#130: Man In The Mirror (Friday, June 26)

A drop of water
Originally uploaded by Gun Sydney

"I'm starting with the man in the mirror,
I'm asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and make a change."
- Michael Jackson, 1958-2009

A friend called me the other day. "Aaaaaarrgghhhh!!!" she yelled as soon as I picked up the phone.
"What's the matter?" I asked, alarmed.
"You're in my head! Whenever I go to do something non-green, one of your Good Friday blogs just pop into my head and I'm forced to do the right thing!"

I ran into another friend of mine last night as I got off the subway. He drives a gas-guzzling Range Rover, but yesterday I saw him sweating in a suit and tie heading home. Apparently my comments about his lack of green endeavors finally got to him. He was coming back from walking to a meeting a mile away from his house.

I think I smell a couple converts. LOL.

A flood is one of the most devastating and powerful natural disasters...yet each flood starts with just one drop of water. You are the man in the mirror, the drop of water, that can effect change. Imagine if you decided to implement just ONE of these Good Friday ideas in your daily life how powerful the effects could be?

Here's one that's easy: Stop buying single-serving packaged products.

Single serve packets, bottled water, beverages, chips, etc. have become more popular as people get busier or try to actively control their portions. Yes, they're convenient, but they typically cost more than the family/regular size, and have a bigger toll on the environment.

So how do you control your portions, get convenient meals/snacks and still help the environment? It's easy: buy the bigger size containers and portion them out in reusable ziploc containers or tupperware (instead of bottled water, buy a water filter and tote around your water in a reusable cup/bottle). The servings will still stay fresh and you'll reduce your trash (and carbon footprint)!

#129: Why Is Envy Green? (Friday, June 19)

"Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house; thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his man-servant, nor his maid-servant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's."

It's the best-selling book of all time, and the most widely distributed. And for some of us, it's the guideline by which we live our lives, and the yard-stick with which we measure right and wrong. Yet surprisingly (considering the countless passages that talk about the earth and our treatment of living things), until 2007, the bible wasn't very eco-friendly. (My guess is that it was probably due in part to the thinness of the pages, which might have required a special paper.)

Then in October 2007, Thomas Nelson, Inc. released the world's first bible printed on recycled paper, and the heaven's rejoiced.

I haven't been able to find any statistics on the sales of bibles printed on recycled paper, but can I get an Amen??

One step closer to protecting God's green earth. :)

#128: It's A Wash (Friday, June 12)

Laundry: it's the bane of my existence. Unfortunately, it's one of the necessities of life. Thankfully there are ways to be green about it (and I don't mean wearing your clothes twice like the celebrities do and calling it a green effort).

Aside from using eco-friendly laundry detergent, here are a few tips that can help make your laundering chores a little more friend.

- Only do full loads of laundry to cut down on the amount of energy expended.

- Switch to cold water washing and save 80 percent on energy used for laundry and save an estimated $60 a year.

- Hang dry your clothes instead of using the dryer and save 700 pounds of C02 a year.

- Buy washable clothes instead of clothes that need to be dry cleaned. Dry cleaning uses harmful chemicals.

- If you must dry clean, try to wear items several times before cleaning them.

#127: 3 Easy Ways To Make Your Bathroom Greener (Friday, June 5)

I spend a lot of time in my bathroom. As a matter of fact, some of my most brilliant ideas have been developed in that room. So it's always nice to find ways to make it greener. Here are 5 easy, easy tips (did I mention they were easy) to green your bathroom:

• Fill a 1/2 gallon milk bottle with water, cover it and put it in your toilet tank. Older toilets can use up to 5 gallons of water with each flush. Newer toilets use about 2 gallons. By putting a sealed bottle in your tank, it'll reduce the amount of water that is consumed with each flush. Click here to watch a video of this idea.

• Substitute your plastic/vinyl shower curtain for one made out of cotton, linen, hemp or other natural materials. This will reduce your VOC exposure, and will also be greener, since you can wash it and re-use it many times.
  

• Switch to recycled toilet paper. Do you know that if every household in the United States replaced just one roll of regular toilet paper with 100% recycled toilet paper, we’d save almost half a million trees? Personally, I use Marcal; it's a fraction of the cost of brand name toilet paper, and 100% recycled.
  

What are you waiting for? Get crackin'!