Selling My Soul

In order to work for Corporate America, I have to sell my soul.

The archetypal Devil appears before me (he always looks like a red, horned version of my father--is that weird?): His goatee splits into a wide grin.  His clawed hands hold a nefarious blue pen (I don't like black ink). His other hand holds a scroll, which he unravels with a flourish.

"Sign here," he says to me. "if you DARE. . .bwah ha ha ha."

And I, like the little lost girl in just about every movie with a Devil in it, lean over and scrawl my name onto the parchment.

The ink flashes; it sears the parchment. when my eyes clear, I see my name has been burned into the document.

Manacles snake out from the floor. They close on my wrists, pull me down into a sitting position. They press my hands to a keyboard. Grey padded walls loom up around me. Industrial berber carpet slides in under my feet.  I scream: "No-o-o. . ."

Yeah, that's how it is.  I have a day job "greenwashing". Greenwashing is like whitewashing a business with an environmentally-friendly sheen, when the rest of the company works to turn valuable resources into products that you don't need that it can sell you. I find loopholes. I find ways that well-intentioned environmental rules should not apply to a company. I gather compliance information when we can't get out from under a regulation, but only after I have thought up every conceivable way it might not apply.

And I'm damn good at it.

I drive to work, either in our car or on the moped. I'm working on the electric bike so I can ride my bike to work, but right now the hills are too damn steep for me to ride up.

I buy clothes so I can look decent at my job.

I spend hours in front of the TV, trying not to wish my life away one workweek at a time.

Yes, I also work on this blog, and several others. I'm actively growing our new businesses. I'm actively working on our careers. But most of the time, I'm living a lie in the corporate world. I'm pretending that I want to get ahead in the rat race. I'm pretending I give a shit. I'm pretending it doesn't hurt to want to be proud of what I do, but being embarrassed by it instead. I'm pretending it doesn't rip my soul apart to be working against rules I actually believe in, to be surrounded by people who care about keeping up with the Jones' or the Kardashians or whomever else.

I'm pretending the fluorescent lights and computer screens don't exacerbate my migraines.

Now, before this goes too far into "woe is me", I'm grateful to have a job, and a well-paying one at that. I'm grateful that, if I don't get my children, I'll be able to start saving up this big ol' paycheck so we can get our land for our self-sustaining ranch/farm/hippie paradise. I'm grateful that they really like my lies. I'm grateful I'm not dependent on this company, like Chinese people often are; this company is not where I live. It can't make me a slave.

But there's something really disheartening about working against  your beliefs. I really feel like I'm selling my soul for a paycheck. If so, the paycheck is not nearly enough. Are you selling your soul?

Should I be building an Ark Instead of an Electric Bike?

We are currently having torrential rain. I've had to reassure my husband that this is 100-year flood-type weather, not normal Colorado weather.

It makes me wonder if we should be building an ark instead of an electric bike.

home-made (unsuccessful, sort of) foam and duct-tape boat.

Because of the weather, I took the moped today. Usually he'd take it, because he has further to go, but in inclement conditions, the exposure counts for more than the gasoline. It was a wet ride. The water stung, and I only get to about 40-45 mph.

The bike would be more comfortable, because it's slower. Of course, I also need to waterproof the electronics.

Hubby did a good job milling down the part we needed in order to replace the sprocket on the motor. I need to tighten it up, but it occurred to me that I can just run the thing and hold the nut and it'll torque itself on pretty well. Of course, that occurred to me at my 9-5, so I can't test this hypothesis until I get home.

Fun with Electronics

So the plan is to assemble the bike once it stops raining. It does me no good to short the connections (most of which are not covered, and will not be until I am sure everything is placed correctly).

And I am still trying to decide which frame and which wheels I will be using.

Fun with prototypes, right? I never claimed the road to Revolution was a straight or tidy one.

Revolting Project 0: Mo' money, Moped

It occurs to me that our very first "Buck the American Dream" project was purchasing a moped. It's a beauty, too. It gets about 85 miles/gallon, the insurance is like $100 a year, and the registration is next to nothing.

Hubby and I can ride it together, so our excursions are on the moped. So far the thing is saving us around $50/week on gas or more.  I'll have the numbers next month. That, by the way, is including the insurance cost and the cost for the registration. The gas savings pay for the whole thing in less than 4 months. And because we live in Colorado, where the skies are clear pretty much all the time, the precipitation is not much to worry about, meaning we can use the moped all year round.

Of course, our next one will have to be electric :-) and I'll rig up solar panels for it to re-charge during the day.

Do you have any super-energy-efficient tools/toys? Tell me about them!