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Sometimes it's easy being green.

Sure, being sustainable may not be all fun and games (shorter showers? Such hardship!) but some green practices are easy and fun to adopt.  

Without further ado, 5 fun ways to get a little greener:

  1)      Shop vintage

Vintage clothing, furniture, and household items are more than just green. They're also unique, funky, and fun to look for. A day of vintage shopping is always fun, and you're

sure to find some real gems. Seriously, one of my favorite pieces of clothing (a vintage Dolce and Gabbana pencil skirt, in case you were wondering) was found in a heap of vintage skirts in a basement resale shop - and I got it for a song.

2)      Go digital

Bookworms rejoice: ebooks are awesome and eco-friendly. Even if you don't have a snazzy Kindle of your own, your local library has ebooks these days, too. You can download and read them instantly - with no late fees and no trip to the library.

3)      Get crafty

The sky is the limit when it comes to repurposing. Almost everything can be "upcycled" and given a new lease on life. If you can dream it, you can make it. Look around your house for ideas. My mother, a glass artist, has an entire line of recycled wine bottles. She shapes them into tumblers, slumps them into cheese boards, melts them into bowls, or turns them into mosaics. Get creative!

4)      Grow it yourself

Gardening at home is as green as it gets. No chemicals, no transportation costs, no nonsense. Just good old fashioned vegetables! It's fun to see your love and care blossoming. If you're garden-shy or low on space, try growing herbs in your window sill. It's nice to have something truly green and growing - and delicious, too.

5)      Take a stroll

Walking or biking to work saves on gas and cuts your stress. Sure, it may take a little longer to get there, but life's about the journey, isn't it? By walking or biking to work, you'll get in some exercise and get to know your town. You may find things you never would have seen if you were bottled up in your car racing from place to place. Make it an adventure - but take your time.

Now, let us hear it! What are your favorite fun ways to go green?

Very good overview article.  No mention of Kashless, but we are still in development.

There are many out there who are worried that the current economic crisis will result in a significant retrenchment in available technology, money, etc.   I don’t share that view, but it is good to ponder what would I do if the supermarket, gas station, and restaurants were empty.   This could happen either due to lack of money to purchase their goods, a significant disruption in the supply chain, significant political unrest, any number of alternatives with increasing probabilities. 

check out the 10 skills required in a FreeConomy post by Matt over in England.  And There is a good list of the 200 artisan skills required to make a Victorian town functional on the Transition Culture blog

Back home in America there is always the stand-by Mother Earth News.  I am personally buying a couple of these resources in physical book form (in case the internet explodes).

GoGreenOnline did a survey of their readers asking what kind of common green behaviors they engaged in.  Of the three “R’s, “Reduce” and “Recycle” were 95% of the activities. “Reuse” had only two items and both at less than 50%.  I bet the actual reuse rate is way lower.  Why don’t people who are very attuned to Recycling Reuse at a higher rate?

about the Waste hierarchy.  In our opinion, Reuse is the most underdeveloped bar in this whole scheme.  Sure, you re-use shopping bags, but what about all that stuff in your garage that isn’t really trash yet. That is the problem Kashless.org is solving.  Have a read.   Earlier this year they also did a primer on REUSE specifically.

highlights:

- According to the U.S. EPA, in 2006, Americans generated about 251 million tons of trash. That’s about 4.6 pounds per person, every day. Of this 251 million, 82 million tons of it was recycled. This recycling saved “the energy equivalent of more than 10 billion gallons of gasoline.”

Reuse

Reuse is simply the act of finding a second (or third, or tenth or hundredth) use for a product to prolong its life. Reuse is an important step after you’ve already reduced, but before you are ready to recycle.

Most of us reuse everyday without realizing it. Any time you buy or sell a product secondhand, such as from Craigslist, eBay or Goodwill, you are providing an additional use for this product, while at the same time, not requiring another one to be created.

To really get in the habit of reusing, focus on:

• Reusable shopping bags
• Lunch boxes and Tupperware containers
• Buying in bulk
• Borrowing from others instead of purchasing
• Rethinking your “trash” – you may be able to make something new out of that old desk

It seems that the idea of a store where everything is free, although undoubtedly there have been many throughout history, the modern idea is credited to The Diggers.  Check out this and that.   They seem to have a virtual store, but it doesn’t seem to have much in the way of listings or activity.

A bunch of artist in NYC has opened a physical store where everything is free.  The Post did a good story on it.  If you are in NYC drop by 99 Nassau St.  Now they just need an on-line presence.

more about the free software and digital goods sector, but the WSJ piece is a good overview on what traditional brick and mortar people are going through to compete with Free.

