Gasoline.

May 14, 2007 at 6:42 pm (Consumption, Oil conservation)

Sorry I’ve been MIA. There have been a lot of family obligations and such lately, which I know isn’t an excuse, but it kinda is. Anwyay…

Today I bought gas for the first time in a bit over two months. Yep, that’s right, two months. I filled up my little Toyota (1989 Camry, for reference) with about 11.5 gallons of 89 octane. I probably should have used a higher octane since I’m not using the car very often, but I may just get one of those fuel additives or something. After all, I’m wondering if I’ll need to fill up more than once this coming summer.

My husband drives a company truck which he brings home at night. He generally stops for groceries and runs errands for the household while he’s out doing the same for his job. My car has the car seats, and only fits one other person besides the little ones and me, so we just don’t go many places. I bring my daughter to school in the morning (2 miles away), and I pick her up a couple of times a week at most. Usually she carpools with another mom that passes this direction on her way home. I do our “big grocery shopping” a couple of times a month, but the store is only about 4 miles from here. The farthest I’ve driven since we’ve moved into our new house (last week of February) has been to my parents’, and they only live about 10 miles away.

The lack of driving is driving me crazy, surprisingly. I’m normally a very “get me out of this house” type, and since I get tired of our little town, I’d usually drive to a bigger city about 90 minutes away. But I’m getting better.

The only thing I’m upset about is that with doing only local driving, usually with a bunch of stop signs, I only got about 24 miles per gallon on this tank. Generally my car gets 28 on town driving, and 32 or so highway, with me getting a nice happy average of 30 when I do it in combination. Maybe I need to keep up with keeping tires inflated or something, maybe work on gentler starts and stops.

Either way, the oldest is out of school at the end of next week, we don’t have too many outside of the house activities scheduled (there’s some library things, a cheer camp and a volleyball camp, but so far, that’s it). Driving should be cut at *least* in half this summer… so wow.

Everyone else looked positively irritated at the $3 per gallon gas today. I, on the other hand, was happy as a clam to know that I wouldn’t be back there doing it again next week, or sooner, like most of them. It was a great feeling. Yay, something is actually working.

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What I did for Earth Day

April 24, 2007 at 2:41 am (Earth Day, Effort, Musings)

I didn’t buy anything. Oh wait. My husband bought milk for me and the little ones, and some bananas. But I didn’t buy anything. That has to count for something, right? I didn’t drive, either. Hubby did, to the store, and my mother and my aunt did, to drive out to the lake with my oldest for the day. So, I guess they undo all the good of me not driving?

I spent most of the day outside working on the yard. “The yard. The evil yard. The yard of doom. The yard that will destroy the planet by its very existence. THAT yard?” Yup, that yard. I pruned trees and shrubs, and didn’t compost the clippings. I used my electric weed eater (I forget, is that better or worse than a gas powered one?). I planted things – all of them being ornamentals (waiting on soil to plant my bell pepper tomorrow). I used water, not from a rain barrel, to water not only said ornamentals, but to also water my grass. Oh wait, it’s shade-specific grass, and baby grass at that, so maybe that’s good. Or bad. Or…

Anyway, I spent the day reconnecting with Earth. My daughter joined me when she got home, and planted more than she ever had before. I got to explain to her about composting and why we weren’t doing it at the moment (there’s a TON of clippings, and there’s nowhere in our (rental) yard at the moment to put them). I explained the importance of little squiggly wormies to the developing the soil without having to use harsh chemicals. I got to explain to my mother how clover is good, because it fixes nitrogen in the soil. And I got powered back up by a big dose of solar-to-human energy.

All in all, it was a beautiful day, one that I’m not sure I’ll forget for quite some time. It may not have been the ideal hippy Earth Day, but it worked for us.

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Still Searching

April 20, 2007 at 6:09 pm (Eat locally, Effort, Sustainable Agriculture)

I’m still searching for local sources of food, organic or not. It’s an extremely frustrating process. This is one of the reasons why people like me (formerly me? transitioning me?) don’t even bother. The closest farmers’ markets are about 45 miles away, with the larger ones being about 70 miles away. There are roadside vendors of some things, but they aren’t regular, and they certainly aren’t organic and probably not sustainably grown. Really, frustrating doesn’t even begin to cover it. There are NO CSA’s, NO co-ops that I can find (yet, still working on that one), nothing. Oh, and apparently, there are less than a couple of hundred acres of certified organic acres in Louisiana.

