Miss the Feel of a Plastic Bag? Make Your Own!

I know we are on to a new topic, but I'd like to give you all a reason to learn how to knit: a pattern for a shopping bag made to the same dimensions as a "traditional" plastic grocery bag. Enjoy!

DIY energy audit

The U.S. Department of Energy paid my salary for 18 months. Now I am asking them how to make my home less inefficient.

I googled "energy audit diy" and came to their page entitled, "Energy Savers: Do-It-Yourself Home Energy Audits." They suggest a laundry list of things to look for around the house relevant to heat loss (air leaks and insulation), inefficient heating or cooling equipment, and lighting, followed by easy, some expensive, upgrades a home-owner can make. What is missing from their list?

My short list of what the DOE forgot:

1. non-utility appliances: computer, cell-phone charger, radio, TV, DVD player, VHS player, toaster, food processor, mixer, refrigerator, washing machine, clothes dryer, dishwasher, phone ... (maybe the DOE figures people don't want to hear that they should consider "lifestyle appliances" in their calculations).

2. how much non-utility appliances, heating/cooling, and lighting are used on a daily basis within the home ... (message from DOE is that maybe you can still leave the lights on in the other room, as long as they are compact florescent lamps).

3. the buildings I frequent outside of my home. Do I support the mega-store that leaves all its lights on for "security" overnight? Do I use the mall to do my power walk because I am not up to braving "the weather"? Do I go to the gym and use electronic equipment to burn calories? (message from DOE: start at home, thats what HGTV told us was right.)

Looking forward to energy audit

My house is really inefficient, and this has been an issue for some time now. Time to confront it!

Rockin your Pesachs off, Seasonally

Next week is Passover, which is one of my favorite holidays. Unfortunately, the seder that I usually attend is this weekend, so I will be sulking accordingly. I'm only sort of joking. Passover is great, specifically because of its ritualized eating interwoven with stories. Our Passover (celebrated at a friend's house) is fairly nontraditional, and the stories always include a political element.

For those of you who don't know, Passover celebrates Moses and the freeing of the Jews from the Egyptians (Boo, Pharaoh!), but a lot of the celebrating centers around the symbolism behind the food we eat (Jonathan Safran Foer does an excellent job of describing this in his book, Eating Animals).

On that note, check out this awesome website, where you can learn more about how Passover is a also celebration of the seasonal changes, and the seder plate as well as the other food reflects this. To learn more about Passover as a political experience, you can see what I wrote here.

Behaving Badly

Do you behave differently away from home?

I just got back from Florida which made me realize how challenging it is to be sustainable while traveling.

At home, I use towels for a week. In the hotel, I found myself using several per day—tossing hand towels frivolously in the corner and using bath towels as a bathmat runway. I drank from the plastic cups and tossed them, opened all the toiletries, left the air conditioning running, and took extra long, extra hot showers.

Staying at a hotel was a no-holds barred excuse to behave badly and now that I’m back home, I am feeling rather guilty.

If I was a steadfast environmentalist, here’s how my stay should have gone:

-Notify the hotel that it is not necessary to change sheets and towels

-Turn off A/C, lights and unplug everything upon leaving

-Leave the little bottles of amenities unopened and use your own

-Write names on cups

-Ask for an e-bill upon checkout

So, for me, reform is just reminding myself to travel as I live.

Beyond "Green-Washing"

I have always been wary about big corporations claiming to be "green" or taking steps in that direction, but apparently Wal-Mart is getting kinda serious about it. They have been researching the excessive energy use beyond just their "big box" Super-centers. Wally World is looking to cut down on their carbon footprint significantly in the next 5 years. Here is the link:

http://www.terrapass.com/blog/posts/wal-mart-reaches-beyond-low-hanging-fruit?utm_source=bronto&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Wal-Mart+reaches+beyond+low-hanging+fruit&utm_content=chasetours%40aol.com&utm_campaign=Newsletter+03%2F24%2F10

If businesses are jumping on the green band wagon because it is lucrative or popular, so be it, as long as they are really doing something and can be held accountable if they aren't...

Challenge with a Capital “C”

After two months of our urban sustainability challenge, I’m not sure how to rate myself. For every small waste-saving victory, there were several waste-producing slip-ups. For each celebrated purchase of locally grown food, there were countless bites of “place-less” products whose origins I could only guess at. And for every apple core and egg shell I reverently laid in my new vermicomposting box, there were handfuls of other food scraps I guiltily dumped in the trash.

It sounds depressing to put it like this, but I’ve come to recognize that having an interest in living sustainably in a city includes cycles of ups and downs. Both practically—with stretches of responsible behavior interrupted by sustainability blunders—and emotionally—with periods of optimism broken by dark nights of despair. More than anything else, these weeks of hyperawareness have hammered home this point: carving out a low-impact, light-on-the-earth urban existence is not an easy undertaking. It requires not just a commitment to personal transformation, but a willingness to circumvent the system. That means making the personal public, saying no when everyone else is saying yes, making decisions that are the very opposite of convenient, spending money with extreme care and purposefulness, never letting down your guard.

Reading about some of the people who have truly transformed their lives to be more sustainable, I realize that I’m not even close to that point. And if it’s this hard for me, I can imagine how impossible it seems for all the regular Joes out there. Most people aren’t going to be willing or able to put in the work to change themselves within a structure that makes it downright difficult. As urban environmental leaders, we need to think beyond what we can do on our own toward how we can make it more convenient (not just trendier) for others. After reading Cradle to Cradle, I’ve started questioning the idea that saving the earth requires a major sacrifice on the part of spoiled first world citizens. Maybe that is the real challenge for UELs within our cohort and beyond—to create a society where healing, preserving, and nurturing the environment coincides with the easy choice for everyone.

changing behavior one person at a time

I think when we look at our individual behavior and try and change it, it is impossible to ignore the behavior of those around you. Sort of joking, sort of serious, I told my boyfriend he owed me a dollar every time he brought home a plastic bag. Here’s the thing. After surgery I could not do anything for myself. It’s bad enough that I am texting him at work begging to bring home lime popicles or something else. I have it good, if I needed something for dinner, a missing ingredient Seth will always pick it up on his way home from work. How then can I turn around and bitch at him for getting parsley, putting that in a bag, and then taking a plastic bag. It’s hard, I can shoot glances at him, but really he’s trying. I made $4 on the, you owe me a dollar everytime you bring home a bag. But honestly when I first got out of the hospital, and was sick, I was so happy to have those extra plastic bags lying around the house, trust me, you don’t want to throw up in a paper bag. So in situations like that the plastic bags were my BFF. I threatened to blog about him and how bad his habits were. It’s hard to try and change your lifestyle when your boyfriend/girlfriend/partner/husband/wife/kids, don’t want to change, or understand that you are trying to change for more than just an assignment for school, but because it will benefit all. Just when I thought I was beating a dead horse, the other day he came home and said he had a present for me. I was super excited, what could it be? It was a stack of about 15 plastic sandwich bags that he had brought his snacks to work in and did not throw out. Maybe I am making some headway! Granted 3 of them were so gross, they could not be re-used, but baby steps, right. Good job Seth for trying to change your wasteful behavior.

