Category: Weird Shit

As a lark, I thought, “Well I should probably put that in the calendar.”

After pressing “save” I wondered two things.

1 Would I be around to give a crap?
2 What will the world look like then?

It’s possible I could still be around, It’s unlikely that I’ll give a crap about it. This is potentially a two fold issue. It’s likely that I’ll be in an old folks home griping about the consistency of my pudding. It’s also likely that I’ll not be in California. In either situation, I doubt I’ll give a crap.

That leaves the second question, what will the world look like in 2035? I’ll be somewhere in my mid 70’s. It’s possible that I might still have my mind in more or less working order. Being a male at that age would be a bit of a rarity in my family so I might be well on the way to checking out for the long dirt nap.

In the 1960’s there was an optimism about the new modern wonders of science and technology. I remember magazines telling us we’d all have flying cars in 20 years. I’m glad I didn’t hold my breath on that one. When I moved to Los Angeles in my 20s and saw how messed up the traffic was, I knew we weren’t going to have flying cars.

People were incapable of driving on a wide, well maintained road, without hitting each other. The thought of those same people flying overhead was truly terrifying. Flaming wrecks raining down on unsuspecting neighborhoods is not something I’d sign up for.

This observation was made well before the distractions of cell phones, and text messages. As those devices became more ubiquitous the accident rate went up, even though the average speeds on the freeways went down. Honestly, how can you have accidents on a roadway where everyone is creeping along at 20mph?

If the California freeways get much slower, horses will become the preferred method of travel again. At least then, people will be able to text and play games on their cellphones without worry. Horses aren’t likely to run into each other because they’re paying attention.

I suppose there would have to be horse sex insurance policies though. I’m not sure how copulation of your transportation would affect your morning commute. However, it might settle the question of just how many genders there are, an added bonus would be that nobody would have to be a biologist to get the picture.

Funny thing about it, is that might be the best case scenario.

The way things are going, I’m actually beginning to wonder if Mad Max, Escape from New York, The Omega Man, or Book of Eli, is a more likely scenario. It’s possible that gas powered vehicles and electric vehicles may end up being moot points.

If WWIII happens, humanity if it survives at all, might be knocked back to hunter gatherers sitting around a fire pit burning books that no-one remembers how to read or bits of furniture that nobody wants to carry around.

We might not even need WWIII to get there.

It could all go the way of Atlas Shrugged. Inconvenient science and / or truths could simply be placed under some overarching government control and suppressed.

Why would people keep working, innovating, and making discoveries if they knew the government and over-regulation would create hurdles so high they personally couldn’t profit from their efforts?

In a way, I wonder if we’re not already on the leading edge of this sort of thing. We’ve heard of quiet quitting in businesses. Is it possible that all the people who are not participating in the workforce are engaging in some unseen herd mentality, a.k.a quiet quitting?

Why should people continue to seek employment in a system that keeps taxing income at ever increasing rates to fund wars, or government entities that they have no control over, and no say in? Why bother to open businesses or create something new, if the state or federal government is just going to take a substantial chunk because the government believes they’re entitled to it?

Isn’t this, at least in part, what happened in the old USSR?

I find the Atlas Shrugged scenario far more disturbing than WWIII. In a nuclear war, it would all be over pretty fast. In Atlas Shrugged it took along time to crush the human spirit into the dust. It was brutal, systematic, and normal.

Good ideas were nationalized, or legislated out of existence. The powerful people in control continued rearranging the deck chairs on The Titanic until everything completely broke down. They’d dis-incentivized knowledge to the point that even when the stole the patents on Reardon Steel, they had no-one who could take over the foundry, and no raw materials to use even if they’d had skilled people.

The politicians in the story, all believed they were doing the right thing. The believed they were the good guys right up to the end, and had no clue why everything broke. In should be noted that Hitler, Stalin, and Chairman Mao all thought they were the good guys… Just Sayin.

That to me is far more frightening.

In that scenario, there were still large populations in cities who were suddenly plunged into the dark. The story of the morning after would be very interesting. I’ll have to check if Ayn Rand wrote a follow on.

I see the morning after as a period of shock and confusion. Then when water stops running from the tap, sewage backs up, and enough people are hungry, looting starts. At first it will be all the bright shiny things that average people couldn’t afford. That would happen because they’d be hoping things would return to normal and all those luxuries would once again have value.

Then as hunger became more intense, practical things would be looted from grocery stores. When the stores were empty, the populations in the cities would turn on each other. As the resources dried up, the survivors would spread out. The most brutal of these would be on top as full anarchy and tribal warfare blossomed. After that, it’s anybody’s guess how society would change.

I suspect we all saw what it might look like when Seattle allowed the autonomous zone called CHOP, or CHAZ, (whatever,) to come into being.

There are those who flippantly say, “Well I’ll be fine, I’ve got food, I’ve got water,” them I ask, “how many bullets do you have and how good a shot are you?”

The implied question is, “how many people are you ready to kill?” This doesn’t even address the fact that bullets are a finite resource. When you run out, what do you do then?

This is why the Atlas Shrugged scenario is more scary to me personally.

It’s also why, if I were offered a way off this planet I’d take it in a heartbeat. I’d prefer to live out my days quietly even if it was among an alien race. I don’t want to watch or participate in my own species destroying itself.

In the second or two after I had these thoughts, I closed the calendar application.

Somewhere on a server 500 miles or so, away from me, a notation has been made that sale of new gas vehicles will be illegal in California in 2035. I’m curious if I or anyone will care when that notification pops up.

It’s possible we’ll all have far more immediate concerns on Jan 1, 2035. Alternatively, I could be dead by then and not care about it in the least.

Funny how I get sidetracked from the simplest of things. At least this time, I’d updated my calendar before I thought about the 2035 deadline.

