What’s Next? Locusts?

Think of my new gazebo as "screen house version 2."

I've always thought that we were facing a serious set of 3 problems, a trifecta of "peak oil", debt (national, state, personal), and terrorism. Each of these is bad enough, but they feed on each other and are interrelated. If we can no longer afford to fund police and our national defense, we are more exposed to terrorism (which will likely increase). Peak oil issues cause everything from higher prices and shortages, trauma to our practice of stocking supermarket shelves via a long distance just-in-time inventory practices, which themselves can lead to shortages, anger or panic, and perhaps more extremism. The relationships are many.

Now I have to admit that there is an obvious 4^th problem: global climate change. This winter we had snowfall totals of over 40 inches in DC. There has been intense record-breaking heat this summer in the metro DC area, with alternating wild rainstorms and more tornado watches than I have ever seen. 2010 is likely to be the hottest year on record, world-wide. There is unusual cold in South America, wildfires in Moscow, floods in Pakistan (and Iowa too). My screen house was a haven in 3 seasons protecting us from flying insects, and I lost it this winter when the winter storms came too fast and furiously. To take its place, I had a new, solid, gazebo built that should withstand the snow (screen house version 2.0, above), but now I worry about falling branches from all these storms.

Global climate change has obvious damaging effects, but it also has lots of subtle ones, even in your back yard. If you are a gardener, you are dealing with more than the usual problems: tomatoes cracking due to alternating dry and wet, cold and hot conditions. Power outages are followed by power surges; I've got a damaged DVR and outside security motion-detecting light that doesn't work any longer, both caused by surges when the power came back on.

Gardens are also yielding less, in part because there are fewer bees (bees are stressed by the weather too). New invasive species of weeds are growing like crazy. Some, like purslane, are rich sources of Omega 3 oils (so all is not bad.) And now there are the damned chiggers. I finally figured out that raised bumps at my beltline and below are not caused by fleas, ticks, or bedbugs, but chiggers. These nearly invisible beasts cause button-size welts and intense itching. Almost nothing gives relief.

In a recent editorial for the Wall Street Journal, "America is at Risk of Boiling Over," Peggy Noonan said she's worried that our nation is becoming simultaneously pessimistic and feeling helpless. She suggests this will lead to deep societal unrest. I agree with her. And wait until the four big problems become more active and begin feeding on each other. So what are the mitigation strategies? You can build a 10 double fence to keep out the deer and deer ticks (I did), but that won't protect against the chiggers.

Riding the DC Metro

Public Transit in DC seems to have traded places with the Hummers and monster trucks. Riding the bus and metro has gone from something only students, nannies, retired and low-skilled help rode in northern DC to wildly popular. Even with a recent doubling of fares -- $2.50 for a bus ride to the metro, $.75 to transfer from the subway to a bus – it is still an incredible bargain. It also beats the alternative of waiting in gas lines or paying $7/gallon for gasoline, even if there are noticeably fewer commuters on the road. The only problem with metro is that its entire infrastructure has rotted from within; in the past, maintenance money was skimped on everything from the bus line and metro cars to the escalators and elevators. Moreover, to save operating costs, buses do not run the air conditioner yet many have windows that you cannot open. Metro stations –-some over a hundred feet underground—have become oppressively hot, and human smells made them a difficult place to be in.

Mix heat with bad smells and you get nausea. In fact, it isn’t uncommon for someone to pass out or become ill, right there in the station or in the train itself. And usually when that happens there is a chain-reaction of sympathy sickness, and that prompts the trains to stop running until someone from Homeland Security can verify that those ill aren’t carrying a contagious disease.

The best strategy is really to stick with above-ground transportation, large buses whose windows you can open, or to travel early in the morning before the crowds commute or leave a little after peak in the evening. That is also a good strategy to avoid what we all fear are the inevitable suicide bombers. They probably wouldn’t bother with a single bus, and for some reason they like peak-hours to do their killing.