Earth Hour a Comedy Hour

Antarctica to Pyramids — lights dim for Earth Hour

From an Antarctic research base and the Great Pyramids of Egypt to the Empire State Building in New York and the Sears Tower in Chicago, illuminated patches of the globe went dark Saturday for Earth Hour, a campaign to highlight the threat of climate change.

Time zone by time zone, nearly 4,000 cities and towns in 88 countries joined the event sponsored by the World Wildlife Fund to dim nonessential lights from 8:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. The campaign began in Australia in 2007 and last year grew to 400 cities worldwide.

I didn't do anything differently in terms of my energy consumption between 8:30 PM and 9:30 PM on Saturday.

I didn't dim nonessential lights. I wasn't protesting Earth Hour. I just didn't feel the need to dim nonessential lights.

Why?

BECAUSE I DON'T TURN ON NONESSENTIAL LIGHTS.

Some of us quietly live our lives without being wasteful. We're not making a statement on the cause du jour or taking part in an event to ease our consciences over our energy gluttony.

It's a way of life for us, not just a stunt for an hour on a given day.

We're good stewards of God's creation and don't need a self-congratulatory event like this to flaunt our environmental awareness.

Earth Hour organizers say there's no uniform way to measure how much energy is saved worldwide.

Yeah, well, this isn't about saving energy. It's about acting like you care about saving energy.

If you really cared, you'd do it anyway, every day.

Earth Hour 2009 has garnered support from global corporations, nonprofit groups, schools, scientists and celebrities — including Oscar-winning actress Cate Blanchett and retired Cape Town Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

McDonald's Corp. planned to dim its arches at 500 locations around the U.S. Midwest. The Marriott, Ritz-Carlton and Fairmont hotel chains and Coca-Cola Co. also planned to participate.

Participation pays off. It's viewed as good for business and public relations. Let's be realistic here.

This is funny.

In the Chicago suburb of Blue Island, Eli Rodriguez, 41, owner of a Mexican restaurant called Tenochtitlan switched off not only the lights but also the television, which was playing a NCAA tournament basketball game.

"Everybody was happy I did it," Rodriguez said. "They support this. They understood."

But after a few seconds, he turned the game back on and kept the lights dim.

Rodriguez switched off the NCAA game for "a few seconds."

What a joke!

"Everybody was happy I did it," Rodriguez said. "They support this. They understood."

I wonder how happy and supportive and understanding everybody would have been if Rodriguez had insisted on keeping the TV off for the entire hour rather than just a few seconds.

Earth Hour was really Earth Seconds at the restaurant.

A few seconds or even a full hour of energy sacrifice may assuage guilty consciences, but that's the extent of the accomplishment of Earth Hour 2009.