Truly Small Things

Seriously, are staples that big of a deal?  I don't even use staples all that often.  But I am also seriously fascinated by staple-free "staplers."  They don't actually use any staples to attach paper together...they somehow cut little holes in the paper and then attach the sheets of paper together.  I'm not entirely sure how they work, but I still think I want one.

You never would think that staples make that much of an environmental impact, and truthfully, they probably don't.  But hey, we're again taking the small steps, and eliminating the waste from making staples as well as the tons of non-reusable metal in staples is one small step.

To Dine For

I don’t worry too much about my environmental impact when I eat out at restaurants…maybe I should, but it’s just not a priority right now. But I’ve been thinking a lot more about eating at home, eating at work on my dinner break, and getting take out:

1) Napkins: I’m trying to get into cloth napkins. According to Ideal Bite, it’s actually cheaper to wash and reuse cloth napkins than it is to buy paper ones. Not that I ever buy paper napkins anyways, but I do use paper towels when I need to. In particular, I use paper napkins all the time when I eat dinner at work. They’re just so convenient. I’m working on embroidering some cloth napkins…I’m hoping to eventually have a set for each season…so that I can combine my love for embroidery with being good to the environment. But it’s slow-going. At least my roommate has some cloth napkins that I can use at home. Maybe I need to have a work napkin as well – is that a little weird?
2) Plastic utensils: Plastic utensils are another one of those things that I use at work all the time, along with paper/Styrofoam plates. When I remember, I try to bring utensils from home, but I worry about losing a spoon or something and we have precious little of those. Maybe I need a little portable fork, knife and spoon set that I can just use at work – but then I’d have to wash them every day.
3) Take-out: I’ve been becoming more conscious of how my food is presented to me. For example, when you get your meal to go at Qdoba, they put the container in a (very large) plastic bag. I already hate plastic bags anyway, but I have no need for a plastic bag for the plastic box that I can very easily carry. I also hate being bothersome, so if they’ve already bagged my food, I just take the bag and figure I’ll recycle it. But if I can catch them, I tell them to skip the bag.

I work such hours that I very rarely eat a real meal at home, so I’m always going for the convenient thing…whether that involves bringing my lunch or all too often going out to grab some food. And I just want to be more and more aware of how I’m using resources when I’m eating some yummy grub.

But The Good News Is...

Now this isn't about eco-living, but I did give myself that out in my first post (that is, that this blog is a place where I can also "mull over other ways that making small changes can make big differences in other aspects of life").

Maybe it's partly from working in news, but sometimes I feel like all I hear is gloom and doom, death and destruction. It's one of the things that frustrates me most about news - obviously, we need people to be aware about problems in the world. But I think we also need people to be aware of the good things that happen in life as well. I can't remember how I got linked to this site, but I was so excited to find HappyNews.com. The site publishes real stories, but only positive ones. And I love their philosophy:

"Our basic belief is not that people should be insulated from bad news. Far from it. We encourage people to be fully engaged, fully informed citizens. That means we need to know the good and the bad. We just believe much of the traditional media has strayed from this course, and reports a disproportionate amount of negative news. We are trying to balance the scales back out. Plus, let's be honest, there are some days when we have just "had enough" and need a pick-me-up. Hopefully this site accomplishes that."

Where to Guzzle Gas?

I took a class in college called “Globalize this!” – yes, the teacher really called it that – and it changed a lot of my perspectives on corporate responsibility. I never liked Wal-mart much before, but after some of the things I learned in that class, I never want to give my money to Wal-mart again if I can help it (although I’ll be honest and admit that I have given them some of my money since).

Another company that I learned some information about was Shell. We read some articles about how Shell has treated the people in the areas where the company gets oil and it is disgraceful. I try to never buy gas from Shell. I know that my own personal boycott isn’t going to stop the bad behavior that such companies exhibit, but at the same time, I don’t want to be part of their success either.

Unfortunately, I’m sure there are a lot of companies out there that treat their workers unfairly or exploit their suppliers in third-world countries, and because I don’t know about these problems, I still give these companies my business. Which is why I was interested in an article from the Sierra Club called “Pick Your Poison: An updated environmentalist’s guide to gasoline.”

