1102 Salty People, River, Roads, Etc.

Thursday, February 01, 2007

Scott Adams wrote in The Dilbert Blog about people who react passionately in blog comments to things he writes, his "favorite" being a particular person who "made it a personal mission to misunderstand me and then get very angry about his misunderstandings." (Oooo, I like that....)

Oh, my, yes. I've known a few of them. They are incapable of the "grain of salt", or of asking "what did you mean by...." They interpret everything literally, misunderstand statement or purpose, take everything personally, react in anger, pick things apart, and make personal attacks. They see insult and attack where there is none meant. Then they won't let it go, and return to snipe again and again, until they really are getting insults.

I've never understood why they get so angry. Really, who cares? Ask for clarification, or let it go. Walk away, you'll live longer.

I still remember one coworker who was like that. There was an email argument going on over some technical point, and it got way past the initial issue that still needed resolution. So I sent an email to all the parties, asking that we please drop the side issues and get back to the question. In my usual "Dear Folks" way, I started out with (and I remember this exactly), "Hey, c'mon guys, let's bring this back to ..." blah blah. "C'mon" as in "Hey, come on". Isn't that how you took it?

One guy forwarded my note to the entire world, up and down the management line, demanding a public apology from me for calling him and others in the discussion "common", as opposed to what I must see as my "self-defined exalted position". He went on for three screens about how by looking down on him as "common", I had insulted his intelligence, his job title, and those of everyone else on the distribution list. (By the way, none of those coworkers knew I was in Mensa.)

Some people laughed at him. Others snubbed and sneered at me. It still burns. It's the reason I mostly don't blog about topics that might generate controversy. There are still people out there like him, and I don't want to attract their attention, because there's no way to respond to them.

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A quick trip to the store to buy two queen and two flat sheets ended up costing six hours, four 22-mile round trips, one of which was a $90 taxi ride, and produced no sheets. But it was an opportunity to examine the roads.

Environmental groups are all het up because the salt line is moving north up the Hudson River. The river is tidal. A certain amount of sea water comes upriver at high tide. At one time, I guess, salt reached only as far up as West Point. Now, the river is showing definite salt at Poughkeepsie and higher (I may have these levels wrong, but that doesn't really matter for this post) and the salt line is moving steadily north.

Some watchdogs are blaming the moving salt line on sea-going tankers and cargo ships. They claim that as the ships move up the river, they dump their seawater ballast, and take on the river's fresh water, which they then later sell to freshwater-starved sea islands. They are very indignant that the shipping companies are "stealing" and carelessly salting our water, and changing the character of the river.

There have been laws passed making it illegal for ships to dump seawater in the river. (There are several good reasons for this, like various beasties that could "escape" and upset the balance, but the main reason given was the salt.)

Baloney. I don't believe, even if every ship that came up the river was dumping, I don't believe they could dump enough to cause the jump in the salt line. There IS a current, you know.

I am surprised that no one has mentioned the salt on the roads. Salt dumped on the roads will be washed away by melt and rains, and almost all surface water ends up eventually in the river. That's how it works.

So far this winter, in the vicinity of my home, we've had one ice storm, but it didn't affect the roads. There have been maybe two or three overnight snow showers which deposited a slight dusting (not enough to hide the grass) which remains in heavily shaded spots, but which was blown off the roads as it fell, by passing traffic.

And yet, the roads around here are so heavily salt covered that it actually, literally, looks like snow on the roads.

Howcum nobody sees a connection? How long before our wells go salty? The highway department would love to chop down every tree within 100 feet of every road, but they can't get away with that. Is this a conspiracy to slowly kill every tree bordering the roads? Is that why they've dumped a normal three-month quota of salt even though there's been no reason to do so?

Every year I get more paranoid about it.
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