In my previous article entitled, Gas Pains, I explored the gasoline crisis affecting our nation, as well as our government’s inane responses to solving the problem.  Although the United States boasts the largest supply of natural gas the world over, The Powers That Be still insist that we import the bulk of it from foreign sources.  With their pockets padded nicely by the rich oil barons, our lawmakers sit on their spreading rumps in Congress, playing their constituents’ hard-earned money as if the makers of Monopoly had minted it.  But fear not, for I have found a very good use for those spreading rumps vis a vis the gas crisis.

Whether you believe that the Earth was created through Intelligent Design or one big ol’ bang, it’s clear that as our planet coalesced from a burning ball, she contained within her — and as her natural outer gases cooled, atop her — all of the ingredients for sustaining life on this planet.  The truly beautiful thing is that our planet was designed to self sustain.  Herbivores ate plants and carnivores ate herbivores as well as other meat-eating critters.  In one form or another, when the plants and animals died and were consumed, they were converted into another form of matter. This is the most basic law of physics: matter cannot be destroyed, only changed.   Thus, plant matter became natural gas and ditto for the heartier fare.   Creatures dead and buried enriched the soil as their bodies decayed and released their own natural gases, making the earth beneath our ancestors’ feet more fruitful for new generations of flora.  Meanwhile, cavemen that consumed meat and veggies … well, let’s put it this way.  For Cro-Magnon Man, the invention of Beano® and Gas-X® was but a distant dream.

Fast-forward now, oh, a few hundred millennia, give or take a few.  In our oceans and in our military labs, The United States Navy is experimenting with innovative means of generating electric power. Using microorganisms to do their thing to raw sewage systems, the Navy is seeing some success in converting the stuff that makes the grass grow green into viable energy.  But don’t break out the champagne just yet. It’s up to us, you see, Joe and Jane Public, to do our civic duty by giving a helping hand, or other body parts, to the military.  With all of the natural gas that carnivores and vegetarians expel, we can harness these resources to solve our energy problems for a song (or perhaps, a peep).  The population poised to make the greatest contribution to the fuel crisis is, of course, our senior citizens.  We comprise approximately 40% of the nation’s populace, and don’t think that we are called “old farts” for nothing!

As eager as we are to contribute, our efforts must be well planned, well organized, and synchronized.  I suggest, therefore, that we make good use of our senior citizen discounts for movie passes.  I recommend that we arrive en masse, after a nice hearty plate or two of pasta fagioli (pasta with beans), in movie houses across the country.  The theaters would be barred to annoying children and ever-texting teens, for we must make a concentrated effort.  The movie houses would have to be outfitted with special equipment, but in comparison to what we are paying at the pumps and what we pay to heat our homes, the expenditures would be negligible.

Reconstructed into two tiers, the once-lovely ceilings in theatres would serve as follows.  High tech fans would pull the, uh, air upward, depositing it, on it’s first, er, pass into the first tier.  Here the effluvium would be collected, to serve as a replacement for the stuff we’re now paying greedy and unfriendly nations to produce for us.  The natural byproducts would then be sucked ever higher, into the second tier of the ceilings.  Here, the introduction of appropriate microorganisms would convert the combustibles into WMD (Weapons of Mass Destruction).  Unlike prior WMD, these would kill silently … what, you never heard the term, “silent but deadly?”  We could package and sell these missiles off to our friends in Israel, or we could just be generous and give ‘em away free of charge.  The gas bombs would assist Israel’s efforts to preserve what is left of their diminished homeland in the Middle East.

We could then drop our own stink bombs, here and there as needed.  Iran and North Korea come immediately to mind as recipients.  If Osama Bin Laden still resides in the caves of Afghanistan, we can finish former Presidents’ Bill Clinton’s and George “Dubyah’s” jobs of smoking that rat Bin Laden out once and for all.   You never heard of smoke bombs?  One whiff of the concentrated concoction and our enemies would drop where they stand.

Imagine that.  A swift, sure, and bloodless war that would eschew the use of uranium, hydrogen, or other devastating chemicals, and a war where we are assured of emerging the victor!  Those few sturdy souls who survive will give new life to the old cliché, “Where were you when the sh*t hit the fan?”  The only fallout from such attacks would actually be beneficial to the environment.  There would be no manmade greenhouse gases to enlarge the hole in the ozone layer and cause Al Gore to down more antacids; this stuff is 100% pure!

Of course, the seniors would have to be compensated as well as stimulated for their efforts.  Tchaikovsky’s The Overture of 1812 would replace the soulless techno hip-hop now played prior to movie trailers.  The seniors could become active participants in the fanfare, particularly those parts in the music that make use of canon fire.  Ta da da da da da da da DAH! Kaboom!   The films themselves would be pre-selected for explosive content; i.e., Chained Lightning, Thirty Seconds over Tokyo or The Charge of the Light Brigade.   Therefore, all could join in, thus giving new meaning to the term “live theater.”

To ensure an endless supply of our newest and cheapest resource, we can draft hospitals and assisted care institutions into the mix. The patients and residents would be willing donors of what they so freely, and indeed, what they are encouraged to expel!  Former bloodsucking insurance carriers would realize that “there is gold in them thar hills” and, at no cost to the insured parties or the institutions, permit longer stays at no additional costs.  Not even President Obama could have crafted a better solution to the raging issue of seniors’ healthcare!

As we Gray Panthers march forth doing our patriotic duty, expelling nature’s elixirs hither and yon, we would cease to be embarrassed by the workings of our bodies and instead, be proud.  Instead of muttering, “excuse me” and blushing profusely as we provide our country with what it needs, those around us would say, “God bless you,” much as they would if we had sneezed.

However, this plan is nothing to sneeze it.  It’s cheap, it’s viable, and it’s critical.  All ye willing to serve your country in this manner, stand up and be heard!  Or, better yet, sit down.  I expect that my most avid fans, Jack S. Fogbound and Sammy K., will be the first ones to sign up and make themselves heard!