Tag Archives: electric vehicles

Thoughts On Fixing What’s Not Broken

2
Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, distraction issues, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 16, 2024- My day was centered on helping a Baha’i friend get to a medical appointment. As Dad taught us to focus on one thing at a time, and doing it right, any other considerations for the afternoon were moot. I got Sportage washed, and opened my collected mail, from last week, but that was all done by mission time.

After the appointment was over, friend recapped the conversation with doctor and physician’s assistant. It seems, as is so often the case, that there is no provision by the practitioners for naturopathic or herbal remedies to the diagnosed malady. Indeed, the implication is that patient (Baha’i friend) ought to accept a treatment plan, “so as to stay ahead of any problems down the road.” Friend did not take the bait, sticking to own regimen for maintaining personal health. In the end, doctor’s advice was: ”Keep doing what you’re doing.”

The goal of any primarily monetized enterprise is to keep the cash flowing. As a snark once told me, “Hey, money pays the bills”, as if that excused the whole nine yards. In so doing, there is a sense that creating a problem, then devising and advancing a solution, is a solid business model. This, when recognized for what it is, gives rise to conspiracy theories-and I have to say, the “kooks” have something there, even if their valid point ends up twisted off into various tangents.

Truth be told, there are enough problems that are extant in this physical world, at any given time, that inventing more issues and devising solutions to them, is little more than a perverse Socratic seminar. Each end of the dominant culture’s spectrum accuses the other of faux saviourhood. Yet, both practice the ruse: The Far Left, by announcing a ban on vehicles with internal combustion engines, by a certain year, without securing the commitment from industry to produce enough Electric Vehicles to meet the resulting demand; the Far Right, by excoriating present immigration policy, then refusing to work with their counterparts in Congress, to resolve the issue. The solutions that each offers are non-starters, that are essentially designed to simply “make the other guy look bad”, and solving nothing.

There are others, coming from both sides, but I shift the focus to my own situation. Things happened, or didn’t happen, this morning, which could have provoked me into attempting to “resolve issues”. Instead, I chose to do nothing. These are matters which it is best to let play out, and resolve themselves. That may not be possible in the larger social issues-but one thing is clear: No problems can truly be solved, by coming up with solutions when no issue exists.

Wind In The Sails Again

2
Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, distraction issues, Family, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal goals, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

July 6, 2022, Brewster, NY- The mechanic of 36 years’ experience looked me in the eye, and begged to differ, about my intention to look around for a newer vehicle, sometime in the near future. “Senor, this vehicle’s engine, motor and frame are solid. One guy’s mistake, in not putting a gasket on the oil pan plug, led to that leak and whatever hit your oil pan could have hit any oil pan, even on a 2022 model. The rest of the stuff we did today is routine maintenance. That was a long drive you made, after all.”

All of that is true. It’s also true that a hybrid, or electric vehicle, uses less fossil fuel than a standard vehicle with an internal combustion engine. Much rubber will meet a few more roads, before the final decision on the matter is made.

In the meantime, I bid farewell to my mother, brother and sister-in-law, did not get to spend time with my sister and brother-in-law (but did enjoy a meatball grinder at Post Road Pizza, in their town of Marlborough) and had a fairly smooth drive, from Saugus to this lovely town in the uplands, east of the Hudson River.

There were traffic snags, in which I found myself. There was a long snarl, for opposing traffic, as I left Saugus. A construction project was tying up for the day, a landscaper had left his truck on the shoulder of the road, on our side, causing northbound traffic to have to use the southbound lane to go around it, which in turn required a police officer to direct the trade-off between the two flows. Further up, a second officer had to direct a trade-off between the two flows, around the project itself.

There was rush hour in the city of Worcester, which kept traffic along I-290 crawling along, for twenty-five minutes or so, with lane shrinkage helping tremendously. Then, at the Connecticut state line, an accident on I-84 southbound, involving at least two vehicles, tied up traffic for about forty minutes. Seven police cars, from both Massachusetts and Connecticut state patrols, the Tolland County Sheriff’s Office and the towns of Holland, MA and Union, CT, were on the scene, blocking the highway and safely coordinating the response to the incident. No word on any casualties. I could see a pickup truck in a ditch, with a young man standing outside it. That was all.

Waterbury, famous for its own traffic snarls, was pretty much clear, save a three-minute slowdown, west of town, due to a construction project that was winding down for the night. I was safely ensconced in my present room, at Comfort Inn, by 9:55. Plugging my laptop into an inactive wall outlet led to loss of connection to a Baha’i Zoom call, but noticing that it WAS an inactive outlet and moving to a live outlet, at least let me get the juice back. That was the lesson from North Sydney, NS, earlier this summer.

Tomorrow, I will cross the Hudson, head over to Pennsylvania, stop at D’s Diner for lunch, then go down to a small town west of Philadelphia, visit family for a bit and make my pilgrimage to Oley, and Glick’s Greenhouse.

Not A Death Sentence

4
Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, impediments, Personal Values, Social, Striving, Travel

April 9, 2022- The lady, who looked to be in her early forties, was bemoaning the fact that twentysomethings looked to her like babies. “I’m olllddd!“, she said to her dance partner, who is in his early sixties, and to me, who promptly told her she hasn’t seen old.

George Foreman famously said that forty is not a death sentence. He is two years my senior, and I would not be surprised if he were to add, “and neither is seventy!” I do not feel any worse for the wear, after a long and sometimes taxing jaunt across the southern part of the country. I feel no worse than I have in times past. Mother, a nonagenarian; my octogenarian aunts and older cousins; and a few older friends are all pushing the boundaries of what is elderly well past what we all thought of as old, even a dozen years ago. I chuckled to myself, appreciatively, a few days ago, when the manager of the motel where I stayed in San Antonio told the Uber driver, whom he was engaging to take me to the bus station, that I was an elderly gentleman. It’s a fine thing that people several decades younger will honour those my age, as I continue to honour my own elders.

On a related note, I sat down and did the math, relative to modes of transportation. The cost of a car rental, alone, far outweighs what I would have paid in gas and oil/lube, even at the inflated prices of the past few weeks, had I driven the Saturn. Time was the big factor in this journey just completed, which will not be the case in the still-potential trips of mid-June to mid-July and September-October. I will weigh several factors carefully, but my vehicle and I are joined at the hip. It was enjoyable to have driven a late model vehicle, with all the bells and whistles-food for thought, for the next car, when there is one. (It’ll be an EV, at any rate.)

Today was a full day, with an online gathering and two in-person events. I was told by a few people to rest today, and I did get in a nap this afternoon. Being with the three groups of friends was energizing, though. This evening, at Raven Cafe, was also rejuvenating. It was there that the above-mentioned woman made her plaint. As long as there is music and camaraderie, though, life is good.