Going Green

Be still my beating heart...is America finally ready to take saving the environment seriously? Are we ready to recycle? Cut our reliance on oil? Cut emissions? The glut of advertising and media coverage on the subject is building, and I only hope this time we take it seriously.

This whole topic isn't new; global warming is not a man-made concept (just a man-made problem). We are strip mining the planet for our daily needs, and it must stop soon. The average household leaves an environmental footprint the size of King Kong, and it really doesn't take a whole lot of effort to make it smaller (like Mighty Joe Young size).

Try recycling. This takes almost zero effort. Instead of chucking the endless catalogues, newspapers and flyers you receive every week - bundle them up. Use an old milk crate to gather the glass, and another one for the cardboard and paper. Once every couple of weeks, trek down to the recycle center and drop them off. Or, better yet, pay a little extra for the trash company to pick it up for you. We pretty much have one bag of trash per week and the rest goes in the bin.

Change your light bulbs to the energy efficient kind. They last longer, and they'll cut your electric bill. They are more expensive, but you spend less in the long run. If you don't want to fork out the expense to do them all at once, just replace them with the good guys when they pop on you.

Run your AC less. We live in Michigan, for cripe's sake, not Brazil. It doesn't get THAT hot. Play more outside in the evening if it's warm in the house. I think we run the AC about a total of 12 days from June to September, and that was on days the high temp hit over 95 F.

Use the rubber mulch in your flower beds. It is made of recycled tires. It doesn't blow away as much as the wood pulp stuff, and it doesn't fade for years. It is soft, so you can use it under your child's play set too.

If everyone gives a little effort, it can go a long way. Christ, I don't know why I even care since we're not breeders...

-K