I thought about posting something, and then this happened.

And now I pretty much just don’t know what to say.  I mean, a lot of thoughts have crossed my mind since the “Great BP Oil Faucet” turned on at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico (I’ll admit that one of them was “I drink your milkshake“), but generally speaking, about all I can come up with is the following:

Good luck to everyone that’s trying to clean this up, especially to the folks trying to help clean up the animals, and to everyone whose livelihoods are being obliterated by this disaster.  I cannot even imagine.

Oh and good luck to BP … maybe you should start making more solar panels now?  Last time I checked solar panels didn’t destroy entire ecosystems?  Just saying.

On the other hand, when you decide you need to go “real” shopping, you might never really consider Goodwill to be your first choice.  Right?

Well, let me introduce you to the concept of second-hand shopping “for real”, which is to say, going to the second-hand clothing store to buy items that you might wear every day, or at least NOT to a pimp & hooker party.  I realize this isn’t a new concept; vintage stores have been around for a while now and happy hipsters are no stranger to the ironic high school t-shirts from the 70′s.  But shopping at vintage stores has always been an unsatisfying experience for me – unless it’s a really REALLY special piece, I don’t hold the belief that clothing, like houses, appreciate in price over time.  So, NO, I don’t want to pay $80 for that dress that probably cost $15 in 1982.  Nice try though.

All of that changed when I discovered Buffalo Exchange.  Merely coming to the realization that places like Buffalo Exchange exist was a revelation for me.

Image courtesy of Time.com; visit the article here

A quick search around the internet tells me that I might be late to the second-hand clothing party, but then again if it took me so long to figure it out, then I know that there are others who haven’t yet.   Anyway, as per my usual disclaimer, this blogger is not paid to endorse or hawk any particular product or store, but if I find a product or a place that I think fits into a  “greener lifestyle” mantra, then I’m happy to talk about it.   Here’s a few reasons why I enjoy shopping at Buffalo Exchange so much:

1. Their clothes are not so “vintage”. Most of the clothing that seems to show up at the Exchange is from within the past 10 years or so… Sure, there’s some vintage items in there, but it’s actually contemporary stuff.  It’s a bit like having the chance to raid your roommate’s closet except that you are raiding ALL roommate’s closets all at once.
2. The prices are well within reason. Shopping at this second-hand clothing store – which sells both used AND new stuff – will not break your bank.  Most of the clothing I’ve bought has been between $12 – $20, and every once in a while, if you’re lucky, you’ll come across a pair of jeans or a designer piece that was once sold for upward of $200.  It might still cost you $50 at the Exchange, but it beats paying the original marked-up price.  (Back to my housing analogy, I think clothes are much more like cars, in that there is always an initial sticker price that is jacked up for name-brand appeal, and then as soon as you put it on it is worth about half as much.  But I will save my lecture about buying used cars for another post…)
3. Having less choice is sometimes really awesome. So this may not make too much sense, but let me explain.  Sometimes when I walk into a store, and they have an entire section devoted to cute dresses, each in about four or five different colors, I become really overwhelmed.  I am a very careful decision maker and if I like even two or three of those dresses, I could spend an entire evening trying to decide which two I want, and in which colors.  Buffalo Exchange takes that stress away from me.  There’s something almost liberating about going straight to your size section and knowing that what’s there is there, and that unless it’s a new piece sold only at the store, you’re not worrying about which colors to get, because that’s your only choice.  AND, per #2 above, you’re probably going to spend less on it, as well.
4. You can sell your own used clothes there too. It’s very satisfying to know that an outfit you might not be interested in wearing anymore might be very appealing to someone else.  My advice is to purge your closet before going, sell your clothes back to them for store credit, and then reward yourself for recycling by shopping!  They rarely buy all of your clothing but if it’s a unique and well-maintained piece, you’ll probably get something for it.  They also take shoes and bags!