My Ziploc Stash

I use a great deal of ziploc bags. They are great at holding goldfish, cheerios, cubes of frozen baby food, puzzle pieces, baby wipes, dirty laundry, extra cheese, cookies, and deli meat. Ironically, plastic bags ... including those advertised to be practically indestructible ... are viewed as trash. Not just disposable; trash. Did you know how many times or how long the same bag can carry your sandwich, that extra bit of cheese, or puzzle pieces? Thicken them up a bit, add a top, and they become tupperware, or make them bigger and they become the now universal plastic organizing bin; obviously not trash.

How do we distinguish between trash and not trash? Or better yet, how do we decide to reuse something verses throwing it in the landfill bound or recycling center bound bin? Its all in the packaging and the advertising, not in the item.

How many times have I reached for the cheaper option, knowing full well that it will likely last 1/2 the time that the slightly more expensive option will? How many times have I thrown out a ziploc, just because I didn't feel like cleaning it? Back to my politics of a dishwasher post. Imagine you treated your glassware, or the plates in your kitchen, that way: throwing them away rather than cleaning them. Imagine considering the true lifespan of a product before bringing it into your life ... i.e. purchasing it or borrowing it.

Now, here's an image. Rural, yes; applicable to urban living, absolutely! I am about to introduce you to my aunt. After boarding horses at her farm in Oakdale, CA (the other home of Hershey's chocolate) for many years, she moved north to a plot of land abutting her dad in the coastal redwoods. She and her husband lived in a trailer for over a year while they built their off-the-grid dream house. She gets her electricity from the sun, water from the forest spring/wells, vegetables from the organic garden whose "soil" is all composted table scraps and horse poop from the two elderly horses she brought with her. She makes an overabundance of vegetables that she eats herself and she sells the extra at the farmers market in town along with potted native plants (forest weeds that she repots in donated plastic -- reusable --pots). She has a side business of landscaping in native plants for summer homes of the wealthy up the road. How much trash does she output? This is an area where there is no trash pickup. She goes to the dump ONCE every OTHER YEAR and she has the same number of barrels as my neighbor in Medford. TWO. She is a reduce, reduce, reuse, reuse, recycle queen.

I look to my aunt Cate for guidance and know that she would at least partially approve of my box of reused ziplocs and the lunch I sent Charlie to school with this morning: 3 tupperwares. One had a sandwich, one had goldfish, and one had a peeled, boiled egg. The only trash will be his juice box and the Stonyfield Farm YoBaby container. At home, we would throw away the juice box and reuse or recycle the yogurt container after throwing away the seal. No hope of that at preschool, hence the tupperwares. I am tired of loosing ziplocs from my stash.

My message of the day is adopt a "Aunt Cate" attitude today. See how much money you save; see how invigorated you are by that extra little bit of time and effort you put into your life. As for me, I am trying to channel her wisdom bit by bit.

Manual labor

This does not apply directly to food or packaging, but I felt that it was important: Last week, the power saw that I use in fence repairs kicked the bucket. While another was being ordered, I was required to use a good old fashioned hand saw. I now have a much more intimate respect for power tools AND for how things got done on a farm pre-electronics. I reflected on how convenient and even lazy it was to simply press a button and brrrrrrr! the wood is sliced like butter. Then, I reflected on the monotonous, and sometimes frustrating task of hand-cutting wood. Not that is was too hard to do, it was just not so darn easy like before!

Yesterday, I went to lunch with my mother. After we finished, my mom asked for a to-go box for the leftovers. I knew in my mind that it would end up in my hands, and this time I didn't really want the leftovers. She always reminds me that eating leftovers is better than buying new food every single time you go to eat. I reluctantly took the box (made of styrofoam). What bothered me is that it is next to impossible to live simply without having to fight hard at every turn. I should finish my meal, and if I don't I should box it up and eat it later. But I shouldn't have to support the use of styrofoam in order to be efficient and money-saving in my eating.

Balcony Salad Bar

Last week I sowed seeds for my balcony salad bar. Despite a few days of torrential rain, the seeds withstood a washout and have germinated. The waiting list for a community garden plot in Arlington is one to two years (really irritating considering all of the untended plots I count while running by) and I no longer have even a rented backyard to dig around in, so container gardening it is!

I planted Encore lettuce mix, arugula, Tatsoi (an Asian green related to bok choy), and Minutina (a succulent green that looks like grass)—all varieties we grew at the Local Food Project at Airlie, but this is my first attempt at cultivating them in pots.

There’s something very intimate about having these baby plants right outside my door. Rather than being out in the field, away from my house, my kitchen, and my dinner table, these greens seem like members of my household, more like houseplants than crops, except that I will eventually eat them, the ultimate plant/human connection. Already I am doting on them (see how many baby pictures I posted?) and I imagine they’ll become a regular fixture in my everyday life as the temperatures warm up, the sunlight stays later, and the leaves become mature enough to clip for salads.

Growing food in pots has its limits (last year’s tomato plant got fried to a crisp before putting out more than a few leaves), but there’s something special about it that ties into household subsistence. In a city, people depend on imported goods for even their most basic needs. Harvesting a bit of supper from a balcony (or front stoop or back porch or windowsill) emancipates city dwellers from the oppressive role of constant consumer and turns them into producers, if only on the smallest of scales. I’m looking forward to eating off my own land.

