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It's so easy being Green
Aug. 3rd, 2009 09:02 pmWell, not easy, exactly; today involved, among other things, biking 10k to the Rideau Canal Festival, and then biking back, this time a longer but prettier route, so we figure about 23k in all. Thank god for general health and fitness. Thank god for older kids. I have to work to keep up with them these days.
Festival was fun. Got to see wool spinning, look at pretty things, learn about biodiversity, vegetarianism/veganism, hemp, raw pie contests, and recycled-inner-tube wallets, sampled yummy food, bought a pretty organic cotton t-shirt, watched slow food being made (took a while, surprise!), and got to listen to Elizabeth May, leader of the Green Party of Canada. That last was why Chris had originally wanted to go. We figured we'd take the boys to the talk and not be too upset if it really wasn't their thing and they wanted to leave - it's all open-air anyway. To our surprise, they were very excited, sat through her entire presentation, and stayed for question period at the end. Who knew.
Daniel's was the first question she took. To paraphrase: "You said we've got all the knowledge we need to fight climate change, and we just need to get people to change their minds and decide to use it. How can we do that?"
She said quite a bit here, but the take-home message was Show Examples. Eg, people say we can't possibly cut our emissions without going broke; show them countries (like Denmark) and companies (like Dupont and Dow) that have done so. Show environmental programs that have worked.
Justin's question was one of the last ones she took: "Do you think the polar bears are going to die out?"
Hard to tell, but they should be OK if we can change what we're doing. She pointed him to a couple of websites he could access - cute moment where she asked, "So when you go back to school in September - does your school have internet access?"
"He's home schooled," I said.
She smiled. "Oh! Oh, that's why... yeah, that explains that," she said, and I don't know what it explained but could probably take a few guesses ;)
They were both so thrilled to meet her, and to talk to her for a bit afterwards. She apologized to Daniel for having called him "young lady" when she took his question. Apparently, her brother had long hair too, as a kid. Cool.
Biked home by the canal, got locally grown, barely-in-season corn on the cob on the way, which we then ate for dinner. Wow, how environmentally virtuous are we?
...of course we accompanied the corn with non-organic beef, probably from the American midwest or from the Alberta Tar Sands Factory Farm, but shhhh, don't tell anybody that part ;)
Festival was fun. Got to see wool spinning, look at pretty things, learn about biodiversity, vegetarianism/veganism, hemp, raw pie contests, and recycled-inner-tube wallets, sampled yummy food, bought a pretty organic cotton t-shirt, watched slow food being made (took a while, surprise!), and got to listen to Elizabeth May, leader of the Green Party of Canada. That last was why Chris had originally wanted to go. We figured we'd take the boys to the talk and not be too upset if it really wasn't their thing and they wanted to leave - it's all open-air anyway. To our surprise, they were very excited, sat through her entire presentation, and stayed for question period at the end. Who knew.
Daniel's was the first question she took. To paraphrase: "You said we've got all the knowledge we need to fight climate change, and we just need to get people to change their minds and decide to use it. How can we do that?"
She said quite a bit here, but the take-home message was Show Examples. Eg, people say we can't possibly cut our emissions without going broke; show them countries (like Denmark) and companies (like Dupont and Dow) that have done so. Show environmental programs that have worked.
Justin's question was one of the last ones she took: "Do you think the polar bears are going to die out?"
Hard to tell, but they should be OK if we can change what we're doing. She pointed him to a couple of websites he could access - cute moment where she asked, "So when you go back to school in September - does your school have internet access?"
"He's home schooled," I said.
She smiled. "Oh! Oh, that's why... yeah, that explains that," she said, and I don't know what it explained but could probably take a few guesses ;)
They were both so thrilled to meet her, and to talk to her for a bit afterwards. She apologized to Daniel for having called him "young lady" when she took his question. Apparently, her brother had long hair too, as a kid. Cool.
Biked home by the canal, got locally grown, barely-in-season corn on the cob on the way, which we then ate for dinner. Wow, how environmentally virtuous are we?
...of course we accompanied the corn with non-organic beef, probably from the American midwest or from the Alberta Tar Sands Factory Farm, but shhhh, don't tell anybody that part ;)
