Overheard on the tennis court. A couple packing their bags getting ready to leave, both of them clearly uncomfortable.
She: You just have to focus on what he told you to practice.
He: But, baby, you know I can’t return your serves.
I certainly have. Today I started reading a book I should have finished at least a decade ago. The kind of book that goes with guitars, long hair and a curious mix of late-teen wanderlust and adolescent weltschmertz. And this special book contained a quote that I really like, or at least the original typescript did:
[…] I shambled after as usual as I’ve been doing all my life after people that interest me, because the only people that interest me are the mad ones, the ones that never yearn or say a commonplace thing … but burn, burn, burn, burn like roman candles across the night.
Jack Kerouac, On the Road
Naive bordering tacky, yes - but there you have it.
London has been turned into a gigantic sociological laboratory over the past couple of days: a 48-hour Tube strike went ahead as planned.
Like power cuts, heavy snow fall and other mega-disruptions, the strike has created new forms of community and something for everyone to talk about without really saying a thing (’it’s bad, innit?’). On the other hand, it has drawn up the lines even further between some of those groupings who already thought very little of each other.
Rush hour traffic in London, especially on the main commuter routes, was always a prime example of urban guerilla warfare. It is literally a cyclical war between cyclists and motorists, with pedestrians caught up as innocent victims somewhere in between (tourists are fair game, though). Such is the tense atmosphere and entrenched hatred that the Taleban should probably consider embarking on a daily recruitment spree to hit their ambitious targets.
From a bike perspective, what used to be a matter of struggling with light artillery (scooters), snipers (electric vehicles) and the odd gunship (bendy buses) is now a full-on nuclear disaster. Negotiating Kensington High Street in strike mode - i.e. normal congestion x 2.5 - at 8am is comparable to wearing a pink ballerina skirt while attempting to tiptoe through a phalanx of black cabs. If we could only harvest the bad karma and turn it into electricity, there would be no need for fossil fuels.
There are a number of lessons to be learned:
a) All black cab drivers are idiots. Fact.
b) All black cab drivers are idiots. Fact.
c) London needs more cycle paths (which would have the added benefit of eliminating the widespread tendency for cyclists to routinely dress up as sweded(!) storm troopers).
This blog is not - and should not be - about my job. However, amidst the seemingly never ending flow of bad news and generally depressing business atmosphere here in London, we are about to launch a report with some positive findings. I think that is worth sharing.
The Carbon Salary Survey is the first attempt to map the landscape of the emerging profession of carbon professionals, i.e. people working in renewables, energy consulting, carbon trading, etc. - in short, ‘green collar’ workers. The survey suggests that:
-68 pct of green workers feel same or more job security
-Over three quarters of those surveyed said they were satisfied with their jobs
-93 percent said they would recommend a career in the environmental sector to others
Despite the recent slow-down in green venture capital available, passion is undoubtedly the human capital (sustainable) futures are made of.
Not quite ready yet, the preliminary findings have been picked up widely:
New York Times: Green Workers Feel Safe Among Slum
The Guardian: Earning Green Workers Feel Safe in Jobs