the good old days

Until we do manage to achieve the miracle of world peace, I’m grateful for my family and friends who’ve given their time and lives to protect us.

One out of every 10 people in America is employed in a service that is related to the U.S. auto industry.

That’s a statistic from the Center for Automotive Research, via GM Facts and Fiction. It’s actually plausible; there are factories around the nation, not just in Detroit, that are somehow related to putting a car together. (I will note, though, it’s not clear how many of those sub-suppliers also work for Honda, Toyota, BMW, or “foreign” companies with US operations.)

The “Big Three” will never simply vanish — they (and the extended support structure of dealerships, suppliers, mechanics, etc.) are simply too large and too integral to the country’s manufacturing landscape. The job loss, health care loss, and tax income loss would be spread over the course of a few years. And it’s also worth noting that, to a large extent, the American Auto Maker crisis is largely of its own making; the recession is simply pinching them harder and sooner than expected.

I’m not against bailing out the auto industry, because the ripple effect around the country would be incredibly bad. At the same time, I haven’t decided if I’m in favor enough to write to my elected officials about it. (Yes, Visteon, when you fire loyal employees, they’ll hold a grudge and not help YOU out when the time comes. Payback’s a bitch, ain’t it.) But I am in favor, just enough, to mention it here. The issue is worth awareness and discussion and thought. And perhaps a large dose of nervous worrying as well.

If it is decided that they deserve a second chance, then the automakers need to be held to a much higher standard than they currently are. It would be inspiring to see them remade into an industry that is a leader in sustainable design and manufacturing, rather than grudgingly hoping global warming is a passing fad. But given the firmly entrenched old-style industry and infrastructure they have, I’m not holding out much hope.

The Etiquette Hell site is an interesting source for anyone who’s been involved in a wedding — as a spouse, as an attendant, as a parent, or even just as a guest. My particular favorite is the “bridezilla” stories, in which once reasonable women transform into raging bitches in their quest for one perfect day. And perfection must be achieved at all costs — financial, emotional, and personal.

But have you ever wondered what happens to those wedding-day-obsessed brides when the wedding day is over and they have to adjust to the real world once more? Thanks to Love Diary #16, we can find out…

Apparently, Crazy Bride doesn’t go away, it just transforms into Man-Hating Shrew (who luckily can be transformed yet again into Docile Damsel, just add water).

I have to sympathize with the bride, though. The whole episode is probably brought on by her simmering resentment of the groom’s insistence on having his hair dyed green for the ceremony.

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Some of the advice is good, like “wash and peel fruits and vegetables that were exposed to fallout.” Some is a bit more questionable, like piling hay around your barn to protect your livestock. All of it is amusing, though.

I’d love to get my hands on a copy of some of those brochures, particularly “Your Livestock Can Survive FALLOUT.” I doubt they’re terribly common, though…

The ever-interesting blog Modern Mechanix recently transcribed the 1932 article How Much Longer Will Our Big Cities Last?

One part I found amusing was the idea that cities would have lots of small planes flying its workers in and out every day. Instead of lots of commuter planes, America instead turned to even more plentiful (and probably more sensible!) commuter automobiles. Turned with quite a vengeance — the next time you’re on a ten-lane highway around a large (or even medium) city, stuck in a traffic jam during rush hour, do a little bit of math to try and guess just how many cars are in gridlock with you. Then, imagine they’re all airplanes. Then, picture “air rage.”

But the most interesting part of the Modern Mechanix article was the doom-filled predictions which completely failed to come true. There’s plenty of infrastructure problems which continue to plague cities. This morning I was listening to the woes of the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board as they struggle to maintain a century-old system which is regularly rusting and breaking (but manages to outperform FEMA’s expectations nonetheless). They’re apparently half a billion dollars in debt, and since they’re not selling as much water as they used to (less residents in the city), the number is not likely to get better soon. When I lived in Boston, tales of more than two hundred year old lead pipes and wood pipes was easily enough to make me buy a water filter (and pray a lot).

Every day the city dweller reads headlines of minor disasters resulting from defects in the complex supply system…. Gas mains explode, blotting out lives and sometimes asphyxiating hundreds. Water pipes burst and flood whole blocks, effecting a serious interruption of traffic….

However gloomy a picture these catastrophes may present, engineers believe that the scene will be far more dismal twenty or thirty years from now. The network of gas and water pipes, power supply and telephone lines, and the subway tunnels and vaults … are still comparatively young and substantial. When they begin to age and weaken from fatigue, however, disasters will be blazed across the headlines far more frequently than they are at present.

Sub-standard water infrastructure is just one example of cities crumbling around their residents. The recent I-35 bridge collapse is a far more serious one. But if all this didn’t make people emigrate from urban areas in 1930, why should it do so now? Cities have been around since just after the dawn of civilization, and they’ll be around until it ends. Stuart Chase (the author on whose theories the article is apparently based) was just yet another doom-sayer whose prophecies of widespread death and destruction never came to pass.