In conclusion, next time you need a new outfit, or next time you start to take that bag of old clothes to Goodwill, try Buffalo Exchange, or another local second-hand store*.  Your wallet will appreciate it, as will the planet, since you’ll be diverting those materials from the waste stream.

*Note:  it’s been my experience that consignment stores are much more complicated than the second-hand stores that I am speaking about… If I remember correctly there are usually membership fees involved, but you should investigate for yourself if a consignment store might be as good – or a better – option.

• Buffalo Exchange   (www.buffaloexchange.com)
• Recently featured in Women’s Day and Lucky magazines
• 14 states nation-wide  (Including two here in Portland!)

“But why?”, you say.  (Or maybe you don’t, I don’t want to put words in your mouth, ha.)  Well consider this:  although you can’t see it, using a good amount of insulation and installing it properly is one of the greatest differences between having an energy efficient house and having a drafty, cold, money-pit of a house.  Observe:

From the GDC's Green Your Home tool

Now, knowing that you need a lot of insulation is one thing; know what KIND of insulation to get is entirely another.  In my diagram above, the pink part of the wall section is pink because I assumed that a lot of people associate that color with Owens Corning’s Pink Panther, aka “The Historical American Emissary of Insulation.”  And it’s true that Owens Corning has a lot of insulation products that are useful for homes, including a new product called Foamular, which is a rigid and moisture-resistant exterior insulation.  I’ve seen how this stuff is made – at the Owens Corning LEED Gold Manufacturing Plant just outside of Portland, no less – and it’s a heck of a lot easier to use than the old pink fiberglass stuff.  No offense to the Pink Panther, of course.

BUT, there are other, perhaps more sustainable options for insulation, ones that use less manufacturing energy or recycled materials, for instance.  Lloyd Alter over at Treehugger recently posted his thoughts on the debate between spray polyurethane foam insulation and recycled denim insulation.  There are advantages and disadvantages to both, and since Lloyd covered them already, I won’t repeat him.  But, depending on what the application is, you might find the fact that the spray foam is easy to install and covers up any gaps appealing; or, you may want to avoid VOCs and use the recycled denim, which helps eliminate material from the waste stream.

Obviously, I am not paid to endorse any product here at the GDC, nor do I personally have a preference as to what people use – perhaps one day when I buy a house, I will decide!  In the meantime, I DO encourage people who have homes and the money to renovate to check out the insulation in their homes and maybe consider upgrading … in almost every climate zone in the country, it will help you save energy, which will help you save money.  Hooray for saving money! 

But I digress.  I firmly believe that the Earth is one mega-giant geophysical system and so I’m predisposed to think that movement in the Earth’s crust in one area is likely to affect movement in the crust in another area.  Maybe this is the case, maybe not.  But, like it or not, there are fault lines all over this planet, and a very good number of us live in an area that would be affected by seismic activity.  Including myself, living in the Pacific Northwest, with the Cascadia subduction zone, where “the seismic clock is ticking.”

Which is why I’ve finally decided to take the creation of my earthquake kit very seriously.  Observe:

The beginnings of my earthquake kit - old clothes and lots of coffee

Having never put together an earthquake kit before (despite living in Los Angeles for two years), I looked up how to make a proper preparedness kit on the internets.  I found one, appropriately, on the site for the San Francisco Chronicle’s SFGate. It includes a lot of head-scratching items, like a small fire extinguisher and sunglasses, but for the most part it is all super valuable stuff that would be useful in the event of a catastrophic earthquake.

*I*, on the other hand, am preparing a bag that would in theory allow me to survive for a day or so trapped underground OR allow me to get out, get on my bike, and go find other people.  It will include important stuff like a super-cool solar-powered/hand-crank radio and LED flashlight, as well as a first aid kit, rain gear, a warm jacket, matches and extra food.  I have, however, taken some liberties from the SFGate site – for instance, they say to include bleach, which I get, but I’m trying to come up with something portable, thus the little bleach pen (good in a pinch, literally).  Also note the copious amounts of coffee; hey, I have a portable French Press, might as well put it to good use!

