The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

I know some of us moved here when prices were low, cheapest waterfronts in Puget Sound. I sure did, bought a shack with 7 acres for the grand total of 24,000 bucks, what our last new car cost. And some of you more recent arrivals came for the view and the natural wonders, still less expensive than Seattle and Gomorrah and a tad less crime. Most of us islanders probably griped about the lack of services, long drives to the nearest hospital, county administration back not long ago on Whidbey Island, few businesses, spotty cellphone coverage, unreturned phone calls from plumbers and electricians and carpenters. But … this was rural living, what did we expect?

Times change. Cellphones are ubiquitous, we all have computers, Artificial Intelligence is here way ahead of predictions. So maybe we were kidding ourselves that our pastoral island living would stay forever. Or at least our lifetimes. Sure, we managed to keep WalMart out of Stanwoodopolis. And rumors of a Microsoft campus on the farmlands of the North End proved to be only that, just rumors.

But just when you least expect it, along comes the future. If you haven’t been reading the Stanwoodopolis Gazette, you probably missed the headlines this week that Google has applied to Island County for permits to build an AI data center on 100 acres between Cascade Lumber and our little international airport above English Boom. Big deal, you maybe think, just a few computers teaching other computers how to think. Or a few hooked together to answer your Google AI questions. Or a bunch of terminals ‘mining’ cryptocurrencies.

If you think that, you’ve been spending too much time on Instagram. These data centers use more power than all us Facebook addicts combined. And the water needed to cool the bazillion miles of circuits, you better get ready for some aquifers to dry up. Maybe all of them. Or else Google will build desalination plants, just need a few more kilowatts to run them.

It’s one thing to block a WalMart, quite another to stop Google. Write to your commissioners and legislators if you think it will help. Me, I’m contacting a realtor before our place is worth what I originally paid for it.