Road to Copenhagen: The Old Country

Good Morning Copenhagen (Cop from now on). 2:48 am Cop time as my body seems to be a bit confused by the time change (8 hours). But ntl I arrived safely and had a fairly uneventful journey with few surprises and nice people.

B/c airports MSP and O'Hare charge for wifi (Bonging or something like that $7.95) I submit by Word doc to you to bring you up to speed on my preparation and a new Day 1...after counting down from Day 28, now I'm going the other way to 19..kind of puts things into perspective of TCK,TCK,TCK and the alarm that COP 15 will send to it's sleeping and awakening citizens,,,,,,

see you back here after a word from the past....thanks for your presence btw

Hmmmm Google won't let a word doc be posted...another learning .....ask me and I'll send you my story...short version

Tuesday's "All Hands On Deck" action at Peavey Plaza in downtown Mpls was a throw back to my Ski to End Hunger fasts and camp outs on the mall in July where I learned that I was to become a father....quite a day that was!!!

Here's a shot of Reed Aronow of the WSF Expedition Cop group speaking with Chuck Prentice and Kate Knuth in the background. Chuck is responsible for the Resolution which I now proudly carry (passed by the Edina City Council 4-1) as an example of local govt having a voice in the matter of Climate Change on a global level. Kate (in orange coat) is the MN State Rep from Arden Hills and New Brighton, very involved in greening our state and will be arriving in Cop on Dec 14th.....

....just when the World leaders (wait that's us) will be arriving in Cop to sign (what NASA's James Hansen the world's leading scientist on Climate Change now says "must fail" (b/c it's so flawed) the Cop Climate Treaty for our planet's road map to a healthy future.

Either way we have a lot of work to do....go to http://www.dailyclimate.org/copenhagen for all the dirt.

Also a huge shout out to Shara Motadhi (Edina HS student who is one of tomorrow's leaders today) for getting me onto FOX 9 Morning Show for a 4 minute interview on Wed morning with Kurt_________. BTW Shara, Kurt said he would post the link on the web so spread it around and send to me I'll post it here....my brief brush with TV stardom.

Speaking of stars....on my long flight from Chicago to Cop I sat next to a young (26) attractive woman, Gita from a small city in Norway. She was returning from LA so my opening line was "so are you a movie star?"...she looks at me smiles and says "yes, I've been in LA for four days in meetings for a film I'm working on." She loves LA but can't believe how much time people spend in vehicles driving around.

The other huge thank you goes to Jen Kochevar my dear friend and one day media director...great shots and video from the Peavey Plaza event and support in getting ready for the journey....here's a shot of Jen in action and of our good bye at the MSP airport.

Amazing the skills we discover in ourselves when we are called into being for something we believe in.

The last piece that really to me is crucial is the growing partnership that the EEC (Edina Energy and Environment Commission) is building with the City Council who demonstrated that with the passing of this resolution the evening before I left:

WHEREAS, the City of Edina adopted ICLEI's Cities for Climate Protection Campaign on November 5, 2007 and

WHEREAS, through its actions (like forming our Edina Energy and Environment Commission) the City of Edina has demonstrated concern over global warming.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOVED, by the City Council of the City Edina strongly supports action at the upcoming UN Convention on Climate Change in Copenhagen for the United States and other nations to commit to reducing green house gas emissions to a level necessary to stablilize
atmospheric CO2 levels at or below 350 ppm

Dated December 1, 2009

A BIG step for a small mid western city about to be better known on the biggest stage the climate conversation has ever seen.

Time to dive into e mail, setting up my day and riding my bike (thanks to my host Jane Vinter) for shopping and finding out "What Kind of World Do You Want?"