I wrote this a while ago, and then forgot to post it. Although I’ve since switched to commuting by train, I do occasionally carpool when I have errands I need to run. And meanwhile, the situation on the Bay’s busiest freeway remains the same…

I never get tired of watching the rush-hour drivers toiling in 3 lanes of traffic on 101.

Every day there is a sea of perplexedness, frustration and boredom stretching 40 miles, endless hands dangling out of their car windows or fingers drumming on the steering wheel.

I’ll admit, I’m a little smug, but then I’m habitually sitting on a bus or driving with a passenger and I’m in the relatively supersonic carpool lane. At least until I hit Redwood City.

Props to eyeteeth for reminding me of something appalling which I first saw about a month ago, and completely failed to muster the time/energy to write about.

The item in question is a Lexus advertising campaign, whose tagline is…

A Strong Want is a Justifiable Need

Part of the problem with writing about this is that it’s so utterly horrible that it defies rational thought. Paul at eyeteeth probably chooses the best path in offering a picture of the offending ad with only a title offering commentary.

But after a few minutes, I realised that I could probably have some fun with the idea, so I dashed off a letter to Lexus’s “General Requests” email line, as follows…

So after the extensive preamble of the last 3 posts we get to the heart of the matter – my actual plan for experimenting with a meat-free lifestyle.

At the centre of this plan is my “Meat List” – quite simply a list of all the meat-based dishes that I really like; the things I might miss if I turn my back on a carnivorous lifestyle forever.

Bloody hippies.

That might seem like a strange sentiment given the content of this blog so far but here’s the thing: I’m not really a hippy; probably more of a pragmatic idealist. I know how I’d like the world to be, but I understand that it’s unlikely and I prefer focussing on what I can do right here and right now, rather than on the general state of humanity.

The problem with your real “I’m a world-changer me” nutters is that they pursue their beliefs about wrong and right with an almost religious fervour, thrusting leaflets into your face at Muni entrances and preaching every-which-where about the dangers of capitalism.

“Could you become a vegetarian?”

It’s a topic of conversation which has come up with friends from time to time over the years, especially, say, in the middle of a steak dinner. And my answer has always been “no”, followed by various reasons (not quite excuses, but close) for that being the case.

But I’ve been examining some of those reasons recently.

It’s been a recurring theme for me this year that 90% of the meat I eat is horrible, horrible crap.

Factory farmed, treated with anti-biotics and growth hormones, it’s not even really meat. And when it’s added to a pasta sauce or risotto, made up into a stew, minced into flash-fried burgers  or roughly cubed and wrapped in tortillas, it becomes little more than “generic protein” – something to bulk up a meal without adding anything much in the way of flavour and texture.

So, although I’ve made the decision to get rid of the car, I’m still flip-flopping wildly between the sensible, grown-up conclusion that it’s the right thing to do and, well, the child in me who loves driving the Jeep. The adult must prevail, though, so I’m continuing to push ahead on investigating the car-free lifestyle.

Perhaps the biggest problem to solve – how to get hold of provisions.

The people who founded the city of San Francisco must have been insane.

“Hey, where shall we start up a new city, then?”

“How about up here on these really steep, hard to build on hills? In an earthquake zone.”

“Hey, it’s really foggy up here too. Awesome idea. “

This is going to seem a bit off-topic for now but bear with me and I’m sure everything will mesh into a coherent whole eventually. In a few posts’ time. If I remember to write them.

I want to talk briefly about sustainability because it’s one of the motivations behind my “leave the car behind and live in the city” plans. Excuse the apparently irrelevant opening example.

I love San Pellegrino sparkling water. I know, every time I open a bottle of the stuff, that I’m essentially being suckered by slick marketing – chubby, friendly bottles with their sophisticated light blue labels. Neverthless, I have a fondness for the stuff for a couple of reasons.

There’s a flipside to my decision to move to SF, a sacrifice which I don’t absolutely have to make, but probably should.

That sacrifice is my car.

I fell in love with her, and for some reason coined the name “Betsie”, the instant I saw her on the lot almost exactly a week after I landed in San Francisco. I’ve always had a thing for Jeep Wranglers – they just look so effortlessly confident and yet somehow quaint… almost cute.

And given that I’d moved here to experience America, what better way than in an all-American car?