A dreary Saturday

We've arranged a civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces.

- Carl Sagan

I'm hearing a lot of whining about the current state of energy prices and their related articles like food and anything that has to be moved like airplanes and fat people. Gasoline is close to $3.90 a gallon here and I still see a lot of people driving like mental patients on holiday and single people in vehicles that could carry a soccer team. I wonder what it will take to get people to change their wasteful lifestyle, then I realize that we're a "morbidly obese" society and nothing that made us that way got us to change, so I suppose it's going to be business as usual and we'll just keep complaining.

CBS is showing ultimate fighting in prime time Saturday night. It's either a reaction to the dearth of programming in the wake of the writers' strike or a comment on the slow death of civilization. I'm thinking the latter. I'll be interested to see the ratings numbers, since it's on versus the NHL finals (on NBC) and stuff like Cops on Fox and a movie on ABC ("The Rookie"). It's beyond me why people would go out of their way to watch people beat each other up, but there are a lot of things that people do that are beyond me, so I suppose watching TV shows where guys beat each other senseless is at the bottom of the list.

Chief among them:

I've never understood the fascination with giant vehicles. Every time I see an H3 on the road, I'm tempted to ask the driver, "So, what branch of the military are you with?"

I still see people wandering out of the grocery store with carts full of plastic bags. I'm guessing they all go in the trash, since they're putting them in those giant vehicles.

I see a lot of people walking around with things in their ears. Bluetooth devices aired to cellular phones, as though they're going to miss an important phone call while they're shopping for underwear. Face it folks, you aren't that important. Miss a call once in a while. It's good for your soul.

Networks keep producing dopey "reality" shows, and supposedly we keep watching them. I think the genre jumped the shark a long time ago, but now I see that The Food Network has the "Next Food Network Star" coming, as though somebody on The Food Network is a star. Get a grip.

I still hear people saying that they don't want to talk about something because, "I don't want to jinx it", as though what they say has a profound effect on reality. If that were true, you wouldn't be as stupid as you are and your life would have turned out differently because your wishes would be realized. That's harsh, eh?

I went through a health screening last week. I was chastised for consuming sandwiches for lunch. "Those things are loaded with sodium!" I was told, as though I was smoking cigarettes or something. I wondered why a society that is supposed to be concerned with our health would allow such horrible substances to be sold. If processed meats are the downfall of our health, then perhaps the FDA should ban them from being sold and protect us from ourselves. Either we should be able to choose our fate or have it foist upon us. Take that logic to its extreme and you will legalize all drugs because the consumer's right to decide will dictate the market. If I am allowed to consume processed meat in sandwich form (and it's bad for my blood pressure) then why aren't I allowed to consume anything else I wish to consume? They'll sell me cigarettes if I want to buy them but I can't smoke marijuana because it is "illegal".

Anyone?