My Action Project

Hello Everyone

Just wanted to share details about my action project. I have organized a communal cooking event at my place of residence, (where all of you have visited). Just to refresh your minds, I live with a community of women from all ethinc and socioeconomic backgrounds. The first event is scheduled for this Sunday March 21. I have 5 participants that have agreed to attend. The purpose of my action project is to gather women from my residence together and cook ethinic cuisine, share a meal together and talk about food sustainability. I plan to make homemade pierogies which are unique to my Polish origin. I plan to have another cooking event in mid April that will include a shopping excursion for organic produce at a local farm with the same group and perhaps new faces who are unable to attend this weekend's event.

Meghan

Sustainable Teeth are Happy Teeth?

I bought a new toothbrush a while ago and I got one of those eco-friendly brushes (the brand is Preserve; they sell it at Whole Foods). The brush has a 100% recycled handle, made from mostly yogurt cups, the packaging is completely recyclable as well, and it doubles as a traveling case for the brush. When you're done with it, you can mail it back.

The problem (there's always a problem), is that it's not a great toothbrush. In fact, it looks like those crummy brushes you get at the dentist's for free. Also, I wonder how many people actually send their brush back to get a new one- I know it's about time to get a new one, but I'm resisting the idea solely because I don't want to go through the hassle of mailing it in.

I do indeed like and want to like buying more environmentally-positive products (not just "less bad" ones, if you catch my drift), but they always seem to be both overpriced and (frequently) made of poorer quality than "regular" products, which is such a disincentive! Nobody is going to be successful in making this anything more than a niche product if they don't overcome these two boundaries and make these products more accessible. I'll probably get another one of these brushes, but I strongly resent my lack of options. And in the grand scheme of environmentalism, most people might not continue to purchase overpriced, poor-quality products just because it makes them "feel good." It isn't worth it.

Meal Planning 101

This is the class I need. I realized this all over again after my dogma box arrived Friday afternoon. I did make risotto for my family--husband loved it, Charlie not so much--with two onions from the box. The apples were yummy, especially the earthy smell they had. I had to ask for help identifying the turnip and beets, a sobering experience. Am I such a grocery store junkie that when a box of food is dropped at my door without packaging, including no ID tags, I am unable to tell what to do with it?

Yes.

Wait! This is just another skill that I should not chastise myself for not having. We should not expect ourselves to be perfect at things we haven't practiced. We should revel in the identification and contemplation of those "missing bits" and put that energy wasted on guilt into learning.

I am getting out my cookbooks for my first lesson of meal planning 101. But first, google:

Save money and time with menu planning
at Menus4Moms.com

Now with beautiful color pictures!

Have skyrocketing food prices got you down?

Have you ever gotten home from an expensive trip to the grocery store and realized you still don't have anything to make for dinner?

Have you tried to figure out where you can cut costs but just can't seem to find any extra in the budget?

Did you know that you can spend less money at the store and less time in the kitchen with one simple tool? In fact...

You can save up to 15 hours and $120 every month by shopping and cooking with a well-crafted menu plan every week.

Irony here is that planning will reduce cost to the planet in thrown away food (and its packaging) and to the consumer in reduced money. Urban communities need to step up and provide this information since its not in the grocery industry's best interest to suggest that its customers buy less. First step, mother's groups and college students, maybe even high schoolers.

Non-Local Eats

My mother recently gave me a rather undeserved and random surprise: a gift card to Whole Foods! Being one of my favorite stores in town, I was like a little kid with candy. I rushed over to the store and began searching for "Kentucky Proud" products, items with a sticker on them that ensures the consumer they are purchasing local goods. To my horror, the great big organic/fair-trade store in Lexington has almost ZERO local products! I am all for sustainable farming and stopping the exploitation of farmers from around the world, but in light of what we have been discussing this semester I am curious of just how much Whole Foods is " helping save the world on step at a time" as they claim on banners all over the store. Sure, those acai berries are grown in a way that an agricultural family gets paid and the rain forest remains relatively safe, but what about the fossil fuels it takes to ship fair-trade products around the globe??? It is almost like taking two steps forward and one step back, in my opinion.

I do have some good things to say however: the groceries I got from Whole Foods had significantly less packaging than the local products from the Good Foods Co-Op I purchased last month!!! The mushrooms I bought actually had a container that is compostable, and several of the other items had almost 100% recycled packages.

So I sacrificed local eating for better packaging this time around. It is unfortunate that such an awesome store doesn't support more Kentucky farmers. I understand that this is a chain store, but I'd like to think that doing some regional research for local products couldn't be that timely or expensive...

Buckets of Rain

The rain has inhibited my ventures into the out of doors.  I traveled to Brooklyn this weekend through torrential downpour, in hopes of having a small mental vacation.  We were in, possibly, a city with the best public transit system in the country, but found ourselves consistently searching for parking along the busy streets.  Perhaps the excuse was that the public transportation within a borough is not adequate; or the torrential rain would soak through our nonexistent rain coats and poorly chosen shoes; or perhaps, we have just been spoiled by the willingness of our peer to drive us around the city.  Although our excursions were not done in a sustainable way, we made an effort to be conscious of our food consumption in support of local urban economy.  

I have noticed that I make a conscious effort to consume in a sustainable manner, and that I know what is manageable.  Although it is a small matter, I was rather proud of myself for spending a good part of the day out of my apartment yesterday, even through the rain.  I had a vanilla chai and a hot chocolate over the course of two hours.  I consciously asked for both items to be "for here" and not "for here" in paper cups.  I looked around the café, 1369 Coffee House, and noticed several people sitting in for their beverages but drinking out of paper cups.  I was a little disheartened to see a pretty enviro-conscious coffee place not pushing their patrons who dine/drink-in to use glasses and mugs, as opposed to the very disposable paper cups.  

where's my shopping cart?

I want a shopping cart. I think it would be a good idea. I would never have to get a bag, or remember to bring my reusable bag, I’d just bring my cart and keep it in the car, so if I was going to take the T, its easy to bring its not huge. Think of all the food I could get at haymarket.

And really this type of cart is not a new “green” idea. They have been around forever. And I think that’s why I want one. Until I was about 7 years old my family lived in Jackson Heights, Queens. I remember my great aunt and I going out all the time to the park, and then the store, always take the cart. I had to hold a hand or hold the cart. Maybe I want one so bad because I remember taking the cart and getting to go to this toy store on Northern Blvd. But the point is, people have been using them forever. And in my perfect world, this is how you get people to use them. Charge for bags, plastic or paper it does not matter. To examples: Ikea and Whole Foods. At whole foods you save .05 cents if you bring your own bag. At Ikea they charge you for a bag. Now for some reason I can not pay 5 cents for a bag, I will carry all the things I buy at Ikea with no bag, I don’t want to pay. And yet at whole foods when I’m only saving 5 cents its not as tempting of an idea. I am wondering why stores don’t just charge for bags. It seems it would be the easiest way to get everyone on board, green or not. When you put a price on things people start to pay attention. Now I have to go buy a shopping cart.

