A study in contrasts

Just.... wow.

Need recycling help?

I was wondering whether I could recycle old CDs tonight, and stumbled on the Internet Consumer Recycling Guide, maintained by the folks over at obviously.com. Especially helpful is their page, The World's Shortest Comprehensive Recycling Guide. Good for posting on the back door (or wherever stuff gets sorted in your house).

I can haz microcar?

Been lusting after these cars since I first saw one in London in 2003, and when I learned early last year that Daimler was *finally* going to make them available in the U.S., I signed up and anxiously awaited the car's launch.

So... about a year later, I finally get to drive my own smart fortwo. And boy, is it cool.

A few specs: This car has a 1-liter gasoline-powered engine. It's a two-seater that weighs in at about 1800 pounds, and is just under 9' long by 5' wide. The EPA mileage rating on it is about 42/highway, which is better than every gas-powered car sold in the U.S. except for two: The Toyota Prius and the Honda Civic hybrid. However, *this* car doesn't come with the $23,000+ pricetag those do, and... well... let's just say it's WAY more fun to drive.

Oh yeah... you can just about park it on a postage stamp. :-)

Wow... is July gone already?

Not quite, but I think I see the end of it around the corner.

What's been happening? Got back from Switzerland (had a great last couple of days), got back into classes, was deluged with gigs, got a new scooter, and a massive head cold. That enough?

Where to start? Gigs. Wow. Normally, late July/early August are especially quiet for me, and I was kinda looking forward to lots of practice time. Not this year. Over the last week or so, I've gotten a ton of calls I wasn't expecting, and I'm as close to booked solid as I can get. Upcoming dates that are open to the public are listed in the right-hand column of this blog (hint, hint to music lovers), and those don't include the obligatory rehearsals before many of the gigs. It's fun, though... two musicals, a bunch of big band stuff, and a couple of R&B gigs with Chadwick Williams. On one of the musicals (Oliver), I'll be reading the woodwind IV book, which is a bassoon book. That would be no problem if I played bassoon, but since I don't I'm going to be transposing from bass/tenor clef (both in C), to play the parts on a Bb treble clef instrument. I'm sure I'll be kicking myself later for saying I'd do that, but it's a good skill to develop, so I've already started practicing. I'll have to post again on how it goes.

On the work front, things are going well this quarter. I'm teaching three strategic management classes, and although it's never easy to keep people focused in summer classes (and let's face it--who can blame them?), I've got a nice group and they seem to be enjoying the class. We're pilot-testing a new version of the learning management system (a web-based system that allows me to provide online content, making my class a "hybrid" format as opposed to strictly face-to-face), and although I'm starting to get the hang of it, either the interface isn't as intuitive as the one I'm used to, or I'm just getting brain damaged in my old age. Something simple as quiz feedback suddenly has more options, the flip side of which is having more ways to screw things up. I'll get it, though... eventually.

In the ongoing quest to be greener, we've been taking a harder look at transportation costs and energy use, and with all the driving I do, that's a pretty sobering thought. In an effort to address some of that and have a bit of fun in the process, I started looking around at scooters, and about a week ago we picked out a true geek rocket--a Yamaha Vino 125. This is one of those in-between sized scooters--it requires a motorcycle license, but isn't big enough to be freeway legal. But it's FUN to drive... should hit up to about 55 or so (I'll have to test that once it's broken in), and so far I've been getting around 80-85 MPG. The first time I filled up the tank, it cost a whole whopping $2.40, and it was everything I could do to not dance around the gas station, giggling and pointing at the other drivers. I don't get to ride it at night until I take the skill test for the full license, but for the time being I'm having an absolute ball, taking it to rehearsals (I can't carry anything bigger than the tenor sax, but that still covers a lot) and trying to get a little practice in every day.

Other than that, I'm getting over my latest cold (and this completely sucks in July--thanks A LOT to whomever gave it to me), and gearing up for class tomorrow. Midterm exams are in about a week, so things should be interesting.

Yawn. Off to bed. G'night!

Changing old habits...

When New Years' Day 2006 rolled around, I made a simple resolution that I've actually managed to keep: to use fewer disposable cups. Although I'm not a coffee person I do have a daily diet soda habit, and it was starting to dawn on me that if I stacked all the cups I'd get at fast food restaurants (another sad fact of life, given my schedule) over a year, I might just be able to build a tower to the moon. Not cool.

So, I started the easy way--I just began re-using my cups. Soon, it became a habit, and since pretty much every fast food joint around here puts their large soft drinks in the same size 32 or 44 ounce cup these days, lids are almost always interchangeable. While it wasn't the reason I started this, I've discovered that many places will give a discounted price for refills; 7-11 stores, for example, will refill any size drink (up to 44oz) for $.99. So it saves me money, too.

That was the humble beginning of what's now becoming a personal challenge to reduce my resource consumption and, more recently, my carbon footprint. It could be that I've failed to pay attention, but the discussion of environmental issues really seems to have picked up in the last year or two, and it seems like everywhere you look there's a new tip for painless, everyday conservation. So I'm paying attention to little things: walking to errands whenever possible, replacing light bulbs with compact fluorescents, taking shorter (or, um... sharing) showers, and taking my name off junk mail lists. I'm also investigating bigger things like a new fridge (yay for rebates!), and we're on the waiting list for a Smart ForTwo which will replace an efficient-but-aging Toyota. For now, however, I'm just happy making progress in the the little things I do daily.

But before I get off the subject, I have to show off my latest enviro-weirdo accessory. Another resolution I made (this one for 2007) was to drink more water and less crap, which is something I especially have to pay attention to while playing. The predictable side effect to that resolution was an increase in our use of bottled water, since the tap water in my city still tastes kind of weird. That will eventually be solved by filtering at home, but in the meantime I've been buying water in bulk and re-filling my own bottles. My favorite, pictured here, came from Sport Chalet and has survived being dropped a number of times with no ill effect. I think it cost around seven bucks.

Now, go forth and be green!