Sunday, January 20th, 2008
The State of Things: Technology and the Folly of Humanity (Part One)
“When did we lose our everything?"

When did it become ok to knowingly and willingly disconnect from society and not be considered some kind of sociopathic freak? Those of you who know me know that I have for a long time protested any website that facilitates social gathering and any sort of high school “clique” like atmosphere. I have recently moved to Burlington VT, having lived previously in the great state of Massachusetts and for a short time in Los Angeles. Now if there's one thing I won't claim it's that I know all the different personality types out there, but I do believe that for the most part we as humans are not nearly as different from one another as we sometimes wish. Burlington is a small city but a “city” none the less. Like two Northamptons except replace the lesbians with snow bums and indie college kids who think they're the illuminated generation that's gonna save the world with hybrids and all-natural organically produced soy-based Oreos. Listen I've had some real conversations with my mom, she's admitted she inhaled and gone on some mind journeys but there's no illusion. She wasn't trying to change things, she just liked the Grateful Dead (no dreads needed). Personally I've never understood the look. Overalls, dreads, that stoned-out-of-your-mind look and oh yeah. They're all white kids. On their half-sober behalf I'm sure they look at me and think “hey man why are you so angry?” Look, just thank yourself I'm not gonna get into how the Beatles ruined black music and a whole generation of good healthy angry people by getting them stoned and dumb. Yeah, Number 9! Fucking great!

Sobering up a little. I remember it was the middle of December 2007. I was doing some site work up in Millers and there was this little Eco village built by some local Amherst contractors for low-income families, who in addition to caring about the disadvantaged were also worried about the environment. There were about ten or so cookie-cutter domiciles all outfitted with the latest and greatest solar panels, energy star everything, super sealed windows, low fiber core insulation. The works. We showed up to lay down hay over the fresh turf seeds we installed a few weeks back, before everything became covered in two to three inches of snow. So there's the mud, the seed, the snow, and now we are supposed to spread hay over that. There's me in a brand new Ford F-550 dumptruck pulling a small trailer with the hay mulcher/spreader inside, then there's Jason in a Chevrolet of equal size with the hay stacked close to ten feet high off the bed, and then there's Jason #2 in another 550 pulling the huge yellow trailer with the ASV-100 (Big fuckin' Skid Steer) to pull the trailer with the mulcher around the site and shoot hay everywhere.

Cycle -
The farmer plants the grain, tends to the grain all year, finally it's harvest time. He comes with his tractor and bailer and cuts the hay and binds it with string and it thus becomes a “hay bale.” He fills an entire barn with these bales, lets it dry for a few months and then we come by with our trucks and buy 112 bales which we haul with the neccasry equipment to the site to shred. We then spread the hay over freshly planted grass seed so next year the grass will grow nice and green and tall and we will most likely come up there with our trucks and mowers and line-trimmers and cut that grass.

Well at least they’ll have solar panels to of set the amount of diesel fuel it
costs to get that grass trimmed around the Eco Homes.

Landscaping in my view is and has always been the constant fight with nature, to modify something that has been growing one way for years, cut it down, move rocks that take eons to get there, remove ice and snow that only gets modified by the all-mighty sun, give the rich something to feel good about when they look outside and wonder what to spend their money on next. “Oh look honey the landscapers are here!" To cut the fucking grass when any real man would be tending to his own lawn and property. Though I guess his laziness is what gives me a fucking job.
- Cycle

People have got to watch out when they decide to just start sitting back and just buying energy star soy-based eco-friendly crap. Think about where it comes from. Are you really helping anything buying organic yogurt from Texas instead of buying the stuff from Cooks farm down the street in Hadley? Either way i guess in the end you should probably call the one-eight-hundred number at the bottom of the grocery store receipt and complain about carrying local products, after all you'll be on the phone long enough with the automated service that you'll probably increase your chance of brain cancer while running up your phone bill.

End of part one
- Jair