Friday, March 27, 2009

Return to Illumination Hour

I am re-posting this rant from last March. It was one of my first few posts (March 26, 2008). We are planning a similar party this year for Saturday, March 28. We will have help from 4 more people because my brother Adam and his family will be visiting. Illumination Hour will take place between 8:30 and 9:30 pm. Join us from your house if you get the chance.

As a side note, Rush Limbaugh jumped on this Thursday afternoon during his show. I am wondering if he was an early adopter of MPU as a daily read. Also, the "on the hour" radio news this morning has noted that there several businesses around the country doing Illumination Hour rather than Earth Hour.

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"Who Doesn't Want to Wear the Ribbon"
Originally posted March 26, 2008

Over the years I have been amazed at the absolutely meaningless gestures that people will go through to prove that they care about something. Many of you will recognize the post title from Kramer's run-in with some "street toughs" over his refusal to wear an AIDS awareness ribbon.



I guess everyone on the planet except me knows that having more ribbons on your lapel than Patton means that you care more about the rain forest, AIDS research, breast cancer, etc. than someone who doesn't wear them. Somehow this makes sense. Which brings me to what has many jazzed today, Earth Hour.

In case you don't know (I didn't until this morning), Earth Hour is a ritual that the inventors of Earth Day have brought us this year. Next Saturday (March 29) between 8 and 9 pm, we are supposed to power down "non-essential" electrical appliance and turn off all of our lights to show that we care about energy conservation and reducing our carbon footprint. Basically, the idea is to produce a voluntary blackout for an hour to reflect on the evilness of our comfortable but very energy intensive lifestyle. Jay Currie has a very different idea.

I have never read his blog before today, but from this post I get the idea that he is just about as tired of empty gestures as I am. He has decided to "Just Say No!" by keeping his lights on (ALL of them) during Earth Hour. I get confused on the inspiration for the idea but Tim Blair has planned an Illumination Hour on March 29 between 8 and 9 pm. As my buddy Chip would say, "What are the odds?" A couple of Tim's dedicated readers have decided to take it a step further and have a Carbon Party.

That is my kind of activism. During their HOUR OF POWER, it sounds like they plan on some sort of steel cage death match between the AC unit and the furnace with the winner getting to dominate the household environment for an hour. They also plan to run their vehicles, all electronic equipment, oven, and the washer and dryer. The hope is that they will consume enough electricity during the hour to more than offset any conservation accomplished during the Earth Hour.

If you're interested in becoming part of Illumination Hour to make a mockery of according to Samantha Burns, "Earth Hour stupidity, and all it represents," then visit her web page and sign the official online petition. If you don't have the activist, petition-signing bent, just forget what your Dad always told you for an hour and leave the light on when you leave a room this Saturday night.

Or better yet, you could call Motel 6 and ask them to keep several lights on for you.

4 comments:

Josh and Margo said...

Seems a little childish to me.

One thing I do think is funny is that since your post mentioned earth day, all the ads on your site are about celebrating earth day, cutting carbon emmisions, and preventing global warming. It made me laugh.

MOM said...

All I can say about your attitude regarding this and other posts is: IT IS CONFIRMED THAT THE APPLE DOES NOT FALL FAR FROM THE TREE. I HAVE MARKED YOU WELL!!
Love,
MOM

Russ said...

If the Earth Day crowd wants to pay to put ads on my blog, I will take their money. AND, it is pretty childish to think that turning your lights off for an hour is meaningful in the overall scheme of things. Welcome back, Josh! I thought you had gone away because you hadn't commented in a while.

Ron said...

Just so you'll know -

Starting at 8:30 PM last night, for one hour, I:

set my 500 watt quartz-halogen trouble-light on the front fence and illuminated my 40 ft white pine;
turned on every light in the house,
including attic, porch, and basement lights;
plugged in several thousand Christmas lights still coiled up in the basement;
turned on three fans to keep the coils of christmas lights cool; plugged in three air conditioners
in the basement;
turned on my radial arm saw, lathe, shop vac, and bench grinder;
burned a few hundred pounds of wood in the chimenea;
turned the thermostat up to 78 and opened all the windows;
and set the oven at 450 with a fan blowing hot air into the open freezer.

Neighbor complained about the shop vac so I turned that off.

:-)

Ron

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