Until we somehow manage to create a world where we don’t need gasoline, I’m going to have to fill up my car’s tank, and regularly. So what company can I support with my business? None of the oil companies were perfect, but a couple of winners emerged, according to the article. I was somewhat surprised to see that Shell actually was in the middle of the pack (avoid ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil). Unfortunately for me, the top of the barrel companies, BP and Sunoco, don’t have gas stations in my area. But it did make me pleased to see that for years, I’ve been doing business with at least a decent company – in Seattle, I almost exclusively buy gas from Arco/ampm – a BP owned chain.

At this point, economically and practically for me, I buy most of my gas from grocery stores, and I’m not sure where that gas comes from. For all I know, it comes from ExxonMobil and I’m just adding to the problem. I guess I’ll just continue on in ignorance until I’m informed otherwise.

Narrow Your Margins

I really appreciate other people out there who care about the little things you can do in life to make a difference. Maybe a small difference at first. But if enough people follow suit, or over a long enough period of time, that difference can be huge.

And I’m also amazed that people can pick up on something so tiny and make it a crusade. Take Tamara Krinsky for example. Her mission is to get people to narrow their margins. The idea is that when you print documents, if you use narrower margins, you can reduce the number of pages you need to print and therefore reduce the amount of paper you print. (Read all about it on Treehugger.)

Her simple mission has expanded to a petition to Microsoft to change the default settings on Word – currently set at 1.25” – to .75” margins. I really support that concept because then the general public wouldn’t have to make the decision to change the margins; it would just happen automatically. I haven’t actually signed the petition yet though because you have to register with a petition Web site, and I’m not so sure about all that. I’ll just spread the word this way for now.

Think before you print next time. If .75” are too narrow for you, even just changing to 1” margins will help!

Blackle

Reading a post about a black Google is actually what inspired me to take action on getting a blog. I had no other way really of sharing this info.

The concept is that it takes more energy for a computer monitor to display an all white screen than an all black screen. So if a Web site like Google that is used millions of times a day went to a black background, then we could save a considerable amount of energy. It's a very small step, but I think it's a cool concept. It all started with a post on Treehugger about the theory but Google picked up on it and created the alternate site, Blackle.

I haven't decided to make Blackle my official search engine though. I have conflicting interests in this case. Right now, I use a Yahoo-powered search engine called Good Search, which allows you to pick a charity that you "search for." Every time you use the search engine, a portion of the advertising revenue goes to the charity you've picked. And hey, if you're going to use any search engine, might as well give money away for free, right? So I might have to stick with Good Search for now.

But just know that you have options.

Now entering the Blogsphere

I've wanted to have a blog for some time now; I think the concept of having a topical blog is really neat. But I never had a topic to start a blog about, so I never started a blog. But now...ta da! Here I am!

I realized yesterday that there are a lot of cool Web sites and blogs that I look at about living "green" aka environmentally friendly. And I wished that there was a way I could share some of the tidbits I've found. It hit me that this was finally a topic for the blog I wanted to start.

My concept started out as "living green in a blue and yellow world." But I couldn't really figure out exactly what I meant by that. As I thought about, I realized that I think a lot of people are on the extreme sides when it comes to the environment. They are either extremely into living a green lifestyle, or they think being earth-friendly is too much of a burden on them and so they do nothing. Living green then to me was about finding a way to make simple changes in everyday life...finding middle ground.

Finding middle ground is a big idea in my life. There are a few things I've very passionate about and I don't compromise on. For the most part, though, I can see both sides to many arguments. I wanted this blog to not only be a place where I could share ideas I find about how to live an earth-friendly life every day, but also where I could mull over other ways that making small changes can make big differences in other aspects of life.

So now we come to "Green or Blellow?" I wanted this blog to incorporate the original concept of living green but also be open to those other thoughts I might have. And I like the idea that finding middle ground can come in different ways - by blending extremes (blue+yellow blended makes green) or by taking pieces of each one (a little blue together with a little yellow creates "blellow"). It's a metaphor that I'm still trying to figure out, but it's a start.

And I'm all about starting with small steps.