EARTH DAY

Ever since I saw An Inconvenient Truth, I have been really working on the ways that Wilson and I can be more environmentally friendly. We have:

• wrapped our hot water heater in some sort of Al Gore approved wrap. It is supposed to make it so that heat stays trapped and we can lower the temperature of the water in the tank. I
• wrapped our pipes so that we don't lose heat there
• we recycle just about everything that we can
• we have a green bin and all other foodstuffs go in there
• we would have a composter but I really hate the bugs and racoons that come with one of those so that is where our green bin picks up that slack.
• when they finally move me to our downtown office, Wilson and I will carpool and I will be taking transit home. For those of you that know me, this is a HUGE sacrifice on my part
• I am trying to make sure that I don't buy products with wasteful packing
• I think I am going to take our produce organic so that I am buying locally and saving the carbon emissions from stuff that is trucked in from around North America
• My next car will be a hybrid - but that won't be for a few years as Wilson and I tend to keep our cars for a long time
• I know that I need to start taking cloth bags to the grocery store but when you have a dog, you need the damn plastic bags for picking up the refuse. Not pleasant but who wants to walk in a park that smells like poo.
• We changed our light bulbs to CFLs - even though they make it hard to read as I find them not as bright.
• I am going to check with our local butcher to see if his meats are procured locally as well - more of the not contributing to the carbon emissions
• We are going to phase out our household cleansers and begin using green prodcuts
• and our last and I think biggest sacrifice of all is using 'green' facial tissues and toilet paper. I am totally a Kleenex and Facelle Royal girl but when I read how many trees this would save, I realized that we had to start this as well. We use cloth napkins all the time except when we are serving canapes before a dinner party - so this helps save some trees.

I realize that this a good start but I believe that we all have to do more. If anyone has any other ideas for me - bring it on. As long as those ideas do not mean that I have to give up pretty shoes, chocolate or red wine - I will give it a whirl.

Green kisses to all,
DiDi