All in all, my earthquake kit is stocked with things I have but don’t use on a regular basis, but still don’t want to get rid of.  I’m finding that this is not only a great way to get prepared for an earthquake but also an in-house recycling exercise.  Being aware of how you use and perhaps waste products in your home is as integral to living more lightly on the earth as realizing that you live on a giant rock that is subjected to forces of geophysics beyond our control.

Do you have any suggestions for putting together an earthquake preparedness kit?  Post them here!

Plastic bag-woven wine bottle carrier!

I’d like to think that the t-shirt quilt that I’m trying to make is upcycling, but as with many sewing projects for me, it’s turning out to be hairier than I initially thought.  You see, I already had this fleece blanket from IKEA, so I thought I would size the patches that I cut out from the t-shirts to fit the blanket, and everything would be great.  Except that the tag for the blanket said that it was  51″ x 67″ – which I trusted – and as it turns out, it’s closer to 51″ by about 56″.  And this is a problem because I sized the patches to fill the blanket along 60″ of length!  So I’m going to have to sew the patches about an inch short each.  Three cheers for improvisation!

T-shirts pre-cutting

T-shirts after I've cut out the good bits

Patches after they've been ironed onto stabilizer backing and laying them out onto the blanket

If you know me, you’ve probably seen one of these t-shirts before… or perhaps you’ve even given one of them to me!  The point of this exercise is, they’ve outgrown their usefulness in my wardrobe but they all mean something to me, and I wanted to hang on to them without having a large pile of unused t-shirts in my closet.  So I am putting them all in one place, and the scraps are being donated to either the rag or recycling piles.

Anyway, here’s to DIY projects and keeping something else out of the wastestream!  (And if anyone has any t-shirt quilt suggestions for me, by all means post them below, I could probably use the help…)

I am originally from Cincinnati and they had one as well, called Building Value.  Does your community have a building supply recycling center?  If so, post in the comments!

Why Dorothy?  Well, 1) because her previous owner was an elderly woman who recently passed away, and I named the car in homage to my favorite Golden Girl, Dorothy, to honor the memory of all the awesome old women out there.  Also, 2) she is named because “there is no place like home” and Dorothy is the closest thing to “home” I have right now.  She is mine, I own her, and if all else fails me in the next few weeks or months while I search for a more permanent “home”, at least I will have Dorothy.

Further more, this is just a friendly reminder that buying a used car is almost ALWAYS going to be better for the environment than buying a new car. There are thousands, if not millions, of used cars drifting around the U.S. and buying a new car simply contributes more to the waste stream, whereas buying a used car takes one OUT OF the waste stream.  (Of course, buying a new Prius or electric car is kind of a necessity since the used versions are so hard to come by, but hopefully you catch my drift.)

For more information on your own car’s fuel economy, carbon footprint, or the fuel economy of a car you are looking to buy, check out fueleconomy.gov, a very useful site that lets you compare cars side by side.  And it has infographics!

Still though, as I leave another apartment behind and go in search of where I belong, I have to wonder what constitutes “home” for me. Sure, there will always be my “hometown”, but there are so many different ways to regard home. If home is where the heart is, then I must say my home is everywhere I have a friend or loved one. And although I placed such a strong value on the goods I ended up keeping, they do not make a home. Hopefully they will make it more interesting though, whenever I decide to settle down.

But, what does “home” mean to you?

So many of our electronics products come in this ridiculous “theft-proof” hard plastic packaging;  and then you try to open it, and you realize it’s adult-proof too, since 30 minutes later you haven’t gotten your product out but your hands are as raw as sushi.  And do the headphones really need to be encased in 3 layers of plastic?  No. I guess the tradeoff with Apple headphones is, they are easy to unpack.  They just don’t last. 

We’re not going to become a more sustainable society until we stop using packaging that both destroys our environment AND our poor hands.  Some companies have figured out how to do this already, so I’d encourage everyone to try to patronize them when you have the chance … for the sake of our general well-being!