Trust the Worms

I recently began my odyssey into learning a distinctly urban skill: vermicomposting. Since I don’t have an outdoor space to build a compost pile (which I stealthily tried out in the backyard of the house we used to rent) and it bugs me to throw all of my produce scraps in the trash (I used to tote my compost pail to the Local Food Project’s big 4x4 foot compost bin), I figured I should join the ranks of other waste-conscious urban environmental citizens and set up a worm bin.

I’m only a few weeks into it and already there have been challenges. The first trick was finding a place to put the thing. Our kitchen is tiny and has no unused nooks or crannies where a box of decomposing food, shredded paper, and worms could unobtrusively do their thing. When I saw Alex’s homemade worm bin (a lot smaller than the large and expensive worm towers marketed to well-meaning UECs) I realized I could make my own compact bin that would fit handily inside the coat closet.

I got up the nerve to order some Red Wigglers (a type of worms ideal for vermicomposting) and then this happened: Roscoe howled (as he usually does when the FedEx man shows up). I hadn’t received an email saying the worms had been shipped, but I went downstairs to check anyway: a small box rested next to the neighbor’s door. I went back inside. The next morning, the box was still there. I peeked at the label. Ack! My worms had been sitting there all night!

Rushing around in the ten minutes before I had to leave for work, I drilled holes in the bin’s lid, ripped open the FedEx box and emptied the worms (along with some soil) into the bottom, tossed in some spinach and an apple core, blanketed them with shredded paper, and slung the whole thing into the closet. I worried all day. Were they still alive? And would this even work? Did I have the right ratio of worms to soil to bedding? Would it start to stink? Did I put in enough food?

The jury’s still out on my worm bin. I don’t think I’m the best vermicompost manager. But I checked just now and even though an apple core I recently added looked untouched, there was no trace of that first handful of spinach. Maybe those little wigglers are getting used to their new urban home.

Not so sustainable...

I've noticed, as the weather has turned from cold to less cold, that the cities and towns have been using sand instead of salt on roads, sidewalks, and parking lots.  It has come to my attention that sand is apparently more friendly to the state of asphalt roads and parking lots.  There have been slightly less potholes and crevasses in the roads this year.  Happy driving to all you car-owning people.  

Picture this.  A public school in the private sector.  Non-profit.  A sustainability-conscious boss.  Sand covers the parking lot between the two campuses of the school.  One person is sweeping the remnants of sand covering the raised white lines that signify where to park.  He carefully creates piles in random places around the lot.  I see him collecting the sand in a trash barrel; I assume he is going to dump it along a designated area in the learning park (almost an acre of land to the right of the parking area).  Guess again.

Flash forward to school cafeteria.  Several students are refusing the meal or picking at the chef salad in front of them.  One refuses to eat and simply throws it all away.  Paper plates.  Paper milk cartons.  Chocolate milk with high fructose corn syrup.   Plastic cups for water.  Paper napkins and plastic utensils.  The trash bin is overflowing with mostly uneaten salad, orange peels, napkins, and half-drunk milk.  How wasteful...

Trash.  I walk with one of my students to take the trash to the dumpster, grateful for him volunteering in the first place.  We need not open the dumpster because its mouth is already agape.  What do we find?  A mouthful of sand.  The neat piles of sand previously placed in a trash receptacle are now to be found taking up a good three-quarters of the dumpster.  The trash almost didn't fit.  Curious. 

Seattle has a place to recycle sand, where it is cleaned and reused.  Where's Boston's initiative?

 

Sustainable Agriculture

Hello All
I recently began reading the periodical Urban Farm: Sustainable City Living and I came across an interesting article entitled "P is for Prosper"by Debbie Moors about Will Allen, the urban gardening pioneer that has built an amazing organization around food justice called Growing Power, Inc in Milwaukee, WI. Check out the website at www.growingpower.org. His story is inspiring. This organization also holds national conferences that I may check out in one of the cities offered.

Anyways, this week I purchased Teddie Peanut butter, from a local company in Everett, MA, pita bread from Lawrence, MA and hummus from NH. I eat these three items at least four times a week since I have cut out a lot of meat in my diet and therefore have to supplement with lots of protein. To those of you who eat mostly veggies any hints on what to eat during the winter months?

Nail Time

During our first UEL cohort in August, we were all riding the subway and Melanie was chatting away about all of the environmental hazards in her neighborhood— and I specifically remember her mentioning nail salons and how environmentally destructive and harmful to human health these businesses are, not to mention that they produce a tremendous amount of hazardous waste.

I knew I was in trouble right then and there. See, you will rarely seem my naked nail bed. My nails are almost always polished—covered in Ballet Slipper Pink, Big Apple Red or Mrs. O'Leary's BBQ.

In terms of urban issues, this is certainly one that I grapple with (I actually had a 1 o’clock mini-mani appointment during my lunch break today).

Before I left for my appointment, I started researching…In 2007 Time magazine named nail salon work one of the worst jobs in the United States because of the toxic products used in most shops. Nevertheless, the industry has more than tripled in size during the past decade and rakes in $6 billion annually. I also read a story about a nail technician who worked in nail salons for over 15 years and discovered that her baby had died in the womb when she was eight months pregnant. She believes the fetus died because of exposure to toxic chemicals in salons, specifically from acrylic, or fake, nails.

I found this terrific Boston-based organization, The Safe Nail Project, that is working towards protecting workers and the public from nail salon chemicals including feature formaldehyde-free polishes, organic lotions, and improved ventilation, proper disposal, among other things.

Plus the organization created these cute little wallet-sized cards with a list of “three free” nail polishes (“three free” are nail polish without toluene, formaldehyde and dibutyl phthalate). I printed one out and brought it today to my appointment; I doubt I’ll ever give up manicures and pedicures, but I will definitely make an effort to choose healthier products.

Getting a manicure with environmentally friendly nail polish:

Ha! Ha! I am hiring an organizer.

I am a true yuppy housewife now. I have a cleaning service twice a month and now I have hired an organizer to come tell me how to deal with my family's stuff.

