The occasionally original blog.

And even though money is pretty tight for her, she told me I could name my price if I would help her, because it was so far away.

I told her she was a dummy for thinking i would take her money but that i would accept the traditional helping-a-friend-move price: a meal (i know she would feel wrong about herself if she didn’t do something for me in return, that’s just how she is) Tradition suggests pizza and beer, we opted for enchiladas and a margarita.

we crashed on the floor of the empty place and left back north in the morning - when we got back to the city three more friends met us at her storage place (the place she was moving into wouldn’t be vacant for a couple months) and we started to move all her stuff up to a storage room on the THIRD FLOOR (because large city storage places be like that)

we had just taken the first box out of the truck when the (only) lady working there walked by and told us they closed in an hour and twenty minutes, and she couldn’t stay even a little late because she had to get to her other job.

One hour twenty minutes. To completely un-jenga a large uhaul and re-tetris it back into a similar sized room on the third floor.

We all just, shared a look, took off hoodies, and got the fuck down to business. 

It was actually.. I still cherish look we passed around. The tiny eyebrow quirks and chin nods. The eye glints. The bigger breath we each took as we prepared to kick it up several gears. That moment of wordless connection, when we all just silently agreed that we were damn well going to do the impossible and didn’t even waste the time it would take to say anything, just got to it.

And we did it too. Finished with exactly two full minutes to spare. And then we all went for dinner and drinks to celebrate. And my friend’s friends that came to help? Two of them were acquaintances/friends of mine already. Like I lived with one for a year a decade ago sort of thing. But this experience? Brought us all closer. Made myself a new friend too.

And the friend i helped move? She and I are closer than ever because of it.

When i left our storage success diner to go home, she asked me again if I was sure i wouldn’t take any money.

I said “I ever tell you when I was 22 I went down to Hollywood to try that scene out? Anyway ten months later, when I just couldn’t do it anymore, and needed to come back, I called one of my best friends and said i can’t do this anymore i need to come back. You know what he said? He said: I’ll be there tomorrow. Not how much will you pay me, not what do i get out of it, not will you be able to cover my gas, just: I’ll be there tomorrow. Okay? You’re my friend. If you need help, I’m going to be there”

Take a moment and ask yourself, a project like this requires a lot of time, money and dedication of resources, why would scientists dedicate that time to something that could just be done by a tree?

The answer is they wouldn't. So that means this claim requires further investigation!

This project is called LIQUID 3, and it's not meant for cities with wide open spaces, it's meant for cities like Belgrade in Serbia. These cities are densely populated and heavily polluted, to the point where pollution actually chokes out current trees and makes creating green spaces difficult.

Liquid 3 was a PhD scientists answer to these problems. The microalgae tank is intended for spaces where you either:

Don't have enough space to plant full trees, or

Don't have enough time to plant trees and wait for them to grow up.

The tank is extremely efficient when you consider the amount of space needed compared to the amount of CO2 turned into oxygen. The tank can operate throughout the winter. And most importantly, it can be quickly set up in areas that desperately need relief from air pollution NOW not in 10 years when trees are done growing. Children currently suffocating on polluted air can't wait for trees to grow, they need to be taken care of now, and Liquid 3 is one of the ways to take care of them. Depending on the species of microalgea used, a number have shown a pretty amazing capacity to pull heavy metals out of the air which is something trees can get choked up by.

The tanks aren't just tanks either! Liquid 3 have solar panels placed on top, they have lighting and mobile phone charging, and they work as public benches. The designers of it want to encourage green spaces where there's room, but where there isn't room or time, Liquid 3 can step in. Realistically, this isn't a replacement for trees. It's replacing boring metal city benches with new, cooler benches that also clean the air (and have at least some heating during the winter).

Not only that, but the microalgea that grows is native to Serbia and all that microalgea has a ton of great uses! It makes for great fertilizer, compost, wastewater treatment, cleaner biofuels and even for helping create new tanks for further air purification. They only require a quick algae divide once a month, and the produced algae can be carted off to where ever it's needed. This makes them effective solutions for areas that can't sustain complex installations.