Every so often I come across a story that lets me know life here really isn’t so bad, no matter what I’m grumbling about at 0600 (the o stands for o, my god it’s early ((thank you, Robin Williams))).

This here is one of those stories.

I often complain about traffic, especially now that the little dudes [...]]]> by Richard

Every so often I come across a story that lets me know life here really isn’t so bad, no matter what I’m grumbling about at 0600 (the o stands for o, my god it’s early ((thank you, Robin Williams))).

This here is one of those stories.

I often complain about traffic, especially now that the little dudes are back in school. I’m such a wimp. I had no idea.

Seems in China there is, right now, and has been for the last almost two weeks a traffic jam that’s more than 60 miles long. You read that right, a traffic jam 60 miles long that has lasted for two weeks. Yeah, puts your commute to shame.

Triggered by road construction, the snarl-up began 10 days ago and was 100 kilometers (60 miles) long at one point. Reaching almost to the outskirts of Beijing, traffic still creeps along in fits and starts, and the crisis could last for another three weeks, authorities say.

In the worst-hit stretches of the road in northern China, drivers pass the time sitting in the shade of their immobilized trucks, playing cards, sleeping on the asphalt or bargaining with price-gouging food vendors. Many of the trucks that carry fruit and vegetables are unrefrigerated, and the cargoes are assumed to be rotting.

You read that right. This traffic jam could last for another three weeks.

I mean, come on! This is ridiculous. I know it’s a symptom of a country undergoing explosive growth. Got that. But, dude, I do not want to even think about being stuck out there. It makes my piddling delays seem even less than inconsequential. It’s so bad, so stuck, people are sleeping under their cars. No portable restrooms were set up, so it’s either hike to a crowded service area of head to the bushes.

This guy seems to have the only reasonable response.

I don’t know about you, but I’m planning to head out into rush-hour traffic for a good laugh right about now.

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Okay, I think we can all agree that any organization or plan that got its start in the 1970s is pretty much suspect right from the word go, yeah? Yeah. I mean, disco? Manimal? You get the idea. However, there’s one thing coming out of that barren, desolate wasteland of culture that still makes sense, [...]]]> by Richard

Okay, I think we can all agree that any organization or plan that got its start in the 1970s is pretty much suspect right from the word go, yeah? Yeah. I mean, disco? Manimal? You get the idea. However, there’s one thing coming out of that barren, desolate wasteland of culture that still makes sense, as opposed to bell bottom jeans, and that’s Earth Day/Earth Week, or whatever you celebrate.

In the United States, Earth Day is celebrated on April 22, while the UN celebrates on the spring equinox and some places celebrate an entire week of environment-themed activities.

Earth Day got its start in 1970 when Wisconsin Senator Gaylord Nelson announced his idea for a nationwide teach-in (yeah, you can tell this idea came from the ’70s) on the environment and the importance of helping to keep it clean and functioning. Regardless of whether you find the current research on catastrophic global climate change to be convincing or you mistakenly believe it’s all a hoax, I think we can agree that there’s certainly no harm in helping to celebrate a day for our home, Earth.

What Earth Day teaches us is that there are ways we can all help protect the environment every day of the year. Whether it be by recycling plastic, paper and cans or by not throwing trash out of your car as you speed down the street. Whether it be by driving a little less and walking or cycling a little more or finding and using detergents that are better for lakes and streams. Heck, it could be as simple as switching to the more environment-friendly spiral light bulbs.

These little methods aren’t hard to accomplish, they aren’t arduous tasks and they don’t support any kind of political agenda. They’re just good common sense.

Of course, if you want to do more, there’s always a place for that. Push political representatives to fund research into alternative energy (again, not political. It’s a fact that the oil will run out. Solar energy? Not so much). Buy and use more fuel-efficient cars and trucks. Keep that thermostat a little higher in summer and a little lower in winter. Install solar water heating on the roof of your house. Heck, start an herb garden or a vegetable garden in your yard. There are literally hundreds of ways you can make life more sustainable, both for you and your children and your children’s children.

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My little dudes know I’m kidding, most of the time, when I talk about what I had to do “back when I was your age.” That includes walking to school uphill five miles in the snow — both ways — and having to dodge alligators and sharks.

I knew I was making stuff up, but I [...]]]> by Richard

My little dudes know I’m kidding, most of the time, when I talk about what I had to do “back when I was your age.” That includes walking to school uphill five miles in the snow — both ways — and having to dodge alligators and sharks.

I knew I was making stuff up, but I thought I was making up stuff that couldn’t be topped by the real world. Turns out I was wrong.

In Colombia, about 40 miles southeast of the country’s capitol Bogota, lies the Rio Negro river. Roaring through the bottom of a series of canyons more than 1,300 feet below the mountain tops, this river and its canyon make it difficult for people living there to get to the outside world.

Doesn’t matter though. No matter how difficult, little dudes and dudettes still have to get to school. And they don’t have cars or airplanes. What they do have is an excess of guts and very strong stomachs.

Yeah. This is what the kids do every morning and afternoon to get to and from school, ride a quarter-mile long zip line.

That’s not the best part, though. The best part is what happens to kids who have to go to school, but are too young to be trusted to ride the zip line by themselves.

They put the younger kid in what amounts to a burlap sack, tie ‘em on and then let them fly. Can you imagine that? Being stuffed into a burlap sack, tied to a metal wire and then shoved out into open space?

Next time the little dudes complain about having to take the bus to school, I’m showing them this.

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