Why?? Well, to be fair, I have just scheduled reconstructive surgery on my foot for the middle of May. I need to plan how I am going to get through 6-8 weeks on crutches. Thankfully, I have some time.

I am excited to incorporate sustainable practices into our family life (with the help of a fellow mother professional) because it will give me the opportunity to impose them ... but more on that later.

Children’s Environmental Literacy Foundation

Click HERE for the CELF Summer Institute and have the opportunity to earn 3 graduate credits!

The idea here is to learn how to incorporate sustainability into middle and high school curriculum. 

CELF Summer Institute in Boston! July 19 - 23

They are currently pursuing 2 types of funding for course attendees.  Both of these will be available to educators who commit to developing 2 lessons for the MA Education for Sustainability  Curriculum Pilot (being spearheaded by BLS Youth CAN).  

- Tuition scholarships (pending funding) will be available to public school educators

- Stipends will be available (pending funding) to all teachers, public and private (likely to be in the amount of $300)

Dinner and a City Council Meeting

I'm enjoying some homemade bread and split pea soup while watching a relatively spirited Cambridge City Council meeting. Since beginning our program, I've been watching more local access cable to better acquaint myself with city politics. It requires some discipline to remain patient through the tedious procedural discourse. For example, if this blog post were conducted at the pace of this ongoing meeting, it would read: I will now proceed with paragraph two. All in favor say "Aye" all opposed "No" - the decision to move onto paragraph two is adopted.

The ongoing "Item Six" of tonight's meeting is addressing the important urban environmental subject of street trees (see Cambridge Urban Forest Canopy Assessment). While watching the meeting thus far, I have noted the following interesting facts:

1) Over the duration of an 18 month period, January 2009 through June 2010, the city has committed to plant 550 street trees. There are approximately 20,000 existing street trees within the bounds of the City of Cambridge.

2) If a resident requests a replacement street tree (at an existing tree box) the city typically replaces the tree within a fiscal year. 

3) If a resident requests a tree at a location without a tree box, and that site is deemed suitable, the resident is required to pay $400 to prepare the sidewalk for the new tree.

4) Street trees are also available free of charge at the "back of sidewalk" which extends fifteen feet from the public right of way.

5) The cost of a typical street tree is $550.

6) The cost of a typical memorial plaque is $550.

Upon recognizing the cost parity of 5 and 6, Councilor Kelley interjected "Let's plant more trees and put up less plaques!"

*Chuckle*

Also discussed was leveraging "public volunteers" to survey the condition of existing trees. Councilor Seidel made this recommendation, without the foggiest idea of how to gather the data or source the volunteers. I thought this was particularly relevant to our encounter with citizen science. If a member of our class was a city council appointee, I think he/she would have introduced citizen scientists as a feasible resolution.

Now back to dinner, and Cambridge budget appropriations.  This meeting is adjourned.

Sustainability at Preschool

Today Charlie went off to school with his new sandwich box. I emblazoned his name on the top and side with purple Sharpie to ensure that the women at Rockland (they are all women teachers) would get the point. A plastic tupperware box with snap down sides is obviously not trash.

Ironically, neither are small plastic sandwich bags which can be used over and over again for a multitude of things: snacks, organizing cubes of frozen baby food or toys, etc.

How do I make the point that the packaging of his school lunch is not trash?

Step 1. Build a Better Lunch Box or Bag

The first lunch box I had for Charlie was a six-pack cooler. Is there something about beer that says, "I throw useful things away"? I guess. When I started him at his first day care center, I brought his milk and homemade baby food in this box and gel free disposable diapers. We used cloth diapers at home, but using reusable at the center would have been too complicated because of their health regulations. My choice of disposables and homemade baby food labeled our family as "earthy crunchy" and no packaging was ever thrown out from that six-pack lunch box.

Charlie's preschool requires that kids that aren't potty trained yet be in Pull-Ups. There are no gel free alternatives on the market. There are no reusable alternatives on the market. Phooey. I do realize that early potty training would have been the eco-friendly choice here, but I am not into pushing my child to follow the development pattern of some "average". Anyway, so our family wasn't branded "earthy crunchy" and sandwich bags began to disappear from the six-pack bag.

Sharpie to the rescue. More precisely, the Whole Foods brand to the rescue.

I took a small reusable shopping bag from Whole Foods (cost=$0.79) and wrote our last name across the top. Ironically, this bag is about three times the size of the six-pack box and less than a third of the price. Fewer sandwich bags get thrown out from this Whole Foods bag because of the social implications of using a reusable bag from "Whole Paycheck". Somehow the reusable bags from Johnny's FoodMaster, Michaels, Stop and Shop, and Target (all more money that this lunch size bag from Whole Foods) don't command the same "earthy crunchy" label. Maybe that is why they appear to be reused less often outside of the grocery shopping realm.

Step 2. Go Tupperware.

Charlie's reusable sandwich box cost just over a dollar at the grocery store, less than a box of ziploc sandwich bags. I could be doing this all because I am cheap, not just eco-conscious.

Step 3. Speak out.

... not to the school, to other parents. I haven't done this yet, but I feel like explaining the simple cost cutting measures achieved by finding a way to label yourself an eco-conscious family. (SHOUTING) Do this before your child gets to Elementary School!!! ... especially if the place doesn't have a school lunch program. Or, better yet, opt out until the school adopts your cost saving politics (the politics of a good dishwasher). Just imagine the space savings at the local town or municipal dump.

Bringing Back the Bento Box

My most memorable childhood gift was from my father. He traveled to Japan on business when I was young, maybe five or six, and came back with a present for me: a bento-box. I had never seen anything like it—it was cute, white and pink, with a Hello-Kitty logo and all of these cool, puzzle-like design components. Even at six, I had a strange affinity for food and all its trappings, so for me, this compartmentalized lunch box was the best gift ever.

I brought that bento box to school all through kindergarten. My mom would fill the little sections with all sorts of weird goodies: refried beans, brown rice, yogurt, and almond butter and seaweed crackers. I remember kids at the lunch table gawking as they munched on florescent orange cheese puffs and red dye #40 gummy snacks; clearly they were just jealous, right?

I still have the bento box and although I don’t use it anymore, its values and significance have stayed with me all these years. The Asian culture created the bento box as a traveling meal. Many other cultures have adopted this concept. I noticed this blue itemized container in my boyfriend’s Tupperware drawer and he explained that in Denmark they use something called a madkasse (lunch box)—it’s a “European” style bento used for sandwiches is called smørrebrød.

