Written by Here is a summary of days one to ten of my Carbon Neutral Strike where at least one thing I do per day avoids needless oil, gas or plastic and I record the findings I have about that process.
You’re also free to try it on Fastfrwrd.info. Thanks a lot, this is Aleya Jobson and the music featured in these episodes is also from me.
And: Dear Solarpunks, thanks for having me here, I hope you enjoy or think or feel something. Let me know.
Day 1: I really wasn’t prepared to go back on my carbon neutral strike already. I was of the mindset that I would do something for Earth Day, I didn’t know what but it came down to the wire and the only thing that made sense was to recommence the strike, and have it start on Earth Day.
So. Today is Earth Day, Day 1 of my proper Carbon Neutral Challenge.
I just walked down to get weed and I got a lot in two different bags. I also bought papers for smoking and I also got a lighter.
At first I wasn’t sure how I would smoke, I visited the weed dispensary near me and they have an electric refillable smoking thing but it costs about $10,000 JMD (Jamaican dollars), a little bit less than $100 USD. And so I can’t afford it but that’s my out, that’s my end goal.
I said I’m not gonna suffer for this. So if it ever gets to a point where it feels like I have to sacrifice everything to continue on the path, I’m not gonna do that. Because I am a small person, [clears throat, sounding a bit like a ‘No’] in theory. I’ve got a big belly but in theory a small person in theory, right? And as a small person, it is not my responsibility to save the world, I just have to be responsible to myself. And if I have a craving for a smoke, I’m not gonna go without weed. [Laughs nervously]
And it sounds like a small thing. Sounds like a small excuse for a thing but I have already done the Carbon Neutral Challenge before and that time I didn’t smoke. And, lemme tell you, everytime I stop smoking, whenever I’m off meds, that’s when things go bad.
You’d think it’s because I’m smoking and I’m off my meds and that’s why things go bad, no! It’s when I’m off my meds and I stop smoking, those things need to go together for me to get out of control, or very… I don’t want to call it out of control. It’s more that I have no distractions and then, since I have the information of what’s happening to the planet, and no distractions, I start to go barmy. And, I’m just not… I’m not doing that.
I can’t afford to do it for one, I have work, I have a job now, I have obligations, I can’t afford to spin out.
So the weed thing was a dilemma at first, I wasn’t sure what to do but then I said ‘Remember, no suffering’ so the answer came through, do what you want to do, just make sure you make the best choice you have available when you do the thing. [All smoking materials aside from the lighter are local produce (tobacco, weed) or a local company (paper)]
That’s where I’m at right now. Yeah. On the way back from shopping I got some mangoes from a neighbour. They have a mango tree and I asked: ‘Hey, is anything ripe?’ And they were like ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah.’
Mangoes go well with weed so that’s also good. But I’ll eventually have to figure out food properly but for today, I’m just gonna have a bunch of mangoes. I’m not gonna stress.
Still, free food, Carbon Neutral, directly local, it’s right next to my house. Got it from the tree fresh.
I have commited a few sins today. So does it sound like I’ve failed? I don’t think so because Carbon Neutral can be done several ways, and in this world where we are at right now, we have to do it several ways because we are not, we don’t have the infrastructure for Carbon Neutrality. So you have to do your best.
Day 2: Last night was fine actually. Last night was super fine. I know how to do this, I’ve done it before. So all I did, I didn’t turn on any lights last night, I had my phone flashlight on, because I have already compensated the use of my phone to make sure that the emissions I have from my phone usage for 8 hours a day is covered by the trees I planted through Trees.org
So yeah. I had my flashlight on and I did things with my flashlight and it was perfectly fine, it was perfectly fine. Spent most of my time lounging on the verandah.
I’m gonna go downtown to the market to see if I buy anything that I wanna eat.
I have a limited budget and also limited cargo space so I can’t stockpile stuff.
So I got a life from a taxi driver to go down the road [they were already driving that way]. So carpooling.
I’ve realised that I can make plastic bricks and the bus stops that I see around the place don’t have seats so it’s already starting in my imagination that we can make seats and benches at bus stops.
