Climate Change Hysteria and a New Year

I fear the dawning of a New Year will be a severe disappointment to the United Nations Climate Change Committee.  I fear I am alone as I listen to their incessant cry:
“Do as I say or die!"
“Give me money or the world will end!”
Meanwhile everyone is being reasonable. But nothing is ‘enough’.  Nothing less than perfection is ‘good enough’.
I’ve heard this message, this critical, whining, complaining, message all my life.  The ‘position’ has been different but always it’s the ‘new religion’.  This Cult of Death cries over and over again.
“Do as I say or die!”   “Listen!, Listen!”. "Listen to me alone!"
Today they claim ‘science’ but science is debate. This isn't science.  It's histeria.  It's fanaticism.  It's politics. It's hustling.
 I am a scientist, The science they slogan is pseudoscience. It's not real science.  The money they want is real money.   It’s always about money.  Give me money and I’ll save the world.  Give me your money.  Do as I say.  You can’t trust anyone but me.  I’ve heard this all my life.
I’m getting old now. It's getting old.
Yet another New Year has come.  Love has won, again.  I’m thankful.  I’m really thankful for all the real scientists, all the real problem solvers,  solution based folks building and making and winning despite the complainers and whiners.
The United Nations is an industry of third world dictators.  The Security Council is the headquarters central for the arms trade.  I’m not being cynical. I simply know casinos don’t want to stop gambling just limit the gambling to those who don’t lose control and sell their children. I know the bars don’t want to stop selling booze just not sell it to those who have already had one liver transplant. The tobacco industry was fine with selling cigarettes as long as you had both lungs.  Really after you’ve lost one lung to cancer you really should move along.  The images of the victims of these industries are bad for their business. The same is true for the UN. It’s industry is war.  The ‘security council’ doesn’t want to stop war. It's in the business of selling weapons and ammunition.  It just doesn’t want the war to get out of control. It’s same old game.  It's the Great Game.
Now the climate change hysterics are on about saving the world with their latest set of regulations. They want another set of United Nations climate change police.  We've got police for the police and committees upon committees.  It’s all hysteria.
“Trust me! Trust me! Trust me!”  "Give me your money!"  "Give me your life!"
Why?
You’re wrong.  Your predictions have all been false.  The world hasn’t ended.  The sky isn’t falling.  The war to end all wars didn’t end all wars.    Just get on with it. You do your thing. I’ll do mine. But stop your incessant childish bullying.  Stop your name calling and your false advertisements and your claim to represent ‘science’.
You’re the United Nations and you're not even United.   The number of mistakes you’ve made , the terrorists you’ve backed, the dictators you’ve supported and the money you’ve wasted is irreverent.
Now you claim that by having another meeting, another committee in your unending rounds of government committees with your resolutions , your exorbitant salaries, and your dictates, that you will save us all from ourselves. You talk. You talk.  You talk and you talk and you talk. And you talk to each other.  And you agree to agree and you want us to pay for your party.  While the rest of us are digging holes and planting trees.  We’re building while you tear down.
You criticize the whole history of human kind. You condemn all that has brought us thus far. You deny life on this planet. You deny the very life that has blossomed and risen.  You are insane.
It’s a New Year.
Despite your incessant hysteria. Despite your promise of death, we have lived.  I'm here to tell you we are in a "Life Change" equation  but today We are alive.
I know you will rain on this parade. You rain on any parade.  You're soul suckers. Meanwhile, I’m going to laugh and sing and celebrate another New Year.  BecauseI believe.  I believethe future is safe even from your soul sucking.  I believe and I have faith. I believe in the present and I believe in the future and I believe in the past.  I believe good men and good women will prevail. I believe we will survive.  We will survive and we will thrive.   I am in love with life. I am just damned tired of your constant whining, complaining,  criticizing and negativity.
It’s a New Year.
We’ve survived despite your claims otherwise.
It’s a New Year and the planet is still here.
Wake up.  Arise.  Celebrate.
Get over yourself. Get out of yourself.  Hear the fear that is you.  Change yourself.  The planet is fine.  We’re fine.  There’s lots to do.  There’s all manner of work to be done.  We don’t need another committee. We don’t need any more ‘threats’.  Stop selling your mealy mouth wares, hawking your worn out slogans with that same old hysteria.  Become the solution.  Be the solution.  Show me, don’t tell me.
It’s a New Year.
I’m frankly thankful. With your mass hysteria,collective stupidity. brain washing the young, and the corruption of the media,  I admit I’ve had my worries.  I know climate. I know science.  But the truth be told nothing is more dangerous than my fellow man except maybe my fellow woman.  And the folk who make up the United Nations are the power brokers of the greatest killers of all times.  You don't get to sit in the United Nations unless you've pleased the man whose selling the big guns in your nation.  Sure they'll outlaw guns for common folk but all the leaders in the United Nation they have guns.  They have the biggest guns of all times.  They can change the climate or the planet anytime they want.  They can kill us dozens of times over but they don't want to.  That would be bad for business.  And they're in the business of war.  That's why it's called the Security Council.  And they don't want things to get out of control.  Not out of their control, anyway. The leadership of this world is based on survival.  They may not be the fittest by any sense of the word but they are survivors.  And they want to survive and they want their kids to survive.   While no one wants to talk about that elephant in the room, that elephant is saying ‘trust me to fix the climate’ . Frankly I don’t trust them to fix squat!  They’re wanting to meddle for profit and nothing else.  Their science is pseudoscience.  And they lie.  Some say that the biggest brain was made for the biggest lie.
But it’s a New Year.
And I’m glad for it.
It’s a New Year. I’m going to dance and sing.  I’m going to tell everyone to dance and sing and celebrate whether it rains or it shines.
Ding dong the witches dead!  Beware of her negativity and incessant complaining and whining and threatening and bullying and demanding.  Just because it kills her doesn't mean it has to kill you.  Mostly beware of anyone saying they're doing it for someone else good  but not their own.  Beware of give me money to help a snail. Or I'm going to kill him for his sake.  I”m saving the planet for the children and the grand children.  Hell, that’s prophecy and religion.  Predictions and projections are just fancy words for “I can see the future”. Give me your money.
Well I can see the future.
t’s a New Year.
Despite all their doom and Death Cult chants we’re alive.
We survived.  Dance, sing, celebrate!
I thank God for that!