One big change in my life has been returning to the packed lunch. In Florida at my magazine job, I had lunch out everyday: sushi, salads and sandwiches. My boyfriend’s situation was no better: coffee and bagel sandwich in the morning then pizza or a sub for lunch. I the grad student and he the artist have no business wasting money on food—not to mention the waste of materials, time, energy and calories consumed from eating out all the time. Did you know that fast food packaging creates 1.7 million tons of trash every year in the form of boxes, plastic or paper bags, plastic forks, etc.?

Now, I try and bring my own food whenever possible. Creating a meal at home is way cheaper and healthier than eating out. I pack our lunch before work. Today we have homemade pasta salad with whole wheat noodles, organic cherry tomatoes and arugula, my leftover local goat cheese, and some very-delicious and very-unsustainable rosemary ham (oh well, it was almost perfect). Our food gets packed up in reusable plastic containers with cloth napkins and stainless-steel silverware in insulated lunchboxes.


My poll today: how waste free was your lunch today? Did you bring your lunch today? Or, if you work at home, did you make your lunch at home?

Consciousness...

Since our last meeting as a class, I have been thinking about the choices I make regarding my food and my resistance to trying something new.  Although I know what I should be eating and that I should be trying new ways of being a more sustainable community member, I find myself still resisting change.  

I find myself more apt to support local businesses rather than worrying if the food or products themselves come from a local source.  By local businesses, I do mean local restaurants.  I stay away from chain restaurants, and I have slipped a few times with the high fructose corn syrup... I do however now read the label much more often.

Did you know that the 1/2% chocolate milk made by Hood (local bee-tee-dubs) has HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP?!?!?!?!?!?!?! Public schools ban vending machines in Massachusetts... No more soda... They thought they were eliminating the levels of high fructose corn syrup... Think again Massachusetts... Major fail. 

 

Poop bags.

Poop bags.

If you live in the city with a dog you know where I am coming from. If you have ever seen someone in an urban environment walking a dog a dog, you pray they have one. It is the law to remove dog waste from city areas. Some places, where I used to live in Brookline, you could not even walk you dog in front of certain buildings incase your dog peed on their pristine piece of grass. I don’t know if it is because I got Japser, (my dog), when I lived in Utah, and lived in the country with him for 4 years, or what, but he will ONLY go the bathroom on grass.

As I am trying to reduce my packaging and change my consumption behavior I look to my dog. Every day we use 2 plastic bags. I used to buy those little blue bags that people attach to their dog’s leashes. Then, even before this project I would ask my roommates, and co-workers to save their plastic bags from the grocery store and give them to me. So I saved some money on not buying these little blue poop bags. They were expensive, around $10 at petco, just to pick up dog poop.

Then, we moved to Nantucket for the summer. Nantucket has a law where stores can not use plastic bags. Everything comes in a paper bag. Which is fine for me, I came prepared for the summer bringing 2 re-usable bags from Trader Joe’s. Here came the problem. We lived on conservation land. If the people in Brookline got mad at dogs peeing on their little green spots outside of their buildings, you can only imagine how the people of Nantucket would act. I wish I had come prepared to the island but I had to buy a $40 “pooper scooper”. Really $40? Well it’s Nantucket, and it said ACK dog on the handle. Shoppers down there are suckers. But because of where I lived, (the Umass Boston field station), we were lucky enough to have the garbage colleted. Most people brought it to the dump, which was on the other side of the island. They are very strict in Nantucket. My friend who also went down there and worked at the Yacht Club was fined $100 for throwing that weird little piece of plastic that comes from when you open a new bottle of milk, she threw that in the garbage instead of the recycling. Big mistake. So I would have to scoop the poop into paper bags and then dispose of it in the big clear plastic bag.

Now after working on this UEL project I have looked at the poop bags to see where I could cut back. I am pleased to say that I try to get the dog to poop in the yard and pick it up with a shovel and put it in the big trash, but I have been saving “non-traditional” bags. Now on our walks I may use a bag from an old loaf of bread, or the 3 pack of romaine lettuce. We were actually stopped last night on a walk down by Jamaica Pond by a woman who said it was great that I was re-using bags, and was going to start using her old bread bags. Win-Win.

Inedible Foodlike Products

I hate scrambled eggs and also french fries due to unfortunate stomach virus-related incidents. Actually, I don't hate them; when I look at scrambled eggs or french fries, my brain just says "not food." That is, I don't even register them as food anymore. In a less-gross example, my kosher friends tell me that they have the same response to bacon and shellfish. It just does not register as something edible.

Michael Pollan writes that we should call junk food (soda, Cheez Doodles, etc) "edible food-like substances" instead of food, because once we define a thing as "not food" it becomes extremely difficult to then justify consuming that not-food.

I'm working on directing my brain towards not accepting junk food as food, but as an "edible food-like substance." It's not that hard; I've come a long way from the middle schooler who (yes) ate Skittles and salt-and-vinegar chips for lunch. I don't really ever eat candy anymore and I've all but dropped chips (not tortilla ones, however) and haven't touched Cheez Doodles in years. Wouldn't it be incredible if we could harness the awesome power of the gross-out moment (not for eggs or french fries, naturally, but for bad not-food) - not in an Upton Sinclair/Supersize Me/Eating Animals sort of way- but in an extremely personal way, in which our bodies tell us, "this is not food."

Hey all,

The post from March 6th was supposed to be for Dawn's blog, but I guess it works for this one too, kinda, not really...

What I intended on blogging about was my confession. I have all but failed on reducing the use of plastic! Whether it is forgetting to use my personal grocery bag instead of allowing my groceries to be bagged, or realizing something was expired on the date and throwing it out. Not that it is sustainable to eat food that is old, but that I obviously bought more food than necessary if it is still there to spoil. And with all the local food that I have been enjoying, much of it is wrapped in seemingly needless plastic.

It becomes difficult to live conveniently and be sustainable. My hometown is sprawled out, with a lack luster public transit system; completely paving the way (no pun intended) for constant personal auto use. Walking to and from the grocery store in many places is like a bad joke. It is

I do have a recycling bin, and as part of my confession, I am lazy about it. If I am in a hurry, I don't separate things, or just toss everything in the trash. It is a bad habit that I am working on...

On a good note, I intend on growing veggies and continuing to eat Kentucky grown products!

