What a special evening………………

My wife and I celebrated our anniversary tonight and we opened a 2002 Penner- Ash Willamette Valley Pinot Noir. Excellent balance, some nice red fruits and an extraordinary finish. If you happen to find some on a shelf at your local wine store I suggest you make the investment and enjoy it!

Cash for Clunkers and Confusion

I need some clarification. The cash for clunkers is to reduce energy consumed by the inefficient car, right? Doesn’t it take a boat load of energy to MAKE the new car that is replacing the clunker? Really, if you improve by 12 mpg (12mph vs 24mph) and drive 12,000 miles per year, you’re only saving about 500 gallons of gas a year. To make the new car to replace your clunker, how much energy is consumed making the steel, transporting it to the car plant, run the machines to bend, cut, drill it, run the computers, paint the metal, etc., etc., it’s gotta take a lot of years of burning less gas  to make up for the energy greenhouse gas discharge it took to build the car. Probably you never get back to even, since after 15 years this new car will be, 15 years from now, a clunker and someone will have to pollute to build a car to replace your now new, but soon to be old clunker.

And the beat goes on……………………

Trying for Simplicity

I recently read an article by Peggy Noonan that struck a nerve, you can find it by googling her name and Goodbye Bland Affluence. My interpretation may be far from her intent but for me it was positive. Simplify my life, appreciate the basics, live close to yourself, be more dependent on relationships, less dependent on things.

I’m working hard to be conscious enough to recognize the items that need simplifying but it’s more difficult than I anticipated. Habits are tough opponents… but on I go.