Play written! / Economy Rant

Today turned out to be a pretty good day. I got on a roll with a play idea I started playing with at the start of the week and had a solid streak. I was able to finish up the first draft. I'm incredibly happy with how it winded up. It's a strange scenario but I think it's highly unique (at least I hope). I can't wait to play with the dialogue more and bring in a couple of actors in, do some readings of it to hear how it sounds.

I was a moody guy last night. It took me 1.5 hours to get home from Sugrila. It should have been a 45 min commute. We had some great Wood Sugars writing sessions and recorded a new podcast. We have whole new set up now, it's a lot like radio, so it's a blast to experiment with. But anyway. Took me a very long time to get home. Buses not running on schedule. Subway down to one track. Frustrating and cold out. I got pretty burned up inside thinking how CTA will not be improving anytime soon. After massive service cuts, old trains and tracks, unfinished construction projects and blossoming budget defecit, we are in for a butt pain of a time getting around Chicago for a long time to come. I got very depressed thinking about it, and when I finally got home I was absolutely exhausted from all of my bottle rage. I was even that guy muttering angrily to myself when the train stalled under ground for some time. Oy vei.

The transportation infrastructure of this nation in general, as we are well into the twenty first century and have the technology, is absolutely embarrassing. The basic economic structure of mankind at this point in time is regressive and will not contribute to forward progress. Particularly in energy, transportation, and medicine. It's beyond sad. Progress is held up because there is a price tag on everything: people, products, supplies, research, manpower. You need either capital or credit to get anything done and organizations have proven to be either irresponsible or stingy with both. I feel like a money based economy is out of date. Don't get me wrong. Money may have been a great motivator for "forward progress" in the past, inciting the industrial revolution, etc. (despite instigating exploitation) but now the concept of money has everything at a standstill. We have the technology for high speed transit and many hungry to work that could build it up. There have been great advances of medicine, yet many who need it don't have the financial status to access it. Thermal power, tidal power, solar power, wind power have hardly been explored to their potential.

The concept of money has clogged such advances like a bad case of constipation. Well, I know you will retort with "if it weren't for getting paid no one would do jack shit, we'd be lazy." Yes, there are some out there without a concept of work ethic but there are many who are motivated by accomplishment, by progress. I think you'd be amazed.

Will Durant wrote in The Story of Civilization something along the lines of (this will be paraphrased, I don't have the book on me anymore) "Mankind took a great step forward when they stopped eating their fellow man and instead enslaved them." Well perhaps it is time we take another great step forward and cease enslaving development and resources with money. But man ain't ready for it. Yanking money out of the daily workings of man would be cause withdrawal syndromes worse than forcing a heavy heroin junky to go cold turkey.

I will rearranging my reading list to learn more about economics. I want to understand it better and maybe someday experiment with my own attempt at configuring a new economic model to ween us off the current addiction to currency. Even if it's rejected by the world at least I'll die having tried to think up something.