Green Greed

This "green" topic is stretching it quite a bit, but I'm going to talk about money (it looks greenish, right?) This is more of a WARNING out there to all of you selling items online. One of my roommates tried to sell his camera over an online bidding site (ebay, craigslist, I don't know) and got screwed out of $1700+! He posted his camera as worth $3300. Someone from England bought it from him and paid in check. They mailed a check for $5000 and asked him to wire the remaining money after shipping costs (which came out to about $1700 in cash). Even though the whole deal sounded shady, he saw that huge check and went on with the deal. He waited to make sure that the check cleared in his bank, then shipped the camera and wired the cash through Western Union. Yesterday he got a call from his bank saying that even though the check cleared through his bank, it did not clear through the international bank. By then, the guy in England had already picked up their cash from Western Union... cash that was 100% out of my roommate's funds since the check for $5000 was a fake. (Didn't he read Catch Me if You Can?!) He contacted the shipping company and had the camera returned to our address. On the bright side he still has his camera, but he's out the $1700 in cash and whatever shipping costs he had to pay. Moral of the story? If he looks like a sham, it probably is a sham! My roomie didn't have that much money in his account to begin with, so now he has to borrow money from his parents to pay off debts. He claims he had some bad Karma building up over the years and just had that feeling.

Have Mercy on Percy

Team Green has had two great clean up this month! The first was the Nashville Clean Water Project: Percy Priest Clean-up on September 13th and the second was the Buffalo Canoe Float in Waynesboro, TN. The Nashville Clean Water Project is a group of representatives from various organizations including Cumberland River Compact, Metro Water, Team Green, Nashville Hiking Meetup, Army Corp of Engineers, the Mayors Office and Think Media. Our goal is to increase awareness of the problem facing Percy Priest Lake and create drastic preventative changes in order to preserve the integrity of Percy Priest and other local waterways. This clean up was the second this year. The first was the largest clean up in Nashville History, and still the shoreline and islands of Percy Priest lake are littered with tires, beer cans, and careless trash. The issue: people boat out to the islands, party, and leave everything there for the island fairies to carry away. This clean up was much smaller, but we used it to get the support from Nashville, Smyrna, LaVergne, and Rutherford County officials. With only 130 volunteers we cleared nearly 350 bags of trash, 40 tires, and numerous large metal items. We will have a significantly larger clean up in the spring, and the mayors have promised to hold a Summit this fall.

The second clean up was at Buffalo River. We launched from Crazy Horse Recreational Park and float down a 10 mile stretch of the river. Team Green had ten canoes, one kayak, and the support of everyone floating with us that day. The twenty one of us cleaned over 15 tires, a hot water heater, grills, Styrofoam coolers, and countless beer bottles and missing flip flops. Many of our canoes were so weighed down by the tires that we were unable to continue cleaning efforts for the last 3 miles of the river, which had more beer cans on the bottom of the current than I could count. Next year I plan to make an over night camping trip of it with a lunch break after five miles. This way we won't be in such a hurry to make it back to land before dark!

Oogle the Google!

Team Green's calendar is now available on Google Calendars!

Garden Poppers

I fried up some Jalapeno Poppers (fresh from the garden) the other day and made the mistake of bringing the extra ones to work, so now I have to blog about the recipe! It is very time consuming if you do it by yourself, but once all of the jalapenos are cut in half and seeded, it only takes a matter of seconds. Why do I call them garden poppers? Well, first to encourage everyone to have a garden, and second, this recipe can be used for any garden variety pepper, including bell peppers, but you will need significantly more cheese!

What you'll need:
PS. My recipes are rarely unit conscious... I don't tend to measure things before I cook them. That takes the fun out of it!

1. Between 10 and 50 jalapenos (depending on how many people you'll be feeding). Each jalapeno makes 2 poppers, and the average person can probably consume 10 poppers in one sitting!
2. At least one other person to help cut the jalapenos and scrape out the seed
3. Deep frier. A sauce pan and some metal utensil to remove the poppers works too.
4. One box (about 8 oz) of cream cheese for every 30-50 jalapeno halves (depending on how cheese you like them).
5. One bag of shredded cheddar for every 30-50 jalapeno halves.
6. Milk
   
7. Parsley, Basil, and maybe oregano would be good too!
8. Salt and Pepper
9. Flour
10. Canola Oil
11. Bread crumbs (this is pretty important. I tried making them without bread crumbs and, well, they tasted pretty crumby!)
12. Paper towel
13. 2 bowls
    

Step One: Halve all of your jalapenos and scrape out the seeds. The seed is by far the hottest part of the pepper and will not be very pleasing (no matter how hot you like your food).
Note: I of course recommend saving the seeds and composting them!

