Greenzone Online

I want to be greener, but I keep wondering how when our entire house is wired with enough blinking, glowing gadgets to light a small town. My first thought was to get rid of my techno geek who had installed all the gadgets. That would surely lower the electricity bill and cut the amount of technology clutter. But then I thought, who would fix the computer? The Tivo? Plus, I would have to turn up the heat at night since my heat-generating techno geek would be gone. My second thought was to throw out a bunch of the gadgets, but I knew there would be so much moaning and groaning I would be fined for noise pollution. I would also be responsible for cramming the landfill with more stuff. So instead of getting rid of my techno geek or throwing out the gadgets here are some other ideas that crossed my mind . I thought I would share these with others who maybe facing the same dilemma.

1. Make the techno geek help create the electricity he or she (yes, women can be techno geeks too) uses. Remember how Fred Flintstone powered his car? Now you can use the same technology! Hook your techno geek up to the Human Power Generator. This little gem may not generate enough power to run all of those gadgets, but it can certainly help your techno geek better appreciate the amount of energy needed to run them. Plus, if you can get the kids interested in it as a game, you could potentially generate enough power to sell back to the utility company!
2. Buy the techno geek a solar power backpack like the one shown at Leafing Through. How handy would that be for the techno geek in your life to tote and recharge his or her laptop, iPod, and cellphone?
3. If you are really ambitious and have room in your backyard, think about a residential wind power system (also shown on the same page as the backpack). If I could get this in our backyard, it might offset a quarter of the electricity used by my techno geek. Okay, maybe I am exaggerating a tad. It would probably offset at least half, not to mention we would be the coolest house on the block

My techno geek voted for options 2 and 3, but our checkbook has said no, at least for now. So you can do what I did and talk with your techno geek about other possible adjustments, which create less groaning and moaning, but still help us green our household. We started by setting the computer monitor to power off after ten minutes of disuse. We also unplug the laptop when it’s not in use. Additionally, we started using power strips so that we can turn off items like the TV and cell phone chargers and keep them from being energy vampires. Finally, my techno geek has also graciously agreed to eliminate at least one computer by donating it to a group like Computers for Schools. What more could a woman ask for other than some earth-friendly chocolate?