It's an new year and I pray to know love - song

C            G                F                   C
It’s a new year and I ask for less fear

It’s a new year and I long for less tears
C                      G                           F
I pray to know love and feel more joy (x2)

Am                  G                       Am
Dancing in the wilderness with friends /Sailing on the oceans without end
Living in the moment alive/Savouring all the good times /Till we die

You and me were meant to be free/Laughing and celebrating life
Never forgetting something more/Than the conflict and strife

(I used my iPhone to record, played my Washburn Rover, and sounded flat in some places. I've not been singing or playing guitar much. Still shamelessly creative.)

Happy New Year 2014

First walk of the year for Gilbert and me.  The first excitement was seeing a ‘fish’ swim up the little side river.  I had my D5000 Nikon with the new Nikkor 18-300 mm lens and the new 2x multiplier.  The shutter didn’t work.  I tried every button till miraculously it worked.  There’s a stunning picture of the fish, maybe a steel head trout or an old salmon, hard to tell.  (It’s dead centre in the picture).
Then a mallard appeared followed by a merganser then a bufflehead.  I’m sure about the green headed mallard but the red headed merganser is a question mark simply because I can only find the field guide to wild flowers. I’ve been moving and nothing is where I know it will be one day. So I’m just guessing about the bird names.  There should be a similar ‘guide’ to acquaintances.  That would make life easier.
I met a  northern farmer with a female Gorky named Billy. I'm sure I met him last year. Gilbert and Billy frolicked while the old guys walked and talked about early days in Winnipeg.  Apparently it’s as cold there again as it was when we were growing up there.  Imagine our mothers sending us out as children to school to walk through the freezing winds of Winnipeg tundra. Today we'd be removed, unless that was their hope in those days too.  We’d all be foster children today raised in loving Mexican homes were times different.
I included a picture of Gilbert from a couple of weeks before when the snow was heavy on the ground where we were today. The snow is all but gone now.
Then there’s shots by the SV GIRI from yesterday.   I loaded 6 bags of clothing and stuff in the truck for donation.
Now I ‘ve just chosen to watch Will and Grace over Jerry Springer. I did catch the end of the world being destroyed and the elite getting away on arks Jan 1, 2014 morning movie.  Was that a hopeful harbinger thrown out to the powerful status quo?
Gilbert is cuddling on the couch beside me.  The gift venison is thawing in preparation for becoming chilli in the cuisinart pressure cooker.
I love to start the year with a busy demanding schedule.
I have to fit pool and hot tub, more television, some reading perhaps, and another walk into this day, just to make it complete.
 I’ll read mail, Facebook and twitter. That’s not something I did a decade ago. I actually remember using a phone on the wall to call friends New Years Day. But that was a whole other technology era away.
I've already added prayer and meditation but a wiser man would do more of that while I'm thinking of the chocolate I've surprisingly left over from Christmas.
Happy New Year!
   

