Chemical Cocktail
Creativity gurus have suggested a number of ways of cleaning up oil pollution. Observing the absorbent qualities of seabirds during oil spills, some have advocated the mass captive breeding of flightless puffins for dumping at sea in the event of a future mass release of oil. Such lateral thinking is going to be essential in counteracting the environmental impact of future oil pollution, particularly if world leaders continue to rely on the burning of fossil fuels as an excuse to fight each other.
Ironically, ecologists forecast an explosion in the puffin population due to over-fishing of cod. It's a simple food chain reaction: we eat all the cod, the cod no longer eat all the sand eel, the sand eel population grows along with the seabird population that also feed on them. Perhaps we should actively encourage sea disposal of oil to keep those freakishly psychedelic beaked puffins in check.
Litter is another problem. Some people say that litter adds some much needed colour to the coastline. Darwin's theory of evolution is fast catching up with them, and following a few hundred years of beer and saturated fat ingestion, their genes will be more historical than bell-bottoms.
From my own beach experience litter includes supermarket trolleys, plastic drums, miscellaneous fishermen's gear, children's broken plastic toys, a single weathered leather sandal (which has proven to be surprisingly comfortable), and an occasional dead sheep (although the sheep might have stumbled off a cliff in a live state originally, possibly trying to get a better view of the strikingly colourful tide line).
In case you are from foreign parts, I should explain that a sheep is an animal not unlike a small woolly white bison, with a slightly neurotic yet mocking call. This detailed and scientifically flawed research has led to some startling conclusions:
In the UK they believe in the truth and freedom of information, so the government publishes a mountain of facts, figures, data, interpretative analysis, and fiendishly complex "sector guidance notes". After all, to paraphrase a well known saying - "the defecated digested product of the male Zebu baffles the cranial neural mass of the Homo Sapien, so that potentially only 1% of the population could possibly interpret the vast tract of publicly available information meaningfully."
Government actuarists (accountants that have gained a certificate of advanced devilry) have calculated that there is a 92.935%* chance that an environmentally concerned individual would have no energy left to complain, having done so.
This leads to approximately one complaint a year, which is filed in a subterranean lead-lined concrete bunker with a single rusted padlock entrance, guarded by genetically modified evil clones of Laird Hamilton.
Perhaps the question we should be asking is why we continue to be reliant upon oil and environmentally toxic chemicals rather than developing environmentally acceptable alternatives?
You may have heard of the Precautionary Principle. The Precautionary Principle is based on the logic that one doesn't do something (say for example chucking noxious stuff into the sea) until the science says its ok to do it. Unfortunately for our environment, the precautionary principle has been mis-interpreted by politicians as continue to chuck the nasty crap into the sea until the accountants says it's commercially ok to go for the environmentally friendly alternative.
So, on the basis of both interpretations of the Precautionary Principle, perhaps its time to tweak the politicians' noses, and give their wrists a collective 'chinese burn', before the neoprene melts on our backs and the Astrovirus attacks. Who knows, 'SAS' and the 'Surfrider Foundation' might just be right.
The views expressed in this article are not representative of the ´óÏó´«Ã½, its employees, or acquaintances, neither are they the express views of the author but merely the result of a series of random electrical impulses stimulating the writer's limited neurology in response to transient visual images under the influence of caffeine and prolonged mild exposure to chemically contaminated sea water. No reference to persons living or dead is implied nor should be inferred, apart form the reference to Laird Hamilton, who is a Laird Hamilton and not Laird Hamilton the surfer, who just happens to have the same name.
Footnote about % :
Recently discovered classified guidance from the Worshipful Society of Actuarists states that the more uncertain a statistic is, the more decimal points should be utilized in its publication, hence giving it the appearance of absolute accuracy and consequently a lesser likelihood of it being challenged by the public. The statistic given in this article of 92.935% is clearly and gratuitously fabricated, possibly confirming the validity of the existence of this clandestine tactic. All other facts, figures, data, and miscellaneous snippets of information quoted herein are entirely "true".
Bibliography and Information Sources:
http://www.epa.gov/
http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/
http://www.surfrider.org/
http://www.sas.org.uk/
http://www.mcsuk.org/
What Exactly Are Puffins Good For? David Jeremiah Oakes - Unpublished 2005.