Step Two: Mix your cream cheese and cheddar cheese. Add a tablespoon or so of your herbs for every block of cream cheese. Add a dash of salt and pepper. Stir up really well.

Step Three: Lay out all of your jalapeno halves on a cookie sheet. Add a clump of cheese mixture to each half. I usually do not make the cheese bulge out of the halve, but you can.

Step Four: Put some milk in one bowl and your flour in a second bowl. Dip each stuffed halve into the milk, then into the flour. Make sure that the flour completely covers the halve. Lay them out on the cookie sheet again and let dry for at least 10 minutes. During this time add your oil to the deep frier or sauce pan. Heat oil to 365 degree F.

Step Five: Replace the flour bowl with bread crumbs. Dip the lightly coated stuffed halves into milk again then into the bread crumbs. Lay them out on the cookie sheet to dry for a couple minutes.

Step Six: Place breaded, stuffed jalapeno halves into metal strainer (that comes with a deep frier) or whatever utensil that will allow you to safely remove jalapenos from the scorching hot oil. Keep poppers in the oil until the bread crumbs turn a light to medium brown. Check to make sure that your cheese is not oozing out of the poppers (this can be messy). If your cheese is oozing out, the temperature is probably too high, or you left them in too long.

Finally: Remove the poppers and set them on a paper towel to soak and cool down. I recommend waiting a half hour to 45 minutes before serving (they are really really really hot, not kidding!)

What a Waste!

When I decided last month to rent out 3 bedrooms in my house, one of the most important things to me was that my tenants conserved water, electric and waste. So, I drew up a lease that outlined what should be recycled or composted and where the closest drop of centers were. The guys have tried, but I had to do an intervention. Since I started recycling and composting, I'm lucky if I get even 1/8th of a bag full by the end of a week. When I walked through their kitchen the other day, their trash can was brimming to the top, and I had seen them take out the garbage only 3 days prior!! So, one of my roommates (who actually got me to start recycling in the first place) went through their garbage with me and sorted everything that could be composted, recycled, reused, or worse... still worked! This is what we came up with: Seven grocery bags full of NON TRASH!

From left to right: recyclables (glossy paper and cardboard), compost-ables (non-glossy paper, and food), reusables (plastic cups, plastic forks, grocery bags, cloth sunglass holders, a large sheet of packing material, etc), and recyclable plastic bags (recyclable at Kroger).

From Left to Right: Clothes (mismatched socks and old t-shirts that can be used as rags), styrofoam (can be recycled at Publix), and recyclables (#1-7 plastic, tin, aluminum, etc)

I also found 4 pens and a highlighter that still worked. What we were left with at the end was not a trash can brimming to the top, but rather a trash can with only 1/8th of a bag full, as it should be! Items remaining in the trash can include mystery plastic and rubber items, candy wrappers made of unknown origin, a cd (which I'm sure can probably be recycled somewhere, and food soaked glossy paper (which can be neither recycled nor composted). How much of your trash are you wasting?

Say you take this challenge and sort through your trash, and come up with the same proportion of reusable, recyclable and compostable goods? What now? Well, don't throw them back in the can and say "that was fun!" If you do not have Metro Curby (curbise pickup) at your house, you can call Earth Savers Recycling at 481-9640 and pay only $48 every 3 months! They will pick up your recycling twice a week (compared to once a month through Curby). There are also drop off centers all over Nashville. Many of them are located at Metro Schools. There is even a place for your hazardous waste, large appliances, carpets, and more. Convenience Centers are available in three locations near Nashville.

Virtual Experience

Team Green now has a helmet cam... which I will be wearing on many of the trips. Below is a YouTube video of Team Green's Dragon Boat experience and an "Intro to Team Green" video. I also brought the helmet cam on our Ocoee White Water and Mountain Biking trip. It'll be interesting to see how that one turns out! Our plan is to add a video section to the Team Green website, so be sure to keep an eye open for that.