Some Down Home Networking

My core network right now is family: my grandmother provided some good resources after talking with her about servant-leadership, and my mother's busy schedule is a resource in itself. After working as a pharmacist by day, she then shares her time with a free health clinic at our church, as well as the clothing bank and programs to help Lexington's homeless.

The action project in Brian's course has put me in touch with some people who will also prove to be valuable in becoming an effective leader. Connecting with people is becoming the best way for me to learn so far. I try to reflect the good attributes of people I admire and respect. It doesn't always work, but it is a good practice for me.

EPA checklist

Hi All, I thought this check list from the EPA was interesting compared to what we had come up with in class to change our behavior. They challenge people to do 5 out of 10.
http://www.epa.gov/pick5/

A Glass of the Good Stuff

At the beginning of our challenge, I looked at my packaging waste from a single day and honed in on a large juice carton as one of the things bugging me most about my trash. Since then, I have bought other cartons of OJ, but continued to wonder if I could find a more sustainable option. After reading an article last fall about the orange juice industry and what really happens to juice that’s “not from concentrate” (stored in tanks for up to a year after processing and laden with preservatives and additives to give it the orangey flavor), I’ve also stared to rethink drinking the stuff period. But sometimes there is nothing so satisfying as a glass of OJ…so the search is on.


When I was a kid, we got juice in cans of concentrate and mixed them with water. In terms of packaging, this definitely trumps the big carton. My dad always insisted on slicing the metal cap off the bottom of the cardboard canister so both pieces could be recycled. Weirdly, I still prefer the taste even though I’ve discovered that it’s often considered inferior.


At this point, all signs are pointing toward fresh-squeezed. But what about cost? The price for a 32-ounce carton of organic orange juice at Trader Joe’s is $3.99. A can of organic OJ concentrate is $2.49. And a four-pound bag of organic oranges grown somewhere in the US is $4.69. After squeezing two oranges I got about two inches of juice in a glass, probably about four ounces. With approximately 10 oranges in a bag, at two ounces each, that’s only 20 ounces of juice for almost five bucks. What kind of wacko system offers a processed product cheaper than a fresh one requiring less labor to make?



The taste though! Just-squeezed orange juice is amazing—the tangy smell, the sugary taste, the full body, the immediate impact of complete orangey-ness. So delicious! I don’t know if I’ll become a fresh-squeezed convert (I’d probably need hardware beyond my little lemon juicer), but I may return to it now and then for special occasions…and possibly pass on the carton in favor of holding out for the good stuff.

Success in small packages

On Wednesday, I picked my son up from school with some trepidation. Had he eaten his lunch? Had he rejected his sandwich? Last week's soybutter and jam sandwich went over like a ton of bricks and ended with his teacher consoling him, explaining that he didn't have to eat his sandwich if it made him that upset. On Wednesday, I did it! Charlie's lunchbox was E.M.P.T.Y!! Charlie ate his preschool sandwich on homemade milk bread, a thick (not-too-crusty) white bread made with King Arthur Flour (VT), local milk, a MA egg, fair trade sugar, and some more Canadian yeast.

Next step, get Rockland Nursery to stop throwing out valuable plastic sandwich baggies.

More tales from the Fridge: and other short stories

Coincidentally, just like Myriah, I recently went through the refridgerator. What I found behind my nice selection of local organic meat and other perishables in the freezor was various frozen items that were forgotten during my Kentucky food campaign. Luckily, they were all within expiration dates, but need to be eaten soon. So this week will be devoted to eating the food in the back of the freezer. Not local, but sustainable in that I will not be wasting. They are your average economy bags of chicken breasts, veggies, a couple steaks, and so on.
I also cleaned out the kitchen cabinets and stumbled upon all kinds of canned goods. I now have about a half and half mixture of local food and typical large brand groceries.
On the other hand, I came across localfirstlexington.com, a website for a non-profit that advocates local businesses and local foods. I found that a lot of my regular grazing spots were places that uses locally grown food. Some of the best barbecue in Lexington is right down the street from my mother's house and they get their meat from Kentucky pig farms. I am not sure if they are free-range or industrially grown, but local is a start.
Tonight I will be spending some time talking with my neighbor about starting a vegetable garden in the backyard; we live in a duplex, so we share not only a wall, but the yard as well. He grows his own tomatoes and sometimes peppers, so I want to team up with him and see if we can't get a decent yield out of either in ground crops or raised planter beds. Since it is a rental property, I don't to till up the ground too much, so it may have to be raised boxes. I have had my neighbors tomatoes, and they are incredibly juicy. I would like to be able to trade with him, and maybe get a gardening coalition going on the whole cul-de-sac. Behind some of the apartment buildings at the end of the street is a large open space. It is literally NEVER used; I have lived on this street for almost three years and I am one of three people who ever go back there. It would be a perfect opportunity for some guerilla gardening.....

The Prospect of Life without a Fridge

First thing I do when I get to my office is go straight to the lunchroom. Today, I brought a somewhat-sustainable salad (arugula from California, Capri Goat Cheese from Hubbardston, Mass. and dried cranberries hailing from Vermont) and some homemade yeasty-parmesan pretzels (Mollie Katzen's recipe are especially good eaten warm-from-the-oven). It’s the kind of lunch that seemed substantial at 7 a.m. but I am sure I’ll be starving by 3 p.m.

I open the kitchen refrigerator and BANG, ohmigosh, SO-MUCH-STUFF.

I swear, people here stockpile plastic to-go containers and half-drained salad dressing bottles like it’s a food museum or something.

Refrigerators, in general, give me mild anxiety. I have nightmares about other people’s refrigerators. And office refrigerators, well, they are enough to send me into a meltdown. Leftovers, especially, drive me crazy. In my house, if leftovers are not consumed within one or two days, I throw them out—I don’t ask what belongs to who or whether someone wants the three remaining bites of shrimp Pad Thai—toss, grind, flush, whatever—gone. I’ll clean other people’s refrigerators, too, if they let me. My boyfriend’s fridge, in true bachelor form, was a collection of expiration dates when we first met. Oh boy did I overhaul his condiments, tossed out the old and replenished with up-to-the-minute bottles of mayo, mustard, ketchup, hot sauce and salsa.

Why do we need all this stuff anyway? I can’t remember the last time I used the yellow plastic squeeze-lemon (bought in case of emergency) or the sweet-and-sour sauce or the cocktail sauce or the tartar sauce or the eggplant rémoulade. It all just sits there, waiting and waiting.