Happy New Year 2010

We've made it another year. Physically survival is too often underestimated. Emotionally we take so much for granted. Intellectually we underestimate the sheer magnitude of this mysterious miracle of life. I want to remember what was great about last year.

It started with me thoroughly enjoying the winter locum in the Trail Hospital, the fine doctors, staff and delightful people I had the priviledge of working with there. How magnificently beautiful and diverse British Columbia is.

Then my own practice survived the business failures of 2009, as the macrocosm of the world reeled, in the microcosm of my office, frank incompetence in business and accounting mismanagement reigned. New owners on the building would not renew the collective leases and staff desertion after the grossest of errors had me working 7 days a week 12 hours aday just to keep a practice open, all the while looking for new offices and new staff.

It would have been even darker were it not for the understanding of patients and referring family physicians, lawyers and their staff. Friends like Laura and Colin stepped in to help. Lo and behold I found a new office in China Town and amazingly with the help of Tracy and Mark the move occurred. I was exhausted but equally amazed. New business administration and accounting began to bring order to the self centered bedlam I'd earlier not attended to struggling with all the immediate demands for patients who overnight lost so much as provincial authorities focused their budgets and attention elsewhere. The sick are rarely a priority. And those who care for the sickest are stigmatized as they are.

Yet here I was in church praying and at home on my knees praying, going to meetings, and finding that truly in times of travail our relationship with God becomes central. Talking with my father, brother and sister in law was inspiring. Friends , colleagues and ministers were all so supportive. Soul food with George was never more appreciated.

And spring came. Out of the darkness and cold, came light and warmth. My sailboat went up on the hard at Mosquito Creek. To fulfill the surveyor's insurance recommendations the hull underwent ultrasound assessment with two areas of weakness found. After the real bloody work of preparation was done Barry the welder came with his magic wand and healed Giri's broken mast and added two new plates to the hull. An ancient evil septic tank was exorcised, water tank leak repaired,and quite amazingly Tom put Humpty together again.

The boat wasn't ready for summer sailing but the weather was perfect for motorcycling and camping. Laura and I had our usual terrific jaunts to the country. We got out together on the Christmas Toy Run and Motorcycle Ride for Dad as well. I did the Oyster Run down in Washington with Donny. The AA round up on Salt Spring Island was the best with Bill and Brian. IDAA conference in San Antonnio, the Alamo and riding a Harley to Corpus Christi were all highlights of the summer.

Then it was deer hunting season and a series of trades with a little out put of money that had me, sans a scooter and a couple of rifles but with a new 30:30 rifle and a 230 Honda enduro.

Laura was with me when I shot a deer. The barbecued tenderloins were so delicious. She enjoyed her days camping, reading, sunbathing in Princeton while I rode all over the back country shooting every can and the bagging the occasional partridge. 4x4ing the Harrison Lake area where fire had struck was an unforgettable drive through dead truck alley.

Then winter was on us and somehow the practice continued with less chaos as Mark's experience grew, Scotia Bank at Granville continued supportive, the taxman fattened, and generally I was again able to focus on learning medicine, amazed at the advances in the knowledge of addiction, brain injury and human sexuality.

I enjoyed very much being asked to teach a course on spirituality in mental health and addiction settings. Several of my articles were also published by the Medical Post. I loved the Canadian Author's Association monthly meetings and especially enjoyed our writer's circle readings and criticism. I continued in the Blue Water Cruising Association and joined the Harley Owner's Group.