LEED The Way

Over the past weekend I went out to Len Foote Hike-Inn at Amicalola Falls on a Team Green Trek. We hiked in five miles, checked in, unloaded our daypacks, and regrouped for a tour of the facilities before heading off for dinner. Len Foote Hike-Inn is a Gold Standard LEED certified facility complete with composting toilets, vericomposting bins, rain water harvesting, wild flower gardens, and a no trash policy (anything you hike in, you must hike out. There are no trash cans on the property). At dinner they have a no waste policy and encourage us to only take what food we can eat, with the goal of only 4 ounches of food waste between all fourty of us plus staff! We reached that goal every time, and would have managed zero food waste if it wasn't for the kids!

Of particular interest to me was the rain water harvesting, vermicomposting bins, and solar panel water heating. Each of them are pretty simple (and relatively cheap in comparison to the energy and resources that we waste each year without them). I'll discuss each of them with a description of how to install them in your own home.

1. Rain Water Harvesting.

Of couse it is not a good idea to use rainwater to wash dishes, bathe in or drink, but it is a wonderful resource of water for the garden and yard. Ideally you will install a metal roof because it will last longer than shingles and can transport the rain water more easily than shingles. With or without a tin roof, you can install rain chains. First, make sure that your gutters are covered either with screen or you can purchase gutters that are already partially covered. This prevents leaves from clogging your gutters.

Note: Notice a bunch of mosquitos in your yard? Mosquitos breed every three days in standing water. Often they breed in gutters that have been clogged with leaves. Remove those leaves, cover your gutters, and you'll notice fewer mosquitos in no time!

Remove the piping that leads from your gutter to the ground. Instead, install a plastic chain leading from the gutter base opening to a large container. You have two options. You can either burry a large container in the ground (this keeps the water from freezing in colder seasons) and install a hand pump to remove the water, or you can have an above ground container with a spout (allowing the water to flow out by gravity rather than air pressure). Make sure that the container has a large opening covered by screen (again to prevent leaves and mosquitos). When it rains, gravity will cary the water down the chain links into the container. Even in the winter when water freezes on the chains, you can still see water making it's way down the chain! There you have it, your rain harvesting system is complete. To use it to water the garden, simply attach a hose to the spout.

2. Vermicomposting

Vermicomposting is composting of food and paper items using worms. Take this challenge.

• Get everyone in your household to place their paper products in a bin each day. Paper products include non-glossy paper, thin cardboard, kleenex, coffee filters and paper towels. Also have them put their food scraps in another bin. Food scraps include all food items and coffee grounds, excluding fats, meats, dary products, and animal feces.
• Weigh how much of your household waste is paper and food product. Take an average over a week. Multiply this number by 2, and buy that amount of worms! Works can eat half of their body weight in a day.
• Next build a composting bin. It should be wider rather than deeper. Mine is about 4 feet long, 2 feet wide, and 6 inches deep. Be sure to drill medium sized holes in the sides near the base (to airate) and small holes in the bottom (to drain). Cover the holes on the sides with screen to prevent worms from crawling out and flies from getting in.
• Next, shred or tear all of your paper and soak it in water. When the paper is soaked, add some crushed leaves and dirt to the mix. Squeeze most of the ater out and place it in the bottom of the bin as the "bedding." The bedding mix should be more than 2 inches deep, but less than 12 inches deep. Add your worms and let them get used to their new habitat for a couple days before adding food. When you add food, be sure to bury it. Cover your bin with a dark plastic bag (works like it dark and moist).
• Be sure to add your paper/food/leaf mixture in sections. Within a few weeks, harvest the wormanure in sections. To do this, remove a section of plastic. The light with drive the worms away, and the material will dry out. After a day or two, collect the dark rich soil-looking material (it's just worm poop!) and place it in a sifter. The fine material is great for the garden (in fact, it can hold moisture better than most manure and does not contain the harmful chemicals that most mature contains). Toss the larger chunchs of partially decayed food and paper product back into the bin.

3. Solar Panel Water Heating

I am not quite sure how to go about doing it, but here is the gist. Your water heating tank requires an absurd amount of energy to heat the water. Often, the water is heated and never used. Other times the hot water runs out and you require more energy to heat more water. Solar Panel Water Heating reduces the amount of energy used to heat the water. Solar panels are placed on your roof, and all water is sent through the solar panel system before going to the water heater. The solar panels will heat the water between 5 and 10 degrees, thus requiring less energy to reach the correct temperature. Another option is a Tankless Water Heater. This works on the same premise, but instead of using solar panels or a water heater tank, the water is passed through the tankless water heat and only the water that passes through it is heated. This reduces the amount of energy used to heat the water. Why? 1. Because it takes more energy to heat a huge tank compared to a small pipe full and 2. Because you are not spending energy on heating water that will not be used.