Public Libraries Can Save You Money

The Consumerist has a short article entitled 7 Ways Your Public Library Can Help You During a Bad Economy. There are lots of good suggestions in the comments, too (as well as the occasionally complaint).

Back from China

Actually I've been back from China for a while. About a week and a half now. It takes some time to catch up and get back into the swing of things.

The following photos are from Yangshuo, China. Yangshuo is near Guilin, which is one of the most popular tourist destinations in China for its gorgeous scenery.




China is an interesting place to visit. In terms of finances it is far more expensive just getting there and back than it is to spend 11 days traveling all over the place. In fact, well over 3 times as expensive.

I greatly enjoyed my first foray into bargaining. Most of the time, my friend and her husband (who is Chinese) did the bargaining for us. However, on the last day of our trip, my boyfriend and I purchased some gifts without their assistance. Using the "walk away" method, we were able to get items for one-forth or less the original price named - good prices for foreigners. The walk away method essentially involves expressing interest in something, looking at a few different options, and then saying you aren't really sure and will keep looking. Then, you walk away while the vendor calls out lower and lower prices until you get to a deal you just can't pass up.

Interesting Articles

I've read two very interesting articles recently, both of which were mentioned on the blog The Good Human (a green blog that's definitely worth subscribing to).

First is the article on California's new vehicle rating system which is to be displayed near the number plate of all new vehicles. Vehicles will be given both a "global warming score" and a "smog score," each ranging from 1 to 10 with 10 being the most environmentally friendly.

Another interesting article is from the NYT entitled Can Weeds Help Solve the Climate Crisis? While the article spends far less time discussing how weeds can help solve the crisis than it does discussing the adaptability of weeds, it is still highly interesting. According to experiments, weeds positively thrive (grow much larger, produce more pollen, etc) at higher temperatures and higher CO2 levels. The article suggests that the "weedy ancestors of our food crops... will cope far better with coming climatic changes than their domesticated descendants." Therefore, focusing on these ancestors in the future may become essential.

Lastly, I will be leaving for a trip to China tomorrow and will not return until July 24th, so I won't be writing any new posts for a while. :)

Plants that Absorb Formaldehyde

I love houseplants, and I have a lot of them. I am forever reading about all the benefits of various types of plants, particularly in relation to removing toxins from the air. Toxins like formaldehyde. But I never really felt I had a good grasp on whether or not these toxins really were things commonly found in the home until I read this article from The Daily Green.

Turns out formaldehyde commonly leaches out over time from things like plywood, particleboard, and fiberboard, often coming from the glue that holds the pieces together.

What plants are good for removing formaldehyde from the air (see the chart here and read this for more information)?

1. Spider plants
2. Corn plants
3. Heart leaf philodendron
4. Golden Pathos
5. Madag Dragon Tree
6. Waneckii
7. Chrysanthemum
8. Peace Lily

Incidentally, some of these plants are also extremely hardy and hard to kill, mainly spider plant, corn plant, heart leaf philodendron, and golden pathos. Interestingly, I have 7 out of the 8 plants listed (no Chrysanthemum), 2 of which came in a basket from a funeral home. Perhaps I need to spread them around my apartment more to up my formaldehyde protection in all areas.

What I do for the environment

Since I recently posted about what I see that harms the environment, I thought I'd list off some of the things I do to help the environment. Most of these are very easy to do.

1. Recycle - For me, this is ingrained. Growing up, my family always recycled. We had so many garbage cans that guests were often very confused - recycling, regular, burnables (okay, this may not be as environmentally friendly), and a bucket for veggie and fruit scraps. If curbside pickup is available, I can't imagine why someone wouldn't recycle. It's so easy!
2. Reusable bags - I've already posted about this. I have tons of bags and use them as often as I can remember to do so.
3. Walk (or bike) to work (and to the store) - Admittedly, I only do this when the weather is nice, but I have been walking to work as much as possible. Of course, walking to work is only an option for those who live relatively close - in my case, a little over a mile.
4. Carpool - In the winter or in bad weather, I carpool with my boyfriend. I'm not sure it's a huge savings, because there is a shorter route he could take to work. I think it's better than taking two cars though.
5. Reuse - My sugar jar is a former spaghetti sauce jar. We mix our own balsamic vinaigrette and our current jar used to be a jelly jar. Most of my furniture is second- (or third- or forth-) hand. I am a scrap paper fiend, even collecting it from the unclaimed printouts at work. Reusing is easy - and cheap!
6. Compost - I have just begun composting and will write more about this in a future post.
7. Grow your own vegetables - Another topic on which I have already posted.
8. CFLs - When bulbs burns out, we switch them to compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs).
9. Thermostat - To reduce our energy use, we set the thermostat to 67 in the winter (which is difficult for a freeze baby like me) and 80 in the summer. I'd love a programmable thermostat but we are in an apartment.
10. Reusable Water Bottles - I have very rarely bought bottled water. It just seems like such a waste and completely unnecessary. Tap water is monitored. I carry around a reusable water bottle, which is especially handy at work.

