The State of the planet

Reading scientific articles and watching reports on TV regarding the state of the planet makes me deeply concerned and worried. The predictions from scientist are really omnious. I often even feel that the ruin of the planet is so close that it is impossible to stop.

Considering how poor most people in the world are I think it will take a lot to turn things around. The poor countries, which have huge populations, of course want the same possibilities as the rich countries. The authorities in these countries do not want to impose to hard regulations on their own domestic industries. Why should not they have the same possibilities to get going as the established industrialized countries have had? It is, or it ought to be, easy for us in the rich part of world to try and limit our pollution and consumption. We have sort of come past the survival limit and can have the luxury to try and perfect our processes, means of transportation and to minimize waste. Some people do not have anything to waste! Somehow the rich countries, besides looking after things within their own borders, must support the poor countries so that they also can improve their living conditions but in an environmental friendly way.

One rich country that is very influential is of course the US. But when it comes to environmental issues its influence has not been positive. For the moment I live in the Midwest of the US and it is sad to see how little they are working with these issues here.
The lifestyle here is conservative in many ways. However conservative does not apply when it comes to consumption. Shopping is a way of life. We have huge stores and you really do not understand where everything goes. How can they sell so much stuff?
In the other end of consumption we have the waste issue and a year ago we got new trash totes. The new thing about them was really only that they enables automatic handling by the garbage truck. The interesting, or I should say scary, thing is that they are huge, about 45o liters and are emptied every week! Despite this many households cannot manage with only one of these huge containers! Before introducing these new trash totes some actually argued that it would be good to have smaller ones to encourage recycling. But the town mayor responded with the following:"- Well, recycling is a good thing in the ideal world. Trash is however a part of life." Sadly I do not think he is alone in his view of recycling and if prominent persons of a society makes these kinds of statements he really undermines the efforts to establish recycling.

We live in little town where many people commute to the closest big town, Indianapolis, but there are no possibilities to go there with public transportation you must go by car. To have a car here is considered life essential. Last week there actually where an article about a family who did not have a car and had a "terrible situation" since "They actually had to take all their groceries home on a bike." Having no car also meant walking to work since there are no buses going in that direction. The reason for the article was that they now had gotten a car from a charity organisation. It had been more interesting if the article had reported that the city now had a new route for the local bus.
I guess still the gas is much too cheap here, it is only about 4 SEK per litre. In order to change peoples attitude towards the car it must be more expensive. If they would put some more tax on the gas price the size of the cars would be smaller and people would be more interested in using alternative means for transportation.
Now many people here talks about that ethanol derived from corn should be a good alternative to oil as fuel for cars. But the main argument for corn seems to be that the US then would be more independent from the oil producing countries in the middle east. That it might be good for the environment is only a secondary benefit.

Finally, after telling you some of my local observations I would like to recommend the BBC produced serie of articles called "Planet under pressure". It is like a summary of all the problems we are facing in the world of today. Reading it is very informative but also so depressing that I feel my desire to do my part in improving the situation instead is impaired. However I try to shake that feeling off because I really hope we somehow can master this precarious situation.

Just another addicton!

I do not consider game addiction any different than any other addiction. It probably in some way fill a need in the life of the people who gets hooked up on it. Then some of these persons do not have the ability to limit themselves and it gets an abuse.

I have never heard the terms MMOG or WOW before even though I have heard a little bit of these kind of games. I guess that they are really absorbing and fun to play once you get in to it. I have played simpler kinds of video- and computer games and although they were not at all this technically advanced they were also kind of "addictive". Once you started you should try "only one more time" since you might be able to improve this or that. Suddenly you realized that time just had flown away! I however do not miss this time consuming hobby and have no plans to take it up.

What drives bloggers?

Blogging was a completely new thing for me when starting this course in English. I had heard the term mentioned but not bothered to look into it. This since I in my spare time have chosen to limit my time in front of the computer. I think it will take some time before I start a blog that is "genuinely mine".

However, what have I found to be characterizing a blogger? Judging by the vast flora of topics that are discussed in a web log the blogger could be anyone. But still I think that bloggers have two typical features. First they have a stronger urge than others to be heard, to share and exchange knowledge, ideas and opinions with others. Secondly they consider Internet as the most convenient and useful medium to do so.

But what is then the actual trigger to start a blog? I guess the reasons could be many. The first that comes to my mind is that you would like to share your opinions with others and feel that the immediate surrounding is not enough. You would like to extend further to receive more and different input. Then a blog is a good way to communicate.
It seems to be rather common that celebrities, journalists and others that also have the opportunity to speak their mind in newspapers and other media also start blogs. The reason for this I think is the more informal and direct publishing. In a blog they can elaborate more than they are allowed to do on TV or in an newspaper article since there you have a limited time or a certain amount of lines that you can fill. In the blog you can ramble on as you like with no editors or producers to set the limits! But also, of course, it must be really interesting to get their readers reactions more directly than what is the case if you express yourself in TV, newspaper or a magazine.
I also get the impression that in certain circles it is sort of "hip" to have a blog. Here it is the actual blogging that is the purpose not the content. They strive to add interesting effects and to get a really stylish design. This group are more interested in blogging in a technical sense but somehow they any way fit into my description of a typical blogger; they want to share their interest and are also eager to receive others reactions.

Why I study at the university?

The main reason that I now study at the university is to be able to keep my job!
Now two and a half years ago my husband, that works for Scania, got an offer to work for a three year period in the US. At that moment I where on parental leave, from my job at Astrazeneca, so I considered moving here as an opportunity to spend even more time with my children. The first six months here in Indiana I was on parental leave, then I got study leave for the rest of the three year period.
A prerequisite to keep my employment is that I study half time. That is quite a lot for me considering that raising kids here demand a lot of the parents, or actually I should say the mother. So that is the reason I chose to study on the Internet. That way I do not have to have a certain schedule to fit with my kids activities. But I think it would have been more interesting to attend some university classes locally. Then I would have had more social interaction.

However during this time my studies has grown more important to me than just enabling me to keep my employment. It gives me challenges, something important that is my own responsibility and I think it adds on to my competence. If I had not studied I think I would have felt more restless and had a harder time getting used to live like this.

Many years ago, after finishing my studies at technical college, I also studied at the university. The reason then was that I thought I needed a more specific and somewhat deeper education in order to get an interesting job. I chose to study a one year program at the university. The reason I chose this particular program was firstly that the subjects interested me, secondly it was really convenient because it was on the neighbouring campus from my college. That way I did not have to move. I also considered longer programs at other schools but I guess I have always been swaying about the question "What to do when I grow up?" So to choose this short program was what I could motivate myself to do at that point. After completing this program I immediately got a job and have been working in this field ever since.

In retrospective I suppose if I had invested in a longer education I would have had a broader field of job opportunities. Not giving myself that advantage I sometimes regret. But I have also learned that education is not the only factor that is influence what kind of job you get or how your career develops. It is also very much depending on opportunity and your own personality.