If we do not permit the earth to produce beauty and joy, it will in the end not produce food, either. Joseph Wood Krutch
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Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Holding my feet to the fire

There are still a great number of things I need to change to win any sort of green award so here are seven things I plan to start with:

  1. 1. I really need to take shorter showers.  For some reason the warm water in the morning just feels so good I lose all track of time. I'm thinking of setting a timer for five minutes and hope that helps.  Actually I went to a campground one time with coin showers.  At the end of the five minutes only the hot water turned off. That got me out of the shower REALLY fast.
  2. 2. I've changed every possible light to fluorescent already but I need to be better at turning off lights when I leave the room. 
  3. 3. Drive even less.  I think $4.00 gas will probably help that a little.
  4. 4. Grow a garden. However that is not easy when there is so little room and very little sun. I have plans for a container garden that can be moved to any location. I need to get building it. 
  5. 5. Plant more trees and clean up more. I have been on one volunteer tree planting  excursion. In less than two hours we planted four-hundred trees and stripped English Ivy off some of the existing trees. It was a lot of fun and I want to do it again.
  6. 6. Use less disposable items.  I no longer buy paper napkins and towels but when we eat out I use them.  I need to follow No Impact Man's method and carry a rag with me.  Maybe some pocket silverware as well.
  7. 7. Attend seminars. Portland is stuffed with free, or very cheap, seminars on living green or simply. It's just a matter of going.

That's my bad list.  Next time I will try and post a few of my accomplishments. Big and small.

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