Smug Alert!
 

http://fox.org/~vince/out/sphy.jpg
Thaaaaaanks!

"I'm averaging thirty five miles per gallon right now."
"Uh, that's nice."
"This car really cuts down on pollution, lowest emissions in its class! I love it."
"Uh-huh. Wow, say, did you ever notice how much downtown has changed?"
"See? The 'needs gas' light just came on, but the computer says I still have 80 miles left on this tank! Isn't that awesome?"
"Yeah."
"I really wish more people would embrace solar power with all the recent innovations in the technology..."

Shit! I really didn't think it was possible that the South Park stereotype actually existed in the wild, but last night I found myself having to endure a one hour lecture on the wonders of hybrid cars and how the driver was doing more than anyone else on the road around him to save the planet. What would have normally have been a pleasant conversation had turned into an in-depth analysis of the car's fuel computer that was interrupted every five minutes by the in-dash GPS unit reminding us to continue driving forward and not make any turns, lest we be tempted to run the car into the guard rail.

"I thought you knew where you were going?"
"Oh, I do, but I have the address programmed in and the navigation turned on in case there is an accident. Hey, it says I'm getting better mileage now that the engine is only running on three cylinders instead of all six!"

Red lights were treated with great caution: Not too much gas, not a lot of acceleration. Take it slow and keep your eyes on the computer. Lane changes gave the feeling of riding in a semi passing with modest speed, creeping by and catching as much of a wind break as possible. Gotta get the most per gallon, gotta save the world! Why wasn't he driving normally, anymore? This wasn't like him.

On the interstate, the doors were locked, but I still considered throwing myself out of the car to escape as it whisked down the road at seventy miles per hour. Despite being fairly "green", myself, I was annoyed to such extremes that I developed a sudden desire to trade my car in for a steam powered automobile from 1896 just so I could shovel burning coal and throw a thick, black cloud into the atmosphere out of spite. This person, this is my good friend! Six months ago, there was little to no talk at all of CO2 emissions, but I now find myself cornered on a regular basis and branded as a detriment to mankind because I drive a four cylinder car that only gets 32mph on the highway. Working out the math of energy required to produce a new hybrid and sell my current car didn't sway him, either. It seems that saving energy and reducing pollution by continuing to drive my current, six year old car for another 100,000 miles wasn't enough -- I was assured I would be doing everyone a favor by switching right now.

I couldn't believe how different it was, interacting with him. Just like the South Park episode, it was as though he'd taken on a new religion in a mere six months and now has the goal of recruiting as many others as he possibly can. Maybe I really should drive the extra sixteen miles to the Wild Oats store instead of Publix so I can buy environmentally friendly food, fossil fuel emissions be damned! Perhaps I really do need to buy a three bedroom house instead of continuing to live in a one bedroom apartment so that I could affix solar panels to the roof and harness the power of the sun. Maybe I've been wrong all along and being environmentally friendly really is about spending more money and purchasing lots of products designed to help and not about keeping things simple.

Dammit, Honda. I'm not blaming you for this one, but I'm getting really creeped out by what you've helped do to my friend of ten years. Are all you hybrid owners really like this? Why don't you simply own a car to drive instead of making such a big deal out of it? You're making me not want that Prius, anymore!

I hear they're a lot of fun to be behind in the HOV lane they've recently been given access to in some states.

Could be worse...your friend could be vegan now too. Just tell him he's not really green until he pops for one of these.

give them some pickled eggs. those farts will render even the most smug weepy.

I've been looking for that picture. woot!

Kitsune, you should send that to the letters to the editor of one of the indy newspapers in my town. I'd love to see the smug-gasm that would result.

To be fair, though, mightn't your friend just be reacting in typical guy fashion about a new toy with lots of gadgets? Maybe he's not otherwise tainted by environmentalism.

