my food site is weber_cam

August 11, 2007

Mine's smaller

I saw a Mini Cooper today with a plate that said "NOT SUV".

It's easy to dislike people for their preferences; I'm guilty at times too, but working on it. This guy (or girl) has a Mini Cooper (mileage estimated at 40 on the high end). Hate to break it to this person, but the Hummer H3 has a mileage rating of 20. So the cars differ by a nominal factor of 2. Hummer owners are easy to hate. But, what if they only commute 5 miles to work, push a manual mower, skip A/C in the Summer, dress in 10 layers in the winter and this H3 is his luxury, his place to spend his carbon. It's possible the carbon footprint of the Hummer owner is tiny compared to the Mini owner who commutes 20 miles to work, uses A/C, heats to 75-deg-F in Winter and skips recycling. Same for the holier-than-thou (see, I'm doing it too) Prius crowd. Yeah, they embrace technology by paying homage to the Toyota profit margin and will embrace it again in 10 years when they have to kick in several thousand dollars for a new battery.

We shouldn't pass judgement on one little slice of a person's life until we know the big picture. I personally think a pedicab culture would solve a big chunk of the fossil fuel problem and obesity in one shot, but I secretly fantasize about owning a Ford F-250 4x4 with a lift kit - diesel.

I use a push mower and live 1.7 miles from work.

2 comments:

Big Momma said...

Ha! Definately the only time a man would brag about his being smaller!!

dusio said...

You have a great blog! I thank you for stopping by and posting a nice comment on my blog. I am keeping the faith.
As for the desire to have a big ole' truck, I am right there with you.