Here in Victoria

Howdy Howdy. What a day. Another reason why I don't like driving. Speeding ticket. $175 bucks out of my pocket. Terrible mistake. After this incident, I was stuck in rush hour, the Colwood crawl. There was half a dozen cyclists who passed me on there bikes, and I was so jealous. I am glad I don't have to drive as much anymore.

I do like how well Victoria is set up for cycling. There are clearly marked cycling lanes, even around busy intersections. There are many people who commute by bike here in the city. I am walking to school, I don't feel like changing my clothes when I get to the campus, and I can't stand riding in jeans. Not fun. There is a nice trail that takes me into the campus, so only half my walk is near traffic. Its very nice.

I got out on the hardtail yesterday. We took a trip out to Comox Lake on the Courtenay side. We rode a trail that we have walked many times, but we went in a reverse direction. There was some backtracking, trying to stay on the right trail. We did ride some nice, fast, flowy sections, and walked down some really steep rock faces. Such a different trail out there than Cumberland. Cumberland is really technical, rooty, with skinny and bridges, as well as downhill sections. The lake has many rocky bluffs, stuff thats to scary for me. It was really nice to get out to somewhere different though.

Gas is $1.29. I put $60 bucks in my car to fill from a quarter tank. It wouldn't bother me if I didn't have to drive down island. Its a drag. I had a great idea today. I think we need to start, as a country, taking money from the oil and gas we export to the U.S., to invest in green energy. I don't know how many people in Canada know that once we have sent a certain amount of oil down south, say 200k barrels a day, we cannot ever reduce that amount, every, even if we can't heat our own homes from our oil. This is because of NAFTA. I read this in a book, which I can't remember the title right now. I think it is called "Stupid to the last drop", about the oil and gas industry in Alberta. I wish the Federal government would tell the oil and gas lobbiest to shove it, and get on with the next generation of energy. Wind, solar, tidal, geo-thermal, plus infrastructure up grades to stop energy loss in transmission lines, and getting cars off the roads and investing in green transportation, local products and food production. Lets get on with this stuff, we will run out of oil, and then what. The world is going to crash, and nothing will have happened to prepare for it. The technology is here, and with some corporate investment, it will be more affordable as it goes mainstream.

Speaking about not figuring out options for the future, and clean energy, when I was out at Comox Lake yesterday, there was some fresh logging activity, close to Courtenay. The slash was cleaned up, and the left-over wood was piled up, like they normally do, but brought farthest away from the road as they could. So much nice clean wood that people could be cutting up and using to heat there homes. Instead the forestry company will burn these piles with diesel and tires, having huge, dirty piles that send massive amounts of GHG emissions and particles into the air, not 5 km from West Courtenay. What a shame. Wood stoves could burn that wood in a clean, responsible way, and using the energy of the wood for something, not just heating the earth. Bio-mass incinerators to create electricity in also a very feasible option that needs to happen.

I am worked up, and I think I am going to quite while I can. Have a nice day!