My Carbon Footprint and the water lapping at my feet

I've got this serious ache in my neck! I keep on turning around to see if I am making a carbon footprint, something that presumably looks like a dirty black shoe-print in some clean and unblemished snow? Maybe, because I am only walking and not driving a large gas-guzzling SUV, I am not sullying the ground behind me; but then I ask myself, if I am zooming along in a plane that is spewing out "carbon footprints" how am I supposed to see them? Do they not then fall rapidly to the ground, say onto poor Mr Seamus Bloggs who is busy tending to his garden!

"Eeee Bye Gum" Seamus said "is it a shoe, no, it's a large footprint if my eyes have not deceived me". He didn't say much more as the next carbon footprint, dropped from a military jet (government approved for the production of as many carbon footprints as it wants) landed on his head!

The other day I saw a photograph in the Taipei Times Newspaper (March 28th, 2007). There were a large group of tourist eyeing in a awe a massive glacier, a Pategonian Glacier in Argentina that was "retreating due to global warming". I'm positive that the expressions on the tourists faces reflected their brainwashed image of this large glacier actually receding before their eyes - so much so did they believe the hype surrounding 'global warming'. I'm sure the tourist advertisement read "come and see the vanishing glacier" or "last chance before it goes forever - bring your swimsuit with you".

Lets look at this practically. Yes, Glaciers and Ice Caps are melting at a faster rate than has ever been recorded. Note that I use the word "recorded' as probably fifty years ago we did not have the means through which to record such things! Okay, so sea levels are rising! I do not dispute the fact that this could be due to the serious abuse of our planet by us but let us not suddenly picture a glacier before us and water lapping at our feet behind us! Let us also not panic, blame the common man for not turning off his bathroom light when he fell asleep and let us not accuse the materialistically possessed neighbour, society gave them the need to feel secure through needless purchases of plastic rubbish!

The average person lives his or her life according to the boundaries set by big business and governments. For example; if from childhood I have been forced to watch advertisements of large cars, forever getting bigger and better with more gadgets and 'nicketydoodas' then I am naturally going to want to have one when I grow older! If every magazine, billboard and newspaper repeatedly throws materialistic wealth and the need to 'have' at me then this is the person that I am going to be when I grow older!

Big business, globalisation and international trade has basically resulted in the societies that we have today; if I could I would buy a small holding today, grow my own vegetables and fruit and live a quiet and care-free life with equally minded people, naturally with my electricity produced from some government approved solar panel or say a windmill! But I can't do that; it is not possible to do such as I am not allowed to drink milk from my cow without sending it through twenty different chemical processes, I must de-bone the meat first, my fruit and veg must be dowsed with a variety of sprays that would take 'even the toughest of stains out' and the taxes that I would have to pay on my land would send me back to work and the production of carbon footprints within weeks. If I somehow managed to work through the above and live in this manner; I would probably find a ten-lane motorway being built over my garden shed or a nuclear power plant blocking the wind from turning my windmill!

If global warming is a result of our abuse of the planet so be it! But let us not all try to increase profits by issuing half-hearted company policies that 'guarantee to reduce our carbon footprint by 5% in two years'! Let us do it not because of possible global warming and the impending destruction of a million homes as sea levels rise, let us simply want to live with nature (not get naked) and to use the planets resources as we replenish them simply out of respect for the ground we walk on, the air that we breath and the water that we piss in! Let us do it for ourselves and out of respect; not because panic buttons have been pressed the world over and as large companies jump on the bandwagon by advertising their input to 'change' with goals that are purely press and financially orientated.

The other day I was meandering through the supermarket when I suddenly noticed that every single piece of vegetable and fruit was wrapped. I mean every vegetable and fruit; individual mangoes nestled onto Styrofoam trays, secured air-tight with glad wrap, baking potatoes each individually wrapped in plastic! What is that all about, are vegetables no longer allowed to breathe the air around us? And this is the very same supermarket that so happily advertised the fact that they would no longer be issuing free plastic bags to customers at the checkout; only paper bags! I say again; don't shout and scream at me when I fail to separate my plastics from the food waste; don't give me the plastic in the first place.

Anyway, enough rambling! I must go and brush my teeth! I need a new toothbrush which I must take out of the plastic bag that I bought it in, then peel off the cardboard backing from the plastic front, then remove the silly plastic cap that protects the bristles from "what?". I must then open up a new tube of toothpaste; first by removing it from the plastic bag that I bought it in, unwrap the plastic packaging that surrounds the three boxes (three for the price of two), then unwrap the plastic that surrounds the individual box and then remove the tube from the cardboard box.

Oh, and I must also go and take a look at my shoes - see if there is any carbon residue on my soul!

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