I found a blog called Experiments in Efficiency. The blogger discusses her life without a refrigerator (aka bliss).

Perhaps I am getting carried away here, but what do you guys think, could you live without a fridge?

Jerusalem Artichokes

Neither an artichoke nor from Jerusalem, this tuber is delicious! (Apparently they were named both for the Italian word for sunflower as well as during a time of religious revival in the U.S.) I signed up for Boston Organic's Dogma Box (filled with local organic food instead of far-traveling food, and got all sorts of things I don't usually eat, like Jerusalem artichokes, which we sliced thin, mixed with thin slices of potatoes and coated in olive oil, thyme, salt and pepper and then baked. Yum! The Jerusalem artichokes had a delicious, nutty flavor and were outrageously filling.

As for the packaging, A+, Boston Organics! They use one large plastic bin, which you leave downstairs for them to pick up the following week. The only real criticism is that the food is mostly being delivered by truck (although they are transitioning into bike delivery, which is really cool), but considering that we usually take out a Zip Car to do grocery shopping in (yeah, I know), I think this is way better, because they're using the one truck to deliver multiple boxes to our building.

I'm looking forward to this week's box (it'll be delivered sometime today), because there are going to be some beets and other root vegetables, and I am going to make roasted vegetable pizza. I like the Dogma box so far, mostly because it's exciting to try out different recipes and vegetables I've never had before!

Kitchen Planning: Let's Bring Back Home Economics

I am not doing too well on the plan to convert our consumption of store-bought bread and english muffins to homemade. I did make english muffins--as you saw--but, so far, that has been the end of it. I do think about it. I have the ingredients.

I have identified the problem. Lack of planning and too much packaging.

Pre-packaged foods allow me not to plan. I just have to buy them and find a place to store them until a meal is about to happen (in 15-20 minutes). No thought required, or at least no action required. I do cook, but often it is for special occasions like holidays, birthdays, or when I am feeling especially warm and fuzzy about my family. It is not a daily occurrence, primarily because I have gotten away with no meal planning for so long. I just buy food. I don't plan.

Why? The concept of planning food preparation is daunting to me. I am not sure how to do it and am scared that if I do it one week that I won't continue. Bad reasoning, but effective in creating a blockade in my thinking. I am completely in awe of other families that know what they are having for dinner more than 30 minutes in advance, and more in awe of those people that cook from scratch ... regularly. I think it is a dying art.

I need--above all else--to learn home economics, sustainable home economics. They are the key to me reducing packaging, food miles, energy consumption, and increasing healthy food intake.

... and by the time Charlie and Bronwyn are in high school, I hope HOME EC has made a comeback with the lens of sustainable practices out in front of it. In the mean time, I should be making bread.

Embodied Energy and Stuff

Lately, it's all about the packaging. During these final dreary days of diminishing winter, sourcing local food remains a secondary, and less attainable objective. In the spirit of this weekend's leadership training, I'm trying to live-out the practice of sustainable consumption by getting serious about the paper and plastics that support delivery of nourishment to my body. Often, I do not require the paper or plastic. These materials are immediately expendable. Yesterday evening, having purchased a salad from Cafe Kiraz,  it was the avocado goodness within I coveted, not the packaging.

To increase awareness of the environmental burdens my food decisions impose, I have relied upon embodied energy analysis. I'm using this quick and dirty associative progression:

Paper and Plastic Packaging 

(are)

Manufactured Goods

(which require)

 Heat/Beat/Treat Processes

(which use)

 Energy/Raw Material Extraction/Transportation

(which contribute to)

Embodied Energy

(is proportional to)

Carbon Emissions

While some of the energy may be generated by renewable and/or nuclear tech, I doubt it.

The main idea of this equation is that the Paper and Plastic Packaging are somehow directly proportional to embodied energy which is somehow directly proportional to increased emissions. This interpretation is open to refute. 

My spinach and avacado salad packaging included:

Plastic Fork & Knife (7.50 Watts)*
Plastic Soda Bottle (65.93 Watts)*
Paper Box (147.18 Watts)*
Plastic Salad Container (~100.00 Watts)
Saran Wrap (2.07 Watts)*
Paper Napkins (15.98 Watts)*


Total Emodied Energy of Packaging = ~240 Watts

* Watt calculation derived from WattzOn - Embodied Energy Database. It has been assumed that packaging was used once for the exclusive delivery of one spinach and avacado salad to my mouth.

Today, I aspire to identify food packaging with wasteful energy consumption in order to improve my consumer habits. By focusing on the numbers, consciously and regularly at first, I will make the natural shift from unconsciously unaware to consciously aware to unconsciously aware.

the ultimate package

The ultimate package. Your home or apartment. What contains you and all your belongings. Americans have a love affair with space, the more one has the more powerful one is. I have spent many days babysitting for wealthy families in Newton, and Welleslely. The smallest house was perhaps 5,000 sq. ft… For a family of 4. One house in Newton, we were playing hide and seek and I could not find the kid for a good 20 minutes, she was on a separate floor of the house that I had never even seen before..

My boyfriend and I are looking to buy a home. I want a small condo. He wants a single family with a yard. I would be happy with 1100sq ft. He would like more. I do not want children. Why do I need a bigger house than that? A bigger container, or home, just holds more stuff. Stuff that I don’t need. I would like a condo that leaves a small ecological footprint. This home only has to fit the two of us, and a 100 lb lazy dog. I would like a smaller place, because it costs less. I forget which book it was but it showed us how living in spaces with shared walls saves energy costs. Makes sense. I thought it would be cheaper to buy but we are debating between a few places in Watertown, MA where for the same price you can get an extra 800 sq. ft. Why buy what you don’t need? Im sure there’s someone out there with a kid or two who needs more space. Why not try and sell it to them? When the realtor was showing it to us, it had another living room and 2 bedrooms downstairs. I asked why someone would want two living rooms. He said incase we wanted to watch different things on tv. Yeah, no. Then he said the dog could play down there. We have nicknamed my dog Jasper, Velcro dog. He is where ever you are, lying at your feet. So no, I’m still not sold. I told him that was more sq. feet that I would have to clean and heat. That does not sound like fun. So I want a smaller place, because it keeps the amount of “stuff” down. Therefore less packaging, less crap. Win – win. Plus less time on maintenance, I’d have time to ride my bike, go skiing, etc. So we shall see, who wins the housing argument between us, but I hope I do!