Plugging in and cleaning up

While unpacking in the Emerald City, I watched the documentary I toted to Michigan but didn't watch.

Who Killed the Electric Car? was decent, if predictable. The title pretty much says it all: the film attempts to figure out how and why the electric car didn't take off in the mid-1990s, despite there being electric vehicles on the market and despite California adopting alternative-energy regulations. The movie's answer to its own question is also fairly obvious: oil companies are the root of all evil.

The cool part was that one of the alternative energy pioneers, Stan Ovshinsky, was someone whose innovative business projects I had to research during my assistantship last semester.

As I was unpacking and listening to the documentary, I discovered the extent to which La Madre has taken over my old room, and I have personally tossed 19 scarves, 9 pairs of gloves, and 13 pairs of her shoes out of my reclaimed space and into storage or giveaway piles...

I think being a packrat is hereditary! Well okay, not really... I think the behaviors are more subtly learned and ingrained. When my grandmother passed away four years ago, it took months to go through her three rooms of clothes, shoes, and jewelry. Imelda jokes aside, La Madre has about three times as many clothes and shoes as me, and I have a hell of a lot!