When the hurly-burly’s done

So I’m all moved in and, with the exception of a) two boxes of books that need to go on my shelves at work and b) a box of “crumbs” that I can’t figure out what to do with, I’m unpacked.  A (now-former) colleague and (still-current) friend is on her way over to take away my extra empty boxes for her own move this weekend.  The construction and excavation next door seems to have stopped.  I’ve got some good music going in the background (thanks to the Shuffle setting on iTunes, I just finished listening to a Son Volt song I hadn’t heard in years), a stocked fridge, and a little bit of downtime.

Contrast that with last night, when I decided to take a break from watching movies (Jesus Camp, Old Joy, and Y Tu Mama Tambien) to send out the itinerary for my trip to Scotland.  Everything was going well until I realized that I had miscalculated and would be arriving in-country on Monday, not Sunday.  Tripped up by the overnight flight, I guess, and ordinarily not a big deal, the way I like to travel, but I have all kinds of hostels, B&Bs, and campsites booked for my trek along the West Highland Way.   After a panicked call to my mom, I figured out that I can eat the 30quid for the room in Edinburgh, hop a train and a bus to Drymen the afternoon that I get to Edinburgh (after running errands–dropping off extra bag at the University, setting up cell service, buying whatever I forgot to pack) and start the walk on the second day, which is the 20-miler.  Awesome.  I’m psyched again, even though I won’t be doing the whole walk. I guess that means I’ll have to go back sometime.

I’ve got some reading left to do for the course, which I really need to finish up.  I want to do some work on my teaching this summer, too, but I’m not entirely sure when that’ll happen.  I figure I’ll have plenty of time to think about it while I’m walking through Scotland and when I come back, I’ll be recharged and ready to take it all on.

So that’s it.  Just figured someone might want an update.

Convergence, of sorts.

I woke up this morning to a bunch of Live Earth-related news on NPR, including a history of the global warming “debate” and a report on how some senator (whose name I missed) blocked the DC Live Earth show from being held in front of the Capitol because it’s a “partisan” event.  Kind of like, I suppose, obeying the laws of physics.  Ugh.

And I thought back to my post of a few weeks ago about the ways in which GHS isn’t doing its part for the environment.  I happened to come across a post on Anil Dash’s site this morning about the water bottle issue, which references the by-now-very-widely-read article in Fast Company about the bottled water industry.  Read it before you proceed.

Now, a week ago today I was in Tecate, Mexico, helping to build a house for a family with no running water, tenuous electricity that’s supposed to be hooked up later this summer, and very few resources (they wear donated clothes and shoes; the kids’ entertainment consists of soccer when they have a ball and throwing rocks when they don’t).  And they are considered well-to-do where they live, because the father has steady construction work.  It kind of begs the question of why we weren’t building for the family down the road with a far worse house (they lived at and ran the scrapyard, where they used fire and chemicals to clean abandoned cars and resell the metal for US$0.50/kilo).  

The thing these families all have in common, no matter their pesos, is that they have to pay a ridiculous amount of money (around US$15/week) for water that is neither clean nor cold.  And remember, they live in the desert.  It was over 100 fahrenheit every day that we were down there.  It was so hot and so dry that nobody’s shirts got sweaty because it evaporated so fast.  These were the kinds of days when you’re told to drink water all the time so you don’t get dehydration-induced diarrhea.

And we’re gladly paying for bottled water we don’t need?  Yes, the container’s convenient.  Buy a Nalgene or other reusable bottle.  Yes, it’s nice to have cold water wherever you want it.  But those plastic disposable bottles don’t have any thermal properties.   Sigg bottles are metal and, from what I can figure out, will keep water cold.  I might buy one to bring to Scotland.

I was thinking–if every time we wanted to drop a dollar (or three or four at the movie theatre) on a plastic bottle of water, we sent it instead to a family in Mexico or some other place without good water, maybe they’d appreciate it more than we do, we who live in the USA near reliable and tasty and clean and non-smelly water.

Clay’s still flogging his Teen Live Earth idea, too, and the more I think about it, the more right-on it sounds.  Check it out if you haven’t already.

Mexico was great.

Photos here.