Yes, I should grow my own. But the season has started in full swing here, and we just moved into our house, and from what I can see, there’s very little in the way of full sun in our yard. I am planting a bell pepper plant, but it will be in a container, and probably be moved through the day to follow the sun. With two little ones, I just don’t have the time or energy for that. Maybe in the fall I’ll plant some things.

I’m just so incredibly irritated at the moment.

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Consumption Junction…

April 19, 2007 at 3:47 pm (Consumption, Effort, Greener living, Recycling)

I have no idea how I accumulated all the stuff I’ve accumulated over the years. Oh wait, I do. My family strongly believes in never getting rid of anything unless you can hand it down to someone else – and generally, as the only “grown up” of my generation, I’ve been the recipient. Add to that a daughter whose grandparents spoil her like crazy, two toddlers – need I say more – and a husband who was a confirmed bachelor with all the amenities… well, we have a lot of stuff. I keep trying to throw things out, find new homes for things, etc., but it’s not easy.

The obvious answer to all this clutter would be to just stop buying. Well, that seems simple enough. But The Hubster likes his CD’s and DVD’s. I like my kitchen gadgets. Babies always seem to need something, and the other daughter, well, I can’t seem to stop the grandparents.

I get disgusted when I see the display of consumables in the US today. Disposable everything. Even things that were once considered nearly-lifetime purchases – televisions, appliances – are something to be used up until something better comes along, or until someone doesn’t feel like shelling out money to get it fixed instead of just replacing it.

Ah, but I’m a hippycrite. We use disposable diapers and wipes. I use disposable feminine products (yes, there are alternatives). We use lots of paper items, including napkins and paper towels. We seldom recycle.

But man, do I have a collection of non-disposable items here.

For the rest of this month, along with my goal of looking sources of local foods, I want to start phasing out our use of some disposables. I want to look at buying, or making (don’t laugh) cloth napkins, and I want to cut down our paper towel use. I’m also going to call our local sanitation department and find out what recycling programs are available to us – from what I’ve seen, there are two huge dumpsters in an area of town for newspaper and cardboard recycling, and that’s it. I never see recycling bins outside.

I’m trying. I really am.

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The Value of a Nice Long Walk

April 15, 2007 at 7:51 pm (Musings)

The youngest ones were cranky and whiny today, so I decided to take them for a morning walk. Of course, morning turned into near-noon. We went to the store, then the park (for a nice swing), and then back home. One of them fell asleep the last block.

Now, this walk sounds wonderful, peaceful, relaxing. And it should be so much better than driving, right?  A Sunday stroll should be the epitome of enjoying the land without adding to a carbon footprint or dealing with environmental damage.  I’m not so sure about that.

We took off with the kids in a plastic wagon. We went to the local convenience store where I grabbed a 7-up (in a plastic bottle – I really was craving carbonation)  and a pack of cigarettes. Then we went to the park, which I noticed was beautifully free of fire ant piles, unlike the rest of this city (indicating some serious pesticide use), and we played on swings made of some synthetic rubbery substance. We walked home past people with meticulous lawns, many of them with sprinklers going full force (despite the half inch of rain we received yesterday and the inch or so we’re expected to receive Tuesday).  We caught glimpses of backyards that consisted of lawns and flower beds, no veggies. We passed some fruit trees (we have many houses with Japanese plum trees, which are currently in fruit) – and the fruit was rotting on the trees, completely unpicked.

I came back from the walk a little tired, but a little frustrated. Would we have been better served by using the car to head to the park, just a couple of miles away? It would have saved a bit of time, time that could have been used in my own home doing things that would help us become more of a green family. I would have been making positive steps in my own backyard instead of criticizing others.

Hmmm. I’m a hippycrite. I guess that’s the whole point, isn’t it? To remind myself on a daily basis of what I could be doing, what I maybe should be doing, and starting to slowly do it.

But hey – we walked to the park.

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“Think Globally, Eat Locally”

April 13, 2007 at 11:22 pm (Eat locally, Healthy living, Sustainable Agriculture)

This is the cry of many folks these days. In fact, they say if one has to choose between an organic veggie that came from 1000 miles away and a non-organic one bought from the local farmer’s market, the local should win nearly every time.

