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She Said, Z Said: It’s Not Easy Being Green
She: I can talk the talk and sling the slang, but when it comes right down to it, I’m just not that green.
Z: You’re the crazy lady who brings a dozen of her own mismatched bags into Vons. What could you possibly mean?
She: There was an article in Time magazine this week about a guy who uses his own waste for composting.
Z: You don’t mean ...
She: Humanure. He poops in a bucket and fertilizes the carrot patch. Ugh. The Earth could be a blackened sphere of carbon destruction, and I would still never be that green.
Z: We all have our comfort zones.
She: Pooping in a bucket is my personal Twilight Zone.
Z: That’s what I’ve always said about you.
She: You know how I used to affectionately call you buckethead? I am so sorry. So very, very sorry.
Z: Do you think this is what they’re talking about at the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference?
She: It would certainly be livelier than cap-and-trade and disappearing islands.
Z: I’m probably not the greenest guy in the world, either. I use a lot of plastic bottles to drink water. I’d love to drink the tap water, but Santa Barbara’s tap water tastes like rusty socks.
She: I’ve got such a big, fat carbon footprint I drive a Mercury Grand Marquis.
Z: I’m not mellow when it’s yellow.
She: I’ve been known to put the top down in a convertible and turn on the heater.
Z: On the other hand, we do drive our cars into the ground.
She: I turn off the lights when I leave a room.
Z: We finally live in a house with insulation. President Barack Obama won’t even get the chance to weatherize us.
She: But we could use some stimulus money for solar panels, a new energy-saving laptop and a rain barrel.
Z: Maybe we’re not such Green Grinches: We have no money, live in a small house and have only one child.
She: Nothing reduces your carbon footprint like poverty and infertility.
Z: When you put it that way, it sounds so virtuous.
She: We’re good folk.
Z: Sadly, I think a lot of being green comes down to some intersection of convenience and money. If I could afford the upfront cost of a serious water filter, it would be much easier than schlepping cases from Costco.
She: I’d drive a Prius if I could afford to buy one. I’ll be able to afford a Volt even less, and would like to drive that even more.
Z: Plus, everyone still has to make their own choices. Our friend A hangs his laundry all over the inside of his house instead of using his dryer, but then jumps on a plane for a business meeting in Seattle.
She: Gee, if only he knew someone who worked at GoToMeeting.
Z: I get that hundreds of millions of people doing little things to conserve can make a huge difference — can keep new power plants from being built — but I also think that Copenhagen is hugely important for the big-picture stuff.
She: I go paperless by writing for an online news site. And I only look at magazines with Jon and Kate or Britney covers in the grocery store. I never buy them.
Z: I’m a purely practical environmentalist. Never mind global destruction — too hard to grasp. I simply don’t like breathing smog, I don’t like the sight of polluted rivers and oceans, and every time I fill up my car, I’m sending money to bad people. Please, raise my gas tax so that I’ll pollute less.
She: So no carbon halo for you this Christmas.
Z: Nah, we’ll make some green resolutions for the new year. That will be our cheap, no-footprint Hanukkah gift to each other this year.
She: Good. Because you know what I don’t want for Hanukkah? A bucket.
Z: Yes, dear.
— Share your green-living suggestions with She and Z by e-mailing .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
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» on 12.14.09 @ 11:33 AM
Well we all are reducing our carbon footprint considerably by reading an ONLINE newspaper. That’s got to count for something.
» on 12.14.09 @ 11:58 AM
This gives the term “bucket list” a whole new meaning.
» on 12.15.09 @ 09:14 AM
Being serious about lowering our carbon footprint can also be entertaining. If you don’t want to defecate in a bucket, start researching the compost toilets. With water as scarce as it is and our need to “close the cycle” and eliminate waste, we need to eliminate our waste in a more efficient manner. Dwell magazine recently had an article about alternatives to our potable water toilets that are so destructive to our environment. It uses so much drinkable water and then it all flows out toward our ocean.
You two can be funny and informative about lifestyle change and have an amusing time while supporting positive “green” movements. (Pun intended.) Seriously, folks.
» on 12.15.09 @ 01:23 PM
Finally someone with a sense of humor about being green! I’ll go turn on the lights on my 5,000 square foot house now so Santa can find me.
» on 12.15.09 @ 06:52 PM
You sure can “talk the talk and sling the slang” .. I love it!
» on 12.16.09 @ 12:27 AM
Sorry to hear about the infertility Zak.
» on 12.17.09 @ 10:54 AM
I like the idea that we can be green just by reading a free online newspaper.
» on 12.18.09 @ 01:02 PM
Ditto. I’m done with the fishwrap and am happy to just read Noozhawk online.
» on 12.18.09 @ 01:07 PM
Once you get over the “ugh” factor, composting toilets are actually a great thing. Especially in a drought prone climate like Santa Barbara’s. Think of all the water we’d have to fight fires, rather than fighting them with chemicals and then getting sued for it. That’s an even bigger “ugh” than the composting toilet in my mind.
» on 12.20.09 @ 11:59 AM
I permanently reduced my carbon footprint by getting a vasectomy. I encourage other men to do the same.
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