Didn’t want y’all to forget about Earth Day because it’s VERY important that we do what we can to shrink our personal carbon footprints. In case you didn’t know, Home Depot is offering one free CFL (compact fluorescent light bulb) to all customers today, so I sent Em over there to get one before he went to work. Who Knew switching just 3 most frequently used light bulbs could result in something like a 500 lb reduction in my carbon footprint? I forgot where I read that because I’ve been reading about all kinds of things I can do personally to lesson my impact on the Earth’s resources.
When Home Depot isn’t giving the things out for free, the CFL “bulbs” cost money, but there are many, many ways to lessen your impact on Earth that actually save you money. No. 2 can tell ya what a cheapskate I am, but I get a lot of tips from fellow cheapskaters. Dawn C. has a number of personal favorite tips for being both frugal and green in her
Greening Your World 101 . Thank you, Dawn; you’ve introduced me to several new avenues of cheapskating.
Diane (damn her!) introduced me to Colin Beavan’s experiment, which led me to feel guilty because I wasn’t doing everything I COULD be doing to help out the environment (or even save money) Some of you may have heard of Colin in the terms of
No Impact Man .
I’m NOWHERE ready to try the stuff he’s trying and since I’m 17 years older than he is, I think I can truthfully say I’m never going to be ready to try the stuff he’s trying. I want to have some fun on the downhill slide.
We DO recycle and I’m working on less impact; I really am. I have a
composter in mind, but it’s expensive and I have that cheapskate thing going. In addition, No. 1’s car broke down this week and I charged half the expense of the repair to my CC while she charged half the expense to hers, so I can't afford to buy anything else until that gets paid. While North Texas isn’t the best place to get around without a car, I have several grocery stores within walking distance and cloth bags as well as a new rolling cart:
I'm hoping that BobbyG, my Chicago friend who's involved in saving the great lakes will agree to blog here once or twice/month on conservation/environmental issues. I think we all need to think about the effects of what we do a little bit more. I don't think we need to go crazy or adopt Colin's way of life; I just think we should think about walking more, turning the lights off more, using less, blah blah.
Think about it!
3 comments:
And a Happy Earth Day to you, too! I might need to look into purchasing some of those shopping bags you have. That would be an easy way for me to reduce my carbon footprints was it?
Sorry for my lack of blogging lately. My internet skills have not been as up to par as they should have been. I've been working more up until the last 2 days which I took off to work on catching up on some homework.
I also started taking guitar lessons from a friend. I'll update more on that in person, but that has also been taking up some of my free time.
Jen cracked me up as I was sitting on the edge of my bed practicing with the guitar case open next to me on the floor. She walked into my room, dropped a dollar in the guitar case, and walked out. :) She said I reminded her of Phoebe from Friends.
That's been about my life lately. Work, school, laundry, paying bills, running errands, etc. The only fun I'm having now is hanging out with my guitar teacher. That's my little bit of personal sanity and escape from the everyday demands of life.
I also have my ticket to come visit in May. I also got a ticket to San Diego to visit Claire in June. Both are just short 4 day visits or so. I'm also hoping for one more vacation before the end of summer, but I haven't decided what that will be yet. Hopefully, it will be somewhere that I've NEVER been to before. I'm just hoping to find a fitting companion since I don't want to go it alone. Except all my friends are pretty broke, so we'll see what happens.
That's all for now. Peace, Love, and Recycle.
xoxo
Wow, that compost tumbler is expensive. I know you two aren't the handy types but you can easily make a very cheap DIY tumbler. Here's one of the simplest ones just to give you an idea.
To make a compost tumbler, purchase a large garbage can with a clamp-on lid. With a 1/4-inch drill bit, drill holes every two to three inches. Build the compost pile within the can. To tumble the can, turn it on its side and roll it a few times.
We've been talking about doing Six Flags this summer so, if you don't have one by then and your inner DIY queen hasn't shown herself, let me know. We'll make it to your specs and bring it down for you.
We do most everything from other folks' scraps and leftovers so you can could call it "recycled", too. :-D
Yes, No. 2 Carbon footprints it was. Good news is coming out of Britain insofar as companies actually lowering prices on eco-friendly products. I hope US companies follow suit.
Are you the last of my children to take up the guitar? I think it's fun to sit around and play songs when we get together. It's kindof too bad that none of us can sing, though. :-)
Looking forward to your visit next month. I'm saving that westbound trail for you. I want to see where it goes and if it ends up near Walgreen's, but I can only see it near here and then again over by Walgreen's, so I have no idea where it goes inbetween. It must go WAY back behind Kroger and then work its way North again. ??? I'm leery of taking it alone, Em's had about enough of my walks, and No. 1 can't think about much besides getting her car fixed (It's still not acting right, so is back in the shop) and getting her stuff moved over to Dave's because she's cancelled her storage unit.
My office is a disaster zone. No. 1 is dumping stuff she wants to donate to whichever charity calls us next, and we haven't done the food run to the mission because her car wasn't working. Hope to get it cleared out before you come down.
Looking for someone with a 2007 Dallas Entertainment Book to get some coupons for the Ripley/Wax Museum so we can check it out while you're here. You might be interested in that, too, Diane. It's not too terribly far from Six Flags.
Thanks for the generous offer, Diane; you have me thinking now. The appeal in this composter over some others was due to the liquid excrement produced as a side product. I'm a little familiar with that stuff (SOMEHOW ??) and plants really love it. I think it would need to be a closed system to make that liquid. But, thinking is good, because I'd really like to have multiple composters (as in 2 or 3 small, round, rollable closed systems) that I could just maybe kick around the yard every few days. <--I need to think more on that.
We all blog when we have the time; sure good to see you again, though.
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