MAY 11, 2017 // 19
BOOK SHELF // GLIMPSE // WILDLIFE // POP CULTURE // WORDS // Q&A // FOOD // FUN
COLUMBIA BAR
BOOKMONGER
Combating the climate change crisis
TROPICAL BREEZE
By RYAN HUME
Just Cool It! –
David Suzuki and
Ian Hanington
Greystone –
312 pp - $18.95
scientific reports from
around the world, gathered
together in the United Na-
tions Framework Conven-
tion on Climate Changes’
Fifth Assessment Report,
substantiate that in the last
few decades “oceans have
warmed, snow and ice have
diminished, sea levels have
risen, and extreme weather
events have become more
common” – and that human
activities are largely re-
sponsible for these dramat-
ic changes.
Among the findings:
since 1990, permanent sea
ice in the Arctic has melted
to half its previous thick-
ness and area. Meanwhile,
the ocean’s absorption of
increased levels of carbon
dioxide in the atmosphere
has changed the pH levels
of the water, resulting in
die-offs of corals, shellfish,
and krill, which is the base
of the ocean’s food chain
– thus impacting all life
forms higher up the chain,
including us.
The authors also point
to overwhelming evidence
that global warming has
significantly affected
transmission of infectious
diseases, rates of respira-
tory illness, malnutrition
linked to crop failures and
desertification, and deg-
radation of water supplies
– and even our economic
prosperity.
Fortunately, the second
half of the book proffers
solutions.
One chapter looks at
actions individuals can
take, whether it’s cutting
down on car use by opting
for greener forms of trans-
port, or improving energy
efficiencies in the home.
Moving to a vegetarian or
vegan diet is another way
of significantly reducing
one’s own carbon footprint
– the authors explain why
this is so.
There are also chapters
on agricultural, techno-
logical and institutional
solutions.
Some of this material
may be rather dry for the
general reader, but for an
issue so fundamental to
our well-being, soldier
on anyway to identify the
many opportunities we
still have to avert climactic
cataclysm.
The Bookmonger is
Barbara Lloyd McMichael,
who writes this weekly col-
umn focusing on the books,
authors and publishers
of the Pacific Northwest.
Contact her at bkmonger@
nwlink.com
It was May Day, so I
decided to give my regards
to the Labor Temple, that
boisterous phoenix built
upon the ashes of the 1922
Astoria fire.
It was raining outside. Late-
ly, it always seems to be raining
outside. Since it was Interna-
tional Workers’ Day, it seemed
appropriate to ask the bartender,
Cala, what she preferred to
drink off-shift. The Tropical
Breeze, a coconut-infused rum
punch, bright with citrus, keeps
an eye pointed at summer.
Yeah, it was still raining
outside, but summer is coming.
It has to be. Any day now. But
in the meantime, do indulge
in the flavors of the tropics. It
rains there, too.
Ingredients
1 ounce vodka
1 ounce Malibu rum
Pineapple juice, as needed
Cranberry juice, just a splash
Ice
Directions
Fill a pint glass with ice.
In a cocktail shaker, mix al-
cohols with more ice, shake
and pour into pint. Top off
with pineapple juice, splash
it with enough cranberry to
turn the glass flamingo pink,
dunk a straw and enjoy!
—Recipe courtesy of
Cala Petersen, bartender
at Labor Temple & Cafe,
Astoria, Oregon
registration
now open for
Reg ister
N ow
summer and fall classes in
• Ba llet
• Ta p
• Ja zz
• H ip-H o p
Photo by James Olson | Alderbrook Imaging
Five years after the pub-
lication of their wide-rang-
ing book, “Everything
Under the Sun,” which
catalogued a myriad of
environmental challenges
worldwide and suggested
ways those might be rem-
edied, British Columbia’s
internationally renowned
geneticist and environmen-
tal activist David Suzuki
and his co-author Ian Han-
ington are back with a new
book, “Just Cool It!”
The fact that the book
cover includes not one, but
two, subtitles – “The Cli-
mate Crisis and What We
Can Do” and “A Post-Paris
Agreement Game Plan” –
should give the reader the
first inkling that this is an-
other book that is positive-
ly bursting at the seam with
ideas. The epigraph, taken
from Shakespeare’s Julius
Caesar, reminds us of our
place in the continuum, and
the opportunities we might
seize upon now or ignore
not only at our own peril,
but that of our descendants.
The first hundred pages
of “Just Cool It!” outline
the science, history and
current status of the phe-
nomenon of global warm-
ing – which in the lifetime
of many of us has gone
from being a “slow-motion
catastrophe that we had
lots of time to work on” to
a crisis that has decisively
arrived on our shorelines,
in our mountains and at our
shrinking polar icecaps.
The authors brook no
climate denier foolishness.
In forceful and measurable
terms, they lay out the
calamity that is upon us.
Well over nine thousand
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