2009-04-23

Earth Day?

So, yesterday was Earth Day. Thanks for the 4-1-1, Sassy B.  Despite my banner art, I'm not the "greenest" guy around. A few months ago, I heard that some people in the environmental movement wanted to change the environmentalism color from "green" to "blue" to distance themselves from their tree hugging hippie roots, and be more the color of clean skies and clean water. And with that, the rest of their arguments were lost on me for a few days.
I mean, I try, but I'm lazy.
I use public transportation to and from work every day.
I've started asking them not to use plastic bags at the grocery store.
I wash my laundry in cold water, and try to do only full loads.
But that's kind of all I've got.  I've tried the CFL's.  I used them at my apartment before I moved, but haven't replaced most of the old style bulbs in my recessed lighting.  I'm having some issues.  I don't mind the curly design, but the slow warm up time is bothering me more here than it did at the old place.  (Sassy, you saw how dark they made my front hallway)
As the current bulbs burn out, I will replace them with CFL's, but I think I'm going to wait for LCD bulbs to come down a little more in price before I start a  serious replacement regime.

12 comments:

mo.stoneskin said...

I read something a while ago about a new technique in manufaturing LCD which will bring their price right down within a few years. Of course, I can't remember what I read, when I read it, or what the technique was.

Cora said...

I'm a big fan of the canvas grocery bags... but as you saw in Seattle, I don't carry them with me EVERYWHERE, I'm not perfect.

I try to recycle as much as possible to cut down on what gets thrown away, and, truth be told, our recycling can is twice as big as our trash can, so that motivates me.

I don't drive much.

I do the laundry in cold water.

I'm breaking the bottled water habit (sniffle) but it isn't easy.

What I REFUSE to do to save the planet though is switch to CFL's. Here's why:

They catch on fire/melt/scorch the ceiling when they burn out. It happened to my sister in her garage. And it happened in my daughter's bedroom.

Mm-hmm. Imagine racing down the hall with a chair and an oven mitt to pull a burning, melting lightbulb out of your kid's ceiling and smelling everything scorching, and seeing waves of heat rolling across the ceiling as your kid is screaming.

That blackening, melting bulb burned my hand through the oven mitt and it burned my kid's ceiling.

Never again will I use them. I switched back to regular bulbs that very same day. Those things are scary. And house fires do NOTHING to save the planet. I'll be a good old fashioned light bulb girl until I die.

Sassy Britches said...

Eeeps! Cora! Maybe ya'll were using a too powerful wattage for the outlet? That's freaky! And dangerous--not just the fire but they're filled with mercury which it really bad if exposed outside the bulb!

Cowguy said...

LOL I post an Earth Day post, look in my blog roll and there's Ol Scope with an Earth day past as well...

Great minds.

sAm said...

One of the easiest (and cheapest) things you can do is just watch the packaging on "stuff" you buy - and try to reduce the amount of "stuff" you buy.
But that being said...I have to say you're better than I am at laundry...I use warm water and don't really give a shit if the load is full.
Sorry.

ShanaM said...

Scary about the lightbulb thing!!

I try to be very earth friendly. I like the earth!

MJenks said...

The other grand thing about the CFLs is that they're filled with mercury. Hope they don't break!

SkylersDad said...

I have not been sold on the CFL's yet, I still use standard bulbs. But we do a really good job on the recycling!

Gwen said...

I think the best thing we can do is just be more aware of the things we are manufacturing and consuming that have half-lives of 2,000 years.

Anonymous said...

I recycle, clothes... Only when they don't stink... And only once! Or maybe it was twice but who's counting??

But really I do recycle everything and I won't let my dad buy anything in a plastic container that isn't recycleable because I care.

J.J. in L.A. said...

We used to recycle but the city told us to stop...they'd sort it at the plant. That's one job I hope they don't do manually. lol!

Tom said...

I have mixed feelings about how to best protect the environment. I can't stand seeing people litter or being wasteful, but I also hate being preached to by hypocritical celebrities and politicians. The whole carbon footprint thing reminds me of the selling of indulgences. I'm all for taking better care our our environment.