I was a reader at Christ Church Cathedra until my move to the north shore caused me to attend St. James Anglican Church more often, mostly because of their later service. In retrospect, practicality has often had a major role to play in my church attendance. I used to attend St. John's Anglican Shaughnassey Sunday night service because I wasn't back from sailing for morning mass. Then I attended Wednesday night West Coast Biker's Church until they moved further out of the city. I was attending Rainbow Community Church evening service in the West End till they moved East Vancouver and hopefully this year I'll get back to them and the Biker church.

I attended the West End Pride Parade, made it out to several charity functions, including Shout, Turning Point and Loving Spoonful. I was divinely dressed for the annual Emperor and Empress charity fundraiser and continued to support Avalon Women's Centre which does great work for women with addictions.

Strathcona Men's AA meeting and the other AA meetings I attend have all made my life fuller with the inspiration, the fellowship and service involved. Cyberdocs on the internet and the email friendships I continue there with others around the world, and blogging, have all added a special richness to my life.

My nephew Andrew's visit with his friend Kyle awakened me to the fact I was probably aging. Their staying out all night partying and liking it seemed a truly alien concept to me yet I believe I may well have been like that when I was in my 20's. I really have grown to love going to bed early, early morning rising and generally G.O.D. – good, orderly, direction. I fear I'm getting set in my ways. My cat, Angel, certainly is.

Now when I think back on the year I really didn't believe my health or sanity would survive the spring. All I thought of for weeks was leaving medicine and working as a shoe salesman. I never wanted to have to trust another person in business or work the extra hours and devote the time and energy involved in making work for others. I never wanted to talk to another contemptuous government agent or beg on behalf of another patient for services that had been promised. I wanted to get on my motorcycle and ride off into the sunset leaving everything and everyone.

Yet I didn't and it all got better. The sun rises after the darkest part of the night. I felt the same about my boat. So much cost and so much work and so much uncertainty. I would have sold it but there wasn't any market for a holy sailboat with a broken mast. I worried it was a metaphor for my life too. But then that was fixed.

And here I am today moored in Salt Spring Marina listening to the wind blowing in the rigging, white caps in the harbor, glad I chose to stay another day before returning to Vancouver. I almost left this morning, lifting the outboard from the dinghy and locking it at the stern, then putting the dinghy on the deck. VHF weather 3 said there'd 20 to 35 knot SE winds in the Strait of Georgia, if I left then I'd go through Active Pass on the turn, and yet. The autopilot isn't working. We were mucking with the hydraulic steering, the water cooling system has a leak, it's winter and cold, I've just put on the hydrovane again and haven't tested it. There's simply no rush. Tomorrow the low will have passed. 15 knot winds predicted from the south. I have the boat all stowed. I'll pay for another day. It's New Year's day. Relax already.

Looking back it was a series of challenges like any year. Each seems at first insurmountable and then somehow whatever that was falls behind and something else takes it's place. All a series of highs and lows like the weather. Sailing, is a great metaphor for life. It's a long haul. Motorcycling is just a metaphor for the short haul.

To paraphrase Mark Twain, most of the deaths and disasters I've know have been in my mind.

2010 is a new year. Last year we had President Obama and Prime Minister Harper. Bin Laden is still out there somewhere and for that we have more and more Security. The Cold War was lost to the the War on Drugs which has now lost to the War on Terrorism. What next? The real estate money crisis, the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, threats of new air borne virus while HIV is increasingly treatable, global warming and planetary pollution, the space station and color is back in fashion. Any year above the ground is a good year. This was a particularly good year.

2010 will be a good year too. The 2010 Winter Olympics are happening right here in February in Vancouver and Whistler. Vincent Massey is having its Winnipeg high school reunion this spring. There's always Sturgis in the summer for motorcyclists to dream about. IDAA is meeting in Buffalo this August and AA is having it's big convention in San Antonnio. I might even make it out to a Blue Water Cruising Association rally.

Mostly I'll be thankful if I'm alive, well, uninjured and will pray the Jabez prayer indeed. I think my Dad is terrific when he tells me in his 90's that he's heading for 100. I hope he makes it.

To all those who are friends, I do wish you a wonderful year of joy and peace. To those who consider me your enemy I wish you well and hope that I am more forgiving. I am very thankful to my teachers and mentors.

This 2010,I really do want to be a better person, a good friend, a fine doctor, a responsible citizen, a talented writer, a safe rider, a competent sailor, a straighter shooter, a caring family member, a good pet owner, considerate of my household plants and all round closer to God.