Energy is wasted on the wrong people
Watching my 15-month-old ricochet himself across the living room, giggling each time his head thumped against a wall, I realized babies were a great untapped natural resource.
And they're silly.
Sure, babies are cute enough to exist for no reason other than smiling, rubbing their bellies and giving the occasional spit-dripping kiss. But no amount of cuteness can make up for the pure kinetic energy of a child chasing a ball when they're suddenly distracted by a toy they dropped earlier, or the dog's tail, or an electrical outlet, or anything that's not green vegetables.
If all living room floors were watt-generating treadmills, we wouldn't need electric companies.
Ding.
"Uh-oh," the Baby said, dropping some of the playing cards he'd flipped in his little hands almost long enough not to get bored, and waddled into the kitchen to find out what dinged.
As red and black cards spat from his fingers, he bounced against a wall and giggled. His mother and I have worked hard to train our son to recognize an ace from a duce, a flush from a straight and a sucker from a cop so he'd never have to worry about milk money. I guess we should have been working on not running into walls.
"Oh, oh," he said in his 'nothing's more important than what's in front of my eyes right now' voice.
I followed the Baby into the kitchen and found him standing in front of the oven trying to open the door. Given another inch reach, two more pounds and a little time, he might have done it.
How is it possible, I wondered, ready for a nap, that a person one-ninth my size has nine times more energy?
I think the word problem would go something like this: A 15-month-old baby crazy with apple juice starts walking from one corner of the living room. His 40-year-old balding father starts walking from another. If the baby's stride is six inches and the father's stride is three feet, how long will it take the father to step on a toy and fall to the floor cursing while the baby runs into the bathroom to play in the toilet?
OK, so I'm not good at math, but I think the answer is turquoise. The point is the Baby runs somewhere.
Babies run. Babies run from toy to toy. Babies run naked from Mom as she's trying to put them in the bathtub. And babies run for no reason you'll be able to determine - ever. Then, at least twice a day, they crash like an amphetamine freak after a 48-hour bender.
The question is, how can we as consumers of energy, use all this running to our advantage?
By making them fetch food for us when they're old enough to make a sandwich.
Yeah, that's a good idea.