I'm kind of happy with my 17 mpg light truck. Oh sure, I pay through the nose for gas, but if you ever need to move fifty guitars into a 15 foot storage space in one day, I'll be the person you call. And I'm glad to help out the non-smug.

http://cellar.org/2006/50guitars.jpg

I'm fairly certain that's what it is, as his commute is about three or four miles of level highway. That's fifty miles per hour of little to no traffic and three stop lights worth of pause, hardly enough of a trip to even utilize the other half of the hybrid. His girlfriend, on the other hand, gets to drive the standard gasoline engine car through a commute that takes her through 1 to 1.5 hours worth of stop-and-go traffic across 45 miles of road. Switching cars is an option, but it never happens for some reason. Other suggestions that have been dismissed include "bicycle to work on cool days", and "carpool with others that live in your neighborood". For some reason, even though we took classes together and live within a half mile of each other, it never struck him to carpool. Instead, I frequently saw him driving across campus from one building to the next: a total of less than a mile by road and substancially less in walking distance.

The people that argue over computer hardware, operating systems, or any kind of brand loyalty usually irritate me, but this bizarre "I'm better than others and more people should be like me" stance based on vehicle preference disguised as environmental kindness is actually creepy.

Trust me, I've heard plenty about this vehicle, already. The excitment in it was not tarnished by my note that the vehicle would effectively be powered by the freaking coal plant two cities away which has only recently been upgraded with select EPA requirements.

Hey, maybe my dream of having a coal powered car is a possibility after all!

ahem...only a hundred years ago:)

edit: OK, OK, so it wasn't coal powered, but with coal gasification...

Hey UT, wasn't there a discussion at some point about where local electricity comes from?

I'll have to find it, but read a recent study that showed an H3 actually uses less energy per-mile than a hybrid.

Well, here the power comes from Limerick; coal emissions aren't a problem...:-)

http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/apr2...8_limerick.jpg

(...makes note of who to call for trucking help when she's already used up good old susanc, who has a truck these days too, by the way:)

My juice comes from this place -- pure coal. Rarely, the wind blows from the south, but when it does, the sky turns an uneasy brown. It is a shame they only blow the stacks at night. If they did it during the day, people would have a better understanding of what Big Bend dumps into the air.

http://static.flickr.com/16/22690306_cc6f3e8535.jpg
http://static.flickr.com/16/21960390_387a8ea8dd.jpg

The practical result of the tw discussion about my local power, which annoyed 99% of readers and amused tw and myself, determined that we could not accurately determine whether the local juice comes from Limerick or Cromby, but Cromby is much closer to us.

Interesting...so *that's* what that plant is.

Still can only pump 30 megawatts, while each of the two units at Limerick can do 1,200 megawatts...that's quite a differential.

But the electrons don't care...and "closer" as the crow flies may not be the same as "closer" gridwise.

A *true* hybrid car would have both a flux capacitor and an oscillation overthruster, though.

we should be investing money on genetic modification and giving the human population genes that cause wings to grow. we could wipe out the need for any transport fuel costs, allowing for space travel to be much cheaper

Speaking of smug and vegan, Cat and Girl have touched on the subject...http://catandgirl.com/archive/cg0333donner.gif

All of the moral superiority, none of the soy. :lol2:

I avoid the guy a work with the diesel VW beetle that has a sign on the back saying it gets 50 miles per gallon.

I would too - that's a cheapskate, not an environmentalist......

Flights of Fancy
 

Mmmmmm....... I see a world where all men fly free, carried aloft by the sweat of their brow and the steady beat of their wings.....

..... and plucking their harps madly at the boy-racers with their baked-bean-fuelled turbo-jets and big exhausts....

You are a pervert. Think we can't read between the lines you sick-o?:eek:

Plus, it would be just one more damn thing to accessorize.

I don't just want "green" energy. I want Soilent Green energy!

I assure you that was Honda's intention all along.

But if you're interested in one of these, I'm sure they would be happy to find one that suits you.

We could extend the genetic modification program to include gas production as well as wing growth, then the boy-racers would have the jet power option.........

mmmm.... that reminds me... i feel quite peckish.... must eat....

I love this site.... it's so vast the echo's reverberate forever.....

BTW... what happenned to that old tag-line.... y'know the one,

putting the b in subtle...

And a Mr. Fusion. "If you're going to build a time machine, why not one with a little style?"