The price of a barrel of oil shot up 10 dollars. The Dow dropped 400 points. Unemployment spiked a half percent. Communities continue to be hollowed out by the mortgage crises.
It all hit the fan today.
There's no shade of lipstick for this pig of an economy.
What a fine Friday!
Watching the news today felt like some Clockwork Orange-type torture. It was painful. Crippling. It made me want to throw up, but I just couldn't turn away, my eyes clamped-open on my own volition.
Has the dreaded day we've all been fearing finally come?
Over the last twenty years the economy has been acting like that Log Jammer ride at Magic Mountain. We climbed a big hill in the 90's, then rode around splashing water everywhere until we hit the first drop in the early 00's. We regained stability and rode around going nowhere for awhile until all of a sudden another steep ramp appeared and we began free-falling. This drop twice as steep and twice as long.
I have the feeling we're halfway down the slide now, and when we hit the bottom the ride is going to be over.
Throw your hands in the air, and wave them like you just don't care.
At least the current gas and economic crises might signal the end of this...
"I been drinkin and smokin
holdin shit cause a brother can't focus
I gotta get to home 'fore the po po's scope this
big ol Excursion
swerving all up in the curve man "
--Krazyie Bone from Ridin'
It's getting harder and harder to pretend to be rich, less rewarding too. Bragging about SUVs is so 2002.
Yep, time to start singing the blues again, the ol' 'ain't got no gas, ain't got no honey' blues.
Going down the road feeling bad.
Time to break out guitars and harmonicas. Woody Guthrie style.
Except, we all need new slogans.
Perhaps: This Ipod is Fascist?
So if everything is as bleak as it seems -- and I haven't even mentioned the dollar, which is fast becoming cheaper to use as toilet paper than to spend - than today is a date we can look back on and say 'it all went downhill from there.'
The Mayans were off by about four years, but at least they were closer than Prince, the creep.. .
June 6, 2008. Where were you when the good times ended?
I was enjoying a cup of coffee in my loft, wondering how I can get my cans to the recycler without having to take the car. Brand new Nissan Versa, and it annoys me to drive it.
Fuck it, at least I'm getting out of town. I'm going camping this weekend. I'm going to park my car by a log and let it sit in the shade for a couple of days, and I'm going to lace up my hiking shoes and tread a dusty path somewhere, up into the hills above Santa Barbara, that posh hamlet sparkling by the sea.
Michael Jackson used to live in those hills. In a place he appropriately called Neverland, until the fantasy world he created for himself ran into conflict with the fantasy world the rest of us have created for ourselves; that of laws and morals and things that will not be tolerated, like sleepovers with kids. I'm not condoning what he did, whatever it was, just pointing out that everything we have as a society, every institution, every law, every fundamental benchmark of civilization, down to the very value of money, is only such because we all will and believe it so.
In God We Trust, more than we'd like to think it means.
But I'd rather not think about it, or Michael Jackson either. I'd rather give my attention to the trees and the birds and follow what they have to say. The sparrows have no idea that oil just hit $139 a barrel. Nor should they care. The crows, however, I'm sure suspect something.
If you ask a cormorant or a duck their opinions on Peak Oil they wouldn't say a thing, because birds can't talk, silly. But they'd pull a picture of the Exxon Valdez from their feathers and show it to you, just so you'd know.
I'm going crazy talking to birds, a little coocoo you might say. (Maybe that's where it comes from?) It's a sign of questionable mental health, but much worse, they're rather bad conversationalist and not much help. I'm starting to get the feeling that they don't like me so much, us.
The birds.
"What should we do? How can we save ourselves?"
"Coooo. Coo. Kitttle. Kittle. Kittle."
That's all they ever say. Kittle. Kittle. Kittle.
And this tells me, it's up to us to fix this mess. And it can be done. It's starting to happen. The old optimist in me comes out. Maybe this financial crises is the shot in the arm we need to start changing our lifestyle? Sure, it'll be rough, but it's also necessary.
And it's already happening. Gas usage dropped 4.5% in March. That's 11 billion gallons. Not much, no, but it's a start. And it may be anecdotal but I've been hearing positive stuff from my friends. They're not driving as much either. Back in the mid 90's, when I grew up, all we ever did for entertainment was cruise around L.A aimlessly. Like the song says: "Victory Blvd. We love it! Santa Monica Blvd. We love it!" Some of my best memories were in the driver's seat, cracking jokes and listening to sports talk, rapping along to Biggie's Ready To Die.
But no longer.
I'm going to buy a bike and start biking to work. It's only 2 miles away, it would be hypocritical to do anything less. A lease on a new car and less than six months later I'm buying a bike. Pretty soon, if this keeps up, I'm going to have to see a man about a horse, literally.
I let the milk drip into my glass until it's absolutely empty. I don't waste gas by driving like a maniac. I eat my leftovers. I buy from a thrift store, not just because I'm hipster scum, but because it's cheap and doesn't add to the cargo load coming over from China.
We're basically going to have to buck up and live like our grandparents did -- tough, thrifty, resourceful -- the folks that made it through the Depression and the War. The Greatest Generation Ever. Except we're the most drug-addled, shallow and coddled, neurotic generation ever.
It's going to be interesting.
humbly cross-posted @ artofstarving.com