Yesterday’s kick-off event for the Road to the White House No-Excuses Tour went well.
Professor Mary Wood was amazingly eloquent, though too generous in her introductory remarks.
Atmospheric scientist Jennifer Francis was equally amazing by her clear explanation of how global warming-induced disturbances in an already chaotic jet-stream produced the extreme heat and fires afflicting the pacific northwest. Including, importantly, the horrendous fires up the McKenzie Valley and down the I-5 corridor of last year, and this year the horrific heat domes.
Regrettably, far worse is yet to come – unless we get our act together on climate.
Today’s ride was just 71 miles, though a bit eventful as I didn’t leave the North Jetty in Florence, Oregon until 430 p.m. One repair, some tightening, packing, and loading, and a good bit of paperwork, then the 1.5-hour drive to the start, accounted for this delay. Many thanks to Warren for even getting me to that start.
Setting up the trike in the face of a stiff ~30 mph ocean wind was properly invigorating. But the shoulder of Hwy 126, at least from Florence to Eugene, really is not suitable for cycling – at least not at night, since it is then harder to avoid rat-a-tat-tat rumble strips. Transportation planners employ those strips to make car and truck travel safer, as they shake up sleepy drifting drivers. But they also jar the already awake cyclist to the bone, causing them to swerve. Not good. Memo to self: Undertake the cycling bit during daylight, where possible, to avoid such hazardous safety measures.
This morning, while I was adjusting my headrest and packing tight for Day 1 of the Road to the White House No-Excuses Tour, I listened to Stephen Colbert’s interview of Supreme Court Justice Breyer.
The Justice recently published “The Authority of the Court and the Peril of Politics.”
[It must be nice to have a cushy job that leaves you sufficient free time to write a book, but I digress.]
At one point, waxing eloquent about the future of our nation, Breyer, spoke about young people, and stated: “The future of this country is in their hands, I’m afraid, not mine. It’s up to the high school students, the college students.”
Excuse my overuse of legal terminology, but that is a bloody cop-out. Young people will have their work cut out for them, and they certainly should be engaged to the extent they can while pursuing their educational goals. But the enormous problems afflicting our nation are not of their creation. We need to clean up our own mess, not leave that to our children.
So let it begin with Justice Breyer. And with me.
(Updated: 9/16/2021 at 6:30am)