When I lived out in the country, this was rather easy. Of course, I didn’t buy all of my food at the local markets, but I often made trips to our local produce stand, and twice-weekly farmer’s market. I often stopped at roadside vendors, especially those selling strawberries – a town about 15 miles from me was known for its huge strawberry production. I bought local honey. It was all so incredibly delicious. I felt better. I felt stronger. I felt – gasp – healthier.

And I say that as someone who really doesn’t like most vegetables. I’ll write more about that later, and my experiment/challenge for 2007 later, but just know that it’s really, really hard for me to like most veggies. But not these. The few veggies (and lots of fruit) that I did eat – and the even more veggies that my daughter was made to eat – were amazing. Mmmmm…

Then I moved. And moved again. And moved again. I swear, I’ll have to cut my carbon footprint down to nothing just to make up for all the moves I’ve made in my lifetime.

Anyway, the town in which we are settled at the moment is a produce black hole. Yes, in summer all the old ladies will pass around their extra tomatoes and zucchini, but that’s about it. No one around here seems to grow anything anymore. Only one person that I know raises chickens (mmmm, fresh free range eggs!), but he usually has only enough eggs for his family and a couple of friends. I have searched and searched, but there’s only one source of local honey, and he only has enough for sale for a couple of months out of the year.

So what’s a girl to do? I love the idea of eating locally, but it just doesn’t seem to want to work for me. So in the meantime, I buy what looks freshest at the supermarket (probably a month old by that point), and lament the yucky taste. Let’s not even get into the opportunity to buy organic around here. I could buy organic carrots, some organic spinach and other greens, and, um, hmm… I think that’s about it.

Yes, I’m a hippycrite. I tell everyone I know that they need to eat locally. But I sure don’t do it. I’d like to, though. Maybe I’m just going to have to step up the research? If I can get my 5 member family to eat at least 70% locally, I’d be thrilled. No, even 50% would be wonderful for me.

Okay, that will be a goal for April. I will look harder to find local foods. Much harder. I’ll look into coops (again) and hope for the best.

Here’s some links about eating locally:

100-mile diet

Local Harvest – find local farmers, markets, CSA’s, coops, etc.

Eat local challenge

Eat local food, at Treehugger

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Welcome!

April 13, 2007 at 8:59 pm (Apathy, Introduction)

When I was a tween (of course we didn’t have that lovely term back then) I was a budding tree hugging liberal. I sent money to the World Wildlife Fund. I read all sorts of things about Greenpeace and Amnesty International. I refused to participate in dissections in Biology class – well, the frog one, anyway – and I wanted to join the Peace Corp. Oh, and I read National Geographic like it was a bible.

Then I grew up. Various incidents occurred, not least of which were several very ugly and guerrilla-esque tactics by Greenpeace on a local company that I did not think deserved it. As I got older, I got harder. Oil crisis? Yeah right. Water crisis? Uh-huh. Deforestation? Well, trees are pretty, but still. I just didn’t care, and didn’t see a problem. After all, when it came down to it, everyone was screaming in different directions, competing for my minuscule drops of green blood, telling me how insignificant other groups were. What I took away from that was that they were all insignificant, instead of that most of them were actually important.

Now I’m in my mid-thirties. I have three children. I look at the state of things today and wonder what kind of world they’ll have to grow up in. I didn’t think that I’d see such drastic changes in my short (shush, it is short, relatively speaking) lifespan, much less what’s going to happen in the rest of it and in theirs. And I started really, really thinking about what I was leaving for them.

Then I got frustrated. Again – conflicting information everywhere you go. This is most important. That is most important. The planet will die if you do this, but if you do that, it’ll die faster. Who can keep up?

Well, I’m going to start trying. This blog is to help me navigate the (receding? rising? heating?) waters of various environmental concepts, strategies, implications, scare tactics. Thing is? From what I see, there’s a few things standing in my own way. I do not like spending money, especially money I don’t have. I don’t have much time, nor do I have much patience. I also still get frustrated reading “green” things.

So, come along with me on a little ride, and we’ll see what I can stir up. Every entry will have some information on it, and how I’m a hippycrite for being concerned about but probably doing very little to nothing. But every little bit helps, right?

Thanks for visiting.

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