getting away from it either, I read recently an article on the Internet about old growth forests in Northern Ontario dying off due to polluted air. This same article talked about fish poisoned with cyanide in India and dead rivers in Mexico. We, you and I and everyone else who enjoys Late Night with David Letterman while lounging in our nylon jammies in the back of our Limousines whilst chatting on our cell phones are having a massive affect on the environment, all environments. We are rapidly using up non-renewable resources, use virtually everything to excess, bulldoze our forests and farm lands to build ritzy condos for rich business men, demand bigger more gas guzzling, more pollutive SUVs to show how successful we are and generally think about our environment last if at all.

Yesterday while commuting to work (I drive a Honda civic by the way) I heard a report on the radio about 15 local mayors lamenting the fact that the latest gas guzzler tax (up to $8000 for the worst offenders) was going to cause a major downturn in the local auto industry. Did the reporter(or the mayors) note that the local auto industry (and the auto industry in general) turns out more gas guzzling, environmentally unfriendly cars than fuel efficient environmentally ones? Puzzle me this, does anyone really need a two and a half ton four wheel drive SUV with 18″ of drive over clearance to commute the one and a half miles to their downtown office? Is it really necessary to drive around town in a 500 HP, V-10 pick up truck whose back box is covered up so can’t possibly carry the leather sofa home from Leons? Does a 1000HP, two seat sports car that gets 3.5 miles per gallon (and that’s Brit gallons, not mini-American gallons!) make any sense? In all of the above I would say no!

It’s not all doom and gloom however, in the last week I have seen advertisements for at least 5 different hybrid cars, cars that run on electricity and/or gas. These cars apparently get better gas mileage, pollute less and are much more environmentally friendly. They have been around for a few years now but are just starting to be promoted and get some exposure. Here once again I think it is the auto manufactures who are at fault for the lack of popularity of the hybrids. First is the styling of the cars, remember the first Honda hybrid to be marketed? It looked like it was a direct transplant from that 70’s Brit show about invading aliens, I think it was called UFO. Then there is the pricing, hybrids typically cost about ten grand more than there pure gas brethren. That’s a high price to pay when the savings (in fuel economy) are not really that spectacular. My Honda civic will go 675 Km on one tank of gas while a friend of mine claims her hybrid will go 1000 km. I can’t say for sure but I think it would take some considerable time to make up the ten grand price difference in just gas savings alone. Then there is the advertising, until this week I could name only two hybrid cars on the market, could count the number of hybrid ads on one hand even though they had been on the market at least a few years. As i said however, the manufacturers do seem to be learning, there are now more ads and apparently many more hybrids to choose from. Maybe there is hope for us after all.

Visit David Suzuki’s blog as well