So, [clears throat sounding like a ‘No’] the big theme is ‘No Suffering’, alright? No suffering, so in that vein, I’m gonna be eating raw. Ok. No problem, I’ve done that before, I can do it again. But I’m also gonna consume dry goods from the supermarket and those kind of things. I’ll just do everything that can be eaten raw without gas, but if it has plastic, what I’m gonna do, I’m gonna take the packaging, stuff it into plastic bricks, and just make plastic bricks.
Alright. I feel better.
Day two, I took public transportation to go to work, my work involves AI. So AI is very emissions-intensive. My work is not as eco as it could be. It’s only text so it could be worse, it could be generating images all the time and videos and that would be even worse. But it’s fine enough for now. [Clears throat sounding like a ‘No’]. I guess, my inner instinct is that it’s a compromise that I’m making. But I said it. The beast demands sacrifice. You either have to compromise your values, or suffer outside the system. [A false binary and dichotomy, there are always more than 2 choices] Day 2, Carbon Neutral Challenge, complete.
[Transition music like a bell]
Day 3: I’ve learned that plastic bricks, for them to be sturdy require sand. Sand is a resource that is not… that is in demand. So it’s not gonna be cheap so my plan is not as simple and straight-forward as I thought. So what I think I will do, is I’ll add trash in each bottle, I’m just thinking of this now, I had the dilemma the whole day, yesterday and whenever and I just now figured it out. Gonna fill the bottles halfway with plastic wrapping trash. Then leave room, don’t stamp them down, not gonna stamp them down. Don’t stamp them down and leave room for sand and then when the time comes, and say for example we’re building benches at the bus stops in Jamaica, in Kingston and elsewhere, why not, if we’re doing that with our plastic bricks, then we can get it done with the sand and everything, just pump the sand into the other half of the bottle, swirl it up and pack it down. And I think that can work!
So, yeah. Optimistic day. Nice day. I had a bad day at work but neither here nor there. I’ll get better and it’ll be fine.
So, like I said, I have a corporate sponsorship that I can try to get in exchange for services rendered in future. And I want to pursue that. But right now, I’m having a difficult time coming up with a small budget proposal of what to do with this potential injection of capital from a partner.
[Transition music]
Day 4: So about today. I had some pineapple, bought some fresh pineapple slices, and I think that’s mostly what I ate for today, I was not hungry again, I just had a mango. The fridge is still in use. I have to admit that, the fridge is still in use and needs to be compensated. The fridge is still in use because I don’t want the fridge to go bad, it’s not my fridge. I can’t have it empty and mildewy and sweaty or musty or anything like that so I have to keep it running.
[Transition music]
Day 5: Today was fine.
[Transition music]
Day 6: So I wrote down something, I’m trying to make it more accessible, what I’m doing. So I’m going to read and… what I write, I’m gonna write what my day is like and then read it.
So food. People are bound by this shared understanding and so is all life on the planet, energy consuming energy. We are different yes. But at the base of things we rely on food and energy consumption three times daily. This shared reality then provides a common ground upon which to understand one another. You want food, we want food. It is fuel for the human machine. Energy consumes and transmutes energy. So we understand a lot about each other already there.
Because of my work on “The Stellar” I associate the number 6 with the devil. I’ve seen 666 twice now, one as an employee ID, second time my inbox. What’s the third?
[Transition music]
Day 7: was pretty good, I did well at work and now I am doing well at home.
[Transition music]
Day 8: For today’s challenge i had a tomato and veganaise sandwich, pistachios, a cranberry water because i forgot my water bottle. Having some wine now. I’m not enjoying it per se but hopefully it will produce an effect. I also had cereal (knockoff captain crunch) with soy milk.
[Transition music]
Day 9: Potato chips, grapes, tomato veganaise sandwich, wine, a cereal bar, cereal, blueberry bagel with Nutella, bag juice, might have some mango juice later tonight or make a salad. Don’t know yet.
[Transition music]
Day 10: I had a big salad with lettuce and tomato from the market and corn, walnuts, grapes and chia seeds. It was nice.
I used regular vinegar and vegetable oil with veganaise whipped together for the dressing.
Thanks for listening to my Carbon Neutral Strike updates!