If you have any suggestions of things you do, let me know! I am always looking for more things that I should be doing, particularly if they are cheap and easy. :)

Grow Your Own Food

This spring marks my first attempt at growing vegetables. I grew up in a family of gardeners, and my grandparents always had a very large garden next to their house. Still do, in fact. I've done my fair share of weeding but never have I been fully responsible for planting, weeding, watering, staking, and harvesting. So far it's going reasonably well.

Container Gardening
Because I was unsure of the amount of sun I would have available in various yard locations, and because I do not know much about the soil at the apartment, I opted for container gardening. A picture of the most elaborate container structure is here. In that one, I have peas, lettuce, and green beans. The lettuce is probably at or very near the edible point, but I have yet to pick any. The peas are just now blooming, and the green beans, planted much more recently, have quite a ways to go. I also have containers for 2 tomato plants, which are happily producing tomatoes, although none have ripened yet. And cucumber, zucchini, and a second round of lettuce. Then I have small pots of parsley (the only thing I have eaten thus far), basil, oregano, cilantro, coriander, and nasturtium.

Saving Money?
I am not going to lie to you and tell you that I'm saving money. Between the containers, the seeds, and all the organic potting soil, I probably won't even break even. However, it feels good to play in the dirt, and to know exactly how my vegetables have been grown. Next year I will probably do better. First of all, I will be using the containers a second time. Secondly, I am currently composting kitchen scraps (more about this in a future post), which I will be able to use next year to cut down on the amount of soil I buy. Plus it's a hobby I really enjoy, so when you factor in the money I could be spending on some other hobby (okay, I'm reaching, I know), I'm really doing quite well.

For those of you who think it is beyond your abilities/patience
Deciding to grow your own vegetables can very quickly become overwhelming - what should you grow; where should you grow it; what do different plants require in terms of soil, maintenance, staking, sun, water, etc... the questions can go on forever. The best piece of advice I can give you is one I found in a book recommended by a coworker called You Grow Girl - best title ever, of course. Start small, do as little as you want, and don't get upset if things don't go as expected. An example from my experience:

On April 11, I bought a tomato plant called a Black Ethiopian at a student plant sale here on campus. Tomato plants are wimpy and cannot be placed outdoors until the weather is quite warm - late May in my area. This tomato plant grew at an alarming rate. Between April 11 and late May, it grew about 4 feet (apparently this variety gets as tall as 6 feet - who knew?) in the south-facing window in my bedroom. The plant is now outside and has approximately 3 feet in the middle where it looks utterly pathetic - all dead leaves. But - it's started to produce tomatoes. It may not produce very many, but that's okay. I tried, and I won't be buying a Black Ethiopian again. Patio tomatoes are much easier. :)

You Grow Girl also mentions that just about any vegetable can be grown in a container. Plus, many herbs can be brought indoors for use all winter long. So go ahead, give it a try.

Environmentally Unfriendly

I walk through a rather affluent area on my way to work. I love to look at the beautiful yards (far preferring ones where I know the tenants/homeowners manage the yards themselves), but I am forever noticing things that make me sad for the environment. Now, I recognize that there is always more I myself can do, but some of the things I see that disappoint me are:

1. This morning I saw a truck dropping bottled water off at a private residence. There are two things that bother me about this. First of all, there's the truck that's delivering this to someone's home - using gas, polluting, etc., all so someone can have bottled water delivered to his/her front door. Secondly, it's bottled water! All that wasted plastic! I hope it at least gets recycled. Tap water and a reusable bottle is so much better.

2. Endless garbage on trash day. What single residence (unless they have 20 kids) needs to produce 8+ huge garbage bags of trash? Weekly! And I can see through those bags - aluminum cans, plastic bottles, corrugated cardboard. It's so easy to recycle here - why don't they do it? Almost everything (and certainly the three I just listed) are all curbside pickup!

3. Yards with signs that say they've recently been treated with chemicals. Give me clover and crab grass any day, or at least go for organic treatments.

4. All the lawn care trucks. Yards aren't that big around here. I should think many of these people can do it themselves. Perhaps even with human-powered mowers (I really need to find out the technical term for those things), although admittedly those don't do the best job when you have lots of crab grass and clover....

There are probably more that I cannot think of right now. And perhaps I need to stop complaining and come up with some solutions - at the minimum, teach my upstairs neighbors (from another country where they perhaps do not recycle?) about recycling.