Canadians != Americans

This comes from an article in the Edmonton section of Canada.com.

an American from San Diego is quoted saying: “What bugs me about Canadians, if I may, is that they wear that damn patch on their bags, the Canadian flag patch. That way, they differentiate themselves from us.”

Here’s another good one

“Some participants expressed a certain amount of annoyance at what is perceived as a systematic attempt by Canadians to make the statement that they are not Americans by sporting the maple leaf,”

Well, duh, that’s because we aren’t Americans. We’re Canadians. And most of us are damn proud of it too.

It’s an article about how Canadians should be more respectful of Americans’ feelings when travelling abroad, because of how US foreign policy is making Americans feel isolated and unsupported in the world.

Now, I personally don’t have anything against the US (maybe aside from their slightly arrogant outlook on the rest of the world). I work and live there, and I even married one. I just have no desire to become one, or to be labelled as one. I know it bugs many Canadians to no end when people try to lump Canadians and Americans into the same pot, or the endless jokes about Canada being the 52nd state. We put the maple leaf on our luggage so that we can be identified as Canadians.

Canadian, and very proud to be one.

Solar power

One thing I’ve always wondered is why people don’t use more solar power. Especially in southern and equatorial regions where there’s plenty of sunny days. There are week long stretches where there’s not a cloud in the sky, and everything outside is baking in the sun. Everytime I look around, I see all this potential energy that could be converted and used. That’s probably because I was going to be an astrophysicist before I switched to medical physics, so I know how much energy there is hitting the Earth in the form of sunlight.

Solar cells (also called photovoltaics in the industry) are thin and easily applied. Nowadays, solar cells are more efficient than they were a few years ago. You can put them anywhere. On the roof of your house, the top of your car, on your garage. Anywhere that gets sunlight.

They’re brittle you say? Encase them in a clear plastic box. That’ll protect them from getting pooped on by birds too.

They don’t generate enough power? Who cares. So what if a bank of solar cells can’t generate enough power to run your house. All you need is for it to generate power so you don’t need to draw as much from the power grid. You still get lower energy costs. And if you can generate enough to run your house, then terrific!

Expensive? Sure, but in the long run, you’ll be saving money.

Storage batteries? Only if you’re generating more energy than you use. And even if you do, you could probably negotiate with your power utility to funnel the excess back into the grid for a credit on your power bill, lowering your power costs even more.

Solar power can even be used to heat water, giving your hot water heater a break.

The US needs to seriously look at alternative sources of energy, instead of digging for more oil or beating countries into submission to get theirs.. When I was in elementary school back in the 70s, energy conservation was the big message. We were always told to turn the lights off in empty rooms, walk instead of taking your car for short trips. Use public transportation. This was the time of the big oil crisis, OPEC embargoes and all that, although at the time I was too young to know or care about that stuff. The oil crisis is over, oil still remains a finite resouce, but consumption has skyrocketed.

Now, as I go around my daily routine, I see everybody driving big SUVs and trucks that get a few dozen miles per gallon of gas. I walk around downtown during the evening, and there are empty office buildings with all their lights on. People drive their cars down the block to the grocery store. Heck, in my apartment complex, people drive the hundred meters or so it takes to just get to the pool!

Now, I’m certainly not a tree hugging, hemp wearing rabid environmentalist. I don’t think everyone should stop driving gas guzzling cars. I do recycle what I can. I drive my car to places where I can’t walk to, but I don’t carpool (athough I’ve thought about it). I’m just wishing people would be more responsible and forward thinking about their resource consumption.

I certainly don’t think we’re headed into a energy crisis. We have energy issues, definitely. Witness what happens every summer when energy usage jumps as people crank up their air conditioners and fans. Nothing emergent or catastrophic yet. It will happen eventually though, and sooner rather than later if nothing is done about it now.

Things to read and consider:

Blog spam

Well, I guess I’m not the only one who’s getting their blog spammed by spam wankers. It’s annoying to find new comments in my blog only to discover it’s just spam. I still think they should all be shot with very large cannons.

At least now there might be a possible solution coming soon. Reading & Writing has also done some work tracing one of the more recent blog spammers.

Taking responsibility

What is it about people that makes them think they can make others responsible for their own stupidity? More and more now, you read in the news about someone suing some company or another for something stupid that they did. All because they think it’s someone else’s fault. True Stella Awards has loads of stories like this.

This morning I was reading in the paper about Phillip Morris settling a case for $2M because some woman left a burning cigarette between the front seats of her car resulting in her daughter getting burned by the subsequent fire. A tragic accident yes, but I fail to see how PM would be responsible for her stupidity for leaving a burning cigarette anywhere other than the ashtray of her car.

Now I’m not advocating for PM or anything, or any of their products (especiallyl cigarettes). I just think that in this particular case (granted that I know very little of the details), PM shouldn’t have settled. Even though there was no explicit acknowledgement of responsibility, settling out of court always seems to imply responsibility.

People need to take responsibility for their actions and choices, and the consequences and results of those actions. Making other people take the blame for your own stupidity sends society into a rapid downward spiral that benefits nobody except lawyers. They get rich taking the lion’s share of the settlement money, the people that sued end up looking like idiots even though they win, and everybody else pays higher prices to cover corporate lawsuit losses.

Wizard’s First Rule: People are stupid.

Blog Spam

Good grief. Spam touting cheap viagra is bad enough in my email. now i’m getting it in my blog. Spammers need to be taken somewhere out back and shot. Many times. With large calibre bullets. Large cannons would be even better.