There is alot of frustration out there with existing marketplaces that have been around for over a decade.  Many people are doing something about it like our friends over at iList.  They announced this week that in six months they have racked up 50,000 registered users. Congratulations!!  Keep up the great design work and the cool social network integration tools.

Americans are great!  For those of you not in the Pacific Northwest, we have had record rains this past week. Floods everywhere.  Random acts of kindness are cropping up everywhere, even Kashless.  Check this post where a man offers to be a “free helper for sand bagging” down in Maple Valley where flooding is getting really dangerous.  And this guy in the Auburn area offering to take in any caged animals including transport during the flood.  Americans are yearning to help each other more.  Hopefully Kashless can help with that and other random acts of kindness. 

Most of you have probably seen it, but if not, you must click over to CBS RIGHT NOW and watch the 60 minutes story on toxic e-Waste.  Hundreds of thousands of computers and hundreds of millions of cell phones are “outdated” each year. Where do they go?  Consumers are getting more concerned about this question and land-fills are actively trying to keep that stuff out of their dumps, but are these systems working?  It seems that there are still plenty of “recyclers” who just want to make a buck. 

With Kashless, hopefully these last year models can go to someone who actually uses them for a bit longer.  One of the best ways to keep things out of the landfill is to keep using them.

Have been reading Earth911 quit a bit lately.  “making every day Earth Day” is a good goal.  They have some very useful directories and resources for recycling all over the place. Their editors do a good job as well with current events.  Their coverage of the issues related to resource overuse and improper recycling leads us to believe in the ReUse power of the Kashless system even more. 

Give that TV to someone who will use it instead of giving it to a “e-waste” recycler who will probably sell it to China.

Kijiji recently commissioned a study to figure out if American’s had stuff lying around the house they didn’t use (duh) and what it might be worth (that was more interesting). 

Now I have a second observation.  What level of cash is your cut-off for “not worth my time”?  For me it is < $100.  Anything for which I will receive less than $100 it is not worth my time to deal with posting, offers, shipping, etc.  Just not worth it.  The fourth column that would be interesting there is the tax receipt value.  I would bet you that the tax benefit of donating say a Video Game console is greater than $4.

Original Anna Karenina with Vivien Leigh and Ralph Richardson and a USB mail scale from Stamps.com

vintage 1987 Panasonic fax machine.

Troy's extra stuff....

Early in 2008 I was cleaning out my garage and had a bunch of stuff that hadn't been used in forever.  A seven year old mountain bike, a twice ridden wake board, a lightly used work out bench, a blow up pool, two snow sleds, a beginner kids bike, some garage shelves, a garden hose, an old pair of skis, a too small snowboard, you know the kinda stuff I'm talking about.  Since the stuff had originally cost me quite a bit and it wasn't really trash yet, I thought to sell it.  Two weeks and tens of hours spent posting stuff on multiple sites, emailing and calling tons of people, waiting around the house, dealing with no-shows, flakes, bounced checks and some downright scary people I had only sold one thing - the mountain bike - for half the asking price. 

So I decided to give it away, but I wanted it to go to someone who actually needed the stuff and would use it.  I tried the free sharing/giving networks my friends recommended.  More posting to multiple sites, three weeks and even MORE waiting, no shows, flakes, (no bounced checks Yea!) and no information about the people who were asking for my cherished stuff.  In the end I got rid of everything but it was WAY TOO HARD and took way too much time/energy/effort.  Heck, I was trying to give something away for free! 

During this time I was also looking for a white board for my home office.  I know there are lots of white boards lying around after office moves, in my friend's basements, etc.  After visiting multiple sites, doing multiple searches (no saved searches - ARGH!), and blogging the need of a white board, none came into my life.  So I went out and bought a new one.  Two days later a friend who follows my Twitter feed said "hey I wish I knew you were looking for a white board, I have an extra one under my desk!"  Oops, more consumption where it was not necessary. 

These are some the formative experiences that have led to the idea of Kashless.org.

The Workout Bench:

The blow Up Pool

An extra harley Davidson Fatboy Seat

7 year old Canyondale Jekyll (originally $3,700)

The too small wakeboard

Seen in the parking lot of Value Village last week: 

Hey, I need an office chair and a filing cabinet like that.  Why is Value Village throwing away all that stuff? Well in the thrift store market, they only keep stuff they know they can sell.  Everything else goes in the trash. Even if it is still good and may be of use to someone else. 

I hope Value Village becomes a large user of Kashless in the future.  They could get this stuff to good homes rather than the dumpster. The people who donated this stuff were trying to keep it out of the land fill.  Why isn't Value Village trying a little harder?