So, Will Los Angeles Black Out on October 20th...or Watt?

...that's a clip from one of my favorite films, Phillip Glass' called "Koyaanisqatsi" (slathered with the Strokes' "Reptilia")...the flick holds a message that goes with the thrust of what I'm about to say...I don't know if you've heard about this but it appears that the powers that are in my fair city are taking a proactive stab at conserving energy...but it might be a day late and a dollar short...


"Led by Supervisor Yvonne B. Burke and City Councilwoman Wendy Greuel, the proposed effort asks Angelenos to simultaneously go dark between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 20, as San Franciscans do the same. Local officials are expected to vote on the plan next week.

At the original event in Sydney, Australia, in March, 2.2 million people cut the lights, causing a 10% drop in electricity use. The so-called Earth Hour reduced 25 tons of carbon dioxide, equivalent to taking nearly 49,000 cars off the road for 60 minutes...


Although officials still are finalizing which public buildings will join in the voluntary blackout, possible candidates include City Hall, the county Hall of Administration, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, DWP headquarters, the Port of Los Angeles and the multicolored pylons at Los Angeles International Airport.

"I think it will have a big visual impact," Katona said." (here's the rest in the LA Times)


...okay, I'll bite, I said to myself when I heard this on talk radio earlier...I'll do my part but I wonder if those millions of single-serve commuters will step up to the plate for 60 minutes to see if they can make a difference...I'm skeptical as it'll take place during Prime Time on a Saturday...and if there's one thing that Angelenos can't deal with, it's an inconvenience to their party plans and intra-city travel habits...they didn't back in 2000 and I don't think even the spike in fuel prices will make 'em curb their power-sponging ways...and I said as much during that last heatwave.

...I bike around this town all the time and take notice of all the wasting of natural resources, primarily water, that goes into making what's essentially a desert by the sea look like some side street art-deco utopia...well at least in the parts where the the "ghetto birds" don't fly too often...don't get me wrong, I hope the proposal gets pushed through and everyone chips in, but I'm familiar enough enough with my fellow citizens and how a lot of them would rather sweep the whole conservation thing under the rug...until it gets unbearable and we get what we got in 2000...when I ride the commuter bus and trains in the morning, it's rare that I see car poolers...even now...so pardon me if the tongue in my cheek hinders my speech...


...ah well, a positive anything beats a negative nothing...I'm no Ed Begley, Jr but I'll give it a whirl just the same even if the proposal doesn't get approved because it's high time for us all to think about alternatives...on many fronts..."ain't nobody gonna shite, shave or bathe until some changes are made!" as my granny used to say when she got fed up with feckless proles, talkin' loud and saying nothing...it all reminds me of a piece I wrote a while back which I closed like so: "... The word "Koyaanisqatsi" is a Hopi Indian noun for "life out of balance; crazy life; life in turmoil; life disintegrating; a state of life that calls for another way of living"...I still stand by that line of thought ... if you live in the area, why don't you do your part on October 20th, yo?...