I guess the dream was brought about by a conversation I had with my Sister. She’d mentioned that my Niece (her Daughter) was very Pro Green Energy and extremely left leaning.

My Nice is no dummy, but she is in college, I suppose I can forgive her for being leftist. I hope she grows out of it.

I’d asked my Sister how my niece justified being so Pro Green given that she’s amazing at math.

My Sister missed my meaning.

I explained that the current total energy output from “renewable” sources provides less than 20% of the current energy we use in America. That number includes Nuclear power. Some say Nuclear isn’t green, but for the sake of argument let’s include it in the discussion because it doesn’t emit carbon like those evil coal and oil burning power plants.

My Sister said my numbers must be wrong. I sent her the following chart from the Government.

My Sister rightly pointed out that the chart speaks of energy consumption, not specifically how much is generated by each source. She’s right! I countered with you can only consume what is available and cannot pick and choose what source the energy comes from.

She considered my point and grudgingly agreed.

I went on to say that we could shut down all of the coal, oil, natural gas power plants. My Sister said that’s exactly what my niece was in favor of.

Because I’m the uncle that likes to stir up trouble I suggested my sister tell my niece that I was in favor of using only green energy. My Sister knows me well enough to ask, “Buuuutttt???”

I continued, “Tell her I’m just not sure how to manage cutting my energy consumption by 80%. Do I turn off my cellphone when I’m not using it? Should I turn off the internet and my computer 80% of the time? Do I not listen to anything but live music? Do I go to bed at sundown? Turn off the air-conditioning and heat? I suggested my Niece send me the specifications on the solar panels she’s using because they must be more efficient than mine.”

My Sister laughed, “You’re so evil! I’ll ask her… Probably at dinner.” My sis also commented that my Niece had invested in a new iPhone but that she did so because her old iPhone wasn’t holding a charge anymore.

My sis said, “I wish I’d thought about the solar panel angle. That’s why you should live here! You’d have suggested she buy an external battery and solar panel to carry with her instead of buying a new phone.”

I chuckled at the thought. My Niece would have taken a very dim view of the suggestion because it wouldn’t have been convenient.

Full disclosure… My Sister likes to rattle people’s cages too.

I suppose I was still chewing over the conversation when I went to sleep.

In the dream I was living in a world where 80% of the power had been removed from the grid.

Our leaders touted this as a victory because the entire country was now using 100% renewable energy.

It was a true statement. Ignoring that the 80% we weren’t using, shut down many aspects of the country. Shipping, Manufacturing, Hospitals, etc.

In the dream, I was scheduling my day to empty the water collected in my refrigerator and wishing I’d opted for the drain tubes to send the ice melt to the plants. I had to carry the water not saved for drinking down stairs in a bucket to the yard.

I was annoyed because my solar panels had the capacity to power my refrigerator. In fact the panels could power all the electrical devices in my home during the daylight hours.

A state mandate had come out saying that in the interest of “Community Good”, all of our houses had to be connected together so that those less fortunate without solar power, could benefit from those of us with solar panels.

This resulted in my house having few operable electronic devices, and my refrigerator being nothing more than an old style Ice Box. The upper shelves now contained blocks of ice.

The melt water, I hand pumped through the reverse osmosis system for drinking and cooking, the waste water from that process was carried in a bucket down to water the plants.

But the ice blocks were free. They were delivered every 2 days courtesy of the state.

While my lighting was generally candles and occasionally an LED lamp, the local State representative enjoyed air-conditioning, an electric vehicle, and a real refrigerator. Their holiday season lights were spectacular.

We were told this was because of the importance of the work and the burden of responsibility the local State representative shouldered.

For my part, I was anticipating being able to fire up my internet for an hour or two. By using my portable solar panel, the battery pack was finally charged.

It took two days of moving the panel around in the sun to get the pack and my computer charged. I hoped to be able to catch up on the national news and if I was lucky, I could possibly watch a show on the computer before it and the power pack died.

Unfortunately, some of my power would have to be spent logging onto the state taxation website to pay my monthly taxes. I hoped the state site would work properly this month because I was already carrying late charges from last month.

The State didn’t accept that their site was broken, or completely down, as an excuse for not paying your monthly tax. After all, “The law was The Law.”

I’d probably be okay though because it had been a very sunny month. The offset and efficiency of my solar panels was in the upper 1% of the producers in my community, so I had credit to declare and both tax months would be covered.

Every household had a single electrical socket that worked. The socket was only powered during the daylight hours.

It was a nice socket, provided by the State and wired to my Solar panels by State Technicians. The socket provided a single A/C current outlet, there were four USB ports that allowed for charging of cell phones and tablets. Usually, the A/C socket couldn’t power the coffee pot until around noon.

While I was filling the toilet tanks with some of the waste ice water, there was a knock at the door.

When I answered it. On my front porch there were several armed workmen. They presented me with a “Reallocation Order”.

The order said that 3 of my solar panels were to be removed and taken to another less fortunate person’s home. It had been determined that my offset and energy production was inequitable to the rest of the community.

Looking toward the State representative’s house, I could see workmen on his roof installing rails, cabling, and standoffs, all necessaryto accommodate additional panels…

A car alarm sounded somewhere in the neighborhood waking me up.

It was 3am. A cool breeze was blowing through the front windows of the house. Shaking my head to dispel the dream? Nightmare? I got up and peed. Realizing I wasn’t going to be able to sleep for a while, I put some ice in a glass and poured myself a stiff bourbon.

I hate having dystopian dreams! They make me cranky the next day.

The next time I’m talking to my Sister, I’m going to suggest that she and my Niece watch the movie Brazil. If I recall correctly, there was some interesting retrofitting of devices.