It's the weekend

Labor Day is one of the (few) Federal holidays I actually get off from work. So I've decided to (mostly) treat the three-day weekend as much of the rest of the working world would: That is, actually taking it OFF.

(I reserve the possibility of coming in for a bit Monday morning to do Tuesday prep work, however).

I do think I've been pushing too hard with the research/extra prep for teaching/other stuff....the weeks begin to feel a month long, and that's not good.

So my plans are just to go out and do something kind of fun. Maybe go antiquing, maybe hit the big JoAnn's again (I have a 50% off one item "Grand Opening" coupon that came in the mail). Spend Sunday afternoon working on quilts. Finish the scarf that's on the needles. (Not the Putney Shawl...this is a moss stitch scarf made of Malabrigo that I've been working off and on - mostly off - for over a year. It's long enough, but I have to decide whether to bind it off now, or whether to work through to the bitter end of the yarn. I can't quite decide. Part of me wants to say "Long scarves are cool" (like "Fezzes are cool" and "Bow ties are cool"), but part of me just wants it done.

I also want to start another scarf and maybe some hats. I'm beginning to think about charity-knitting again, after running across a bag of a now-discontinued Lion Brand wool ("Kool Wool") that I bought quite a bunch of on clearance with the thought that if I knit it at a fairly tight gauge, it would make good warm watchcaps. I don't know for sure where to send stuff, though. I'll have to do some research on what needs are out there and what groups I want to support.

I also want to start a hat for myself. I ran across a ball of a pretty brown tweed Paton's wool, and remembered I had the Krummholz hat pattern that I bought a year or so ago...and I want a hat of that.

I think part of this is "come on fall, come on winter" wishful thinking. It's been hot again, and we didn't get a drop of rain from Isaac (after several days of thinking we would, and one day of being told that we might really get dumped on). It's supposed to be 100* again on Sunday, and I disapprove of that.

***

I finished reading "The Ghost Map" last night. It took me a while to get through the Epilogue, which, compared to the rest of the book, is kind of disorganized. The author gets very speculative in it. And he seems to contradict himself. In the first part, he talks about how great cities are, how committed he is to living in (and raising his children in) a large, large city. And how cities are much more environmentally friendly than living in the countryside or small towns are (because of "economies of scale" and things like less transportation needed/availability of mass transit).

And okay, I will grant him some points on the "environmental efficiency" front. But having lived for the early part of my adult life in a high-density region of a city (not a HUGE city, but not a small one either - Ann Arbor, Michigan) - life in the "big city" is not entirely a good thing.

The biggest pro I remember of living in Ann Arbor was not having to have a car. The fact that I could walk everywhere for pretty much everything I wanted. (True- if I wanted to shop at a supermarket, with lower prices and much bigger selection that White Market or Village Corner had, I'd have to either take a bus or bum a ride off a friend who had a car - but for most of the food I needed, one of those two stores, plus regular trips to the farmer's market, pretty much took care of things).

The biggest con, in my opinion, was the noise. Oh Celestia, the NOISE. Of course, I lived a couple blocks from a popular bar, which in retrospect was an unfortunate choice (but then again: secure apartments - ones that weren't old-house apartments that could be broken into with a good strong kick - were relatively few and far between, and one apartment complex I had considered I rejected when someone I knew remarked, "It's great! It's like an all-day, all-night party in there!"). I remember when Michigan's basketball team won the championship and the people streamed out of the bar to celebrate by screaming and banging on the hoods of cars. (I remember, in part, because I had a big Organic Chemistry exam the next day).

I also have to admit - and I realize this is part of my own personal quirks and my own personal prejudices here but - I didn't like the constant crush of people. The fact that there were always people around, everywhere, and to get away from them you either had to be able to drive out of town, or walk really far, or go into your apartment and lock the door. I didn't like the pamphleteers on the street. I didn't like the  protesters outside the grocery store that sold meat (granted, they only showed up a few days a year, but still). I didn't like getting hit up by the people allegedly collecting for some charity. I just didn't like people coming into my personal headspace and confronting me with their causes or their problems or whatever they were advertising. I just wanted to walk down the street and be LEFT ALONE. (I suppose that's why Bluetooth and things like earbuds are so popular - it's a way to try to maintain your own headspace when in a crowd).

But anyway. Johnson (the author of The Ghost Map) talks about how cities do have these efficiencies of scale, and how they're vibrant, all that stuff. But he does this in the service of noting that it hadn't always been so - of course, he just finished writing a book about a major cholera epidemic in a city, and that in part the high density of population may have allowed for increased spread. But he goes on to note that that's been pretty much conquered now, and the real worry is bioterrorism, which could definitely take down a city.

But even then, he goes on to argue, we're learning so much about viral DNA/RNA that we may 'soon' have the ability to make rapid-response vaccines, so given a bioterrorist attack, only a "few" people (hundreds, rather than tens of thousands, was the impression I got) would die before they could vaccinate against it. And how this was coming in future decades....the implication I took being that we should all move into cities and not worry.

Mmmn, I don't know. To be honest, I care less about what we will hypothetically be able to do forty years from now than I do about what we can do - and what threats we face - NOW. Because I might not be here forty or fifty years hence, but I'm here NOW, and I'd rather not be one of those unfortunate people who winds up in the path of some bioengineered virus. And in my mind, living in what people here sometimes jocularly refer to as "DOOO-rant, USA" is probably a better way to avoid viruses than living in, say, Washington DC and carrying a respirator at all times. (Can you imagine if a bioterror threat were high, and everyone was issued and told to carry, under penalty of law for not doing so, respirators - like Britons were with gas masks in WWII?)

(He also goes into a discourse about suitcase nukes, with the conclusion that there's pretty much nothing we can do about that, and maybe if they start happening, the city-planet he proposes will just come to accept that they're a part of life, kind of like natural disasters. That makes me shudder a little).

So, at any rate: I don't buy the argument that we should all move into cities NAOW because it's better for the planet and leads to a "more vibrant" culture. I still think there is insufficient soundproofing and too many selfish people who think everyone else should share their choice in music or television or other activities (I had a next-door neighbor one year in Ann Arbor who would have his girlfriend over regularly over night and their "fun times" were distressingly loud). There are just some of us who are overwhelmed by the thought of so many people around all the time, and all the other sensory assaults one can get in a big city.

(Besides....who'd do the farming? Who'd keep an eye on the nature preserves?)