I’m a little behind in writing about the news but I’m trying to catch up and flex my writing muscles and use my mind again so today I write about the idiocy in Oregon.

While driving to the hospital this week we heard a news story on KYW. In Portland, Oregon authorities caught a young man urinating in the reservoir. The reservoir held 8 million gallons of water. In what can only be described as an epic overreaction the city drained the 8 million gallon reservoir. Stunning, just stunning.

I’ve been staying at my parents’ house during the day while undergoing my radiation treatments so I have lots of time to watch the TV news. Every day I watch reports about record droughts and wildfires in Texas and Arizona and Florida. I saw ranchers selling off cattle in the hopes that they wouldn’t die before they could be sold. Last I heard 42 square miles of land has burned in Arizona. I can’t help but think of all the good that 8 million gallons of supposedly contaminated water would have done for those who so desperately need it.

Alright. Fine. If the powers that be really felt that the urine posed that much of a danger to the residents of Oregon, (I’m all for safe drinking water) but what if they’d have stopped for a minute and thought, where can this water do the most good? What if instead of an idiotic knee-jerk reaction the authorities in Oregon called those states stricken with drought and said, “We have 8 million gallons of water that some fool peed in. We’re going to flush it all away. Can we help irrigate your fields or water your cattle/horses or put out your fires? I’m willing to bet there would have been tanker trucks on the road in an hour headed directly to Portland.

Such foolish waste. it’s examples like this that make it all to easy to understand why the world is running out of fossil fuels.