April 22nd, 2009 Posted in event, green business, reusing, save money | No Comments »
In celebration o’ Earth Day (Fun Fact: Earth Day was started by someone named Gaylord), Swaptree is planting a tree for each trade completed today. “‘Old on a tic”, you might exclaim, “Just wot is this ‘Swaptree’ thing, anyway?”
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April 8th, 2009 Posted in food, green business, reusing, save money | 7 Comments »

To make a long story short, I won’t have internet at my house ’til Friday, so yesterday I went to Swift Creek Coffee House to leech off their wireless internet.
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November 18th, 2008 Posted in green business, recycle, reusing | 4 Comments »

If you’re like me, you probably have at least one really old pair of shoes lying around somewhere. They’re too old/holey/torn up to wear, and yet you cannot find it in your heart to throw them away, discarding all those hours of hard work from child labor in the Philippines. But hearken, there’s a way to recycle your old sneakers!
Good ol’ Nike has set up a shoe recycling program, wherein you turn in your old shoes and they ship them to a processing plant. At the plant, they separate the old shoes into 3 different materials (rubber, foam, and plastic) and grind them up. They’ve recycled more than 21 million pairs of shoes since 1990!
Once they’re ground up, they can be turned into running tracks, new shoes, basketball courts, or even new clothes. That’s a lot better than just throwing away your old shoes to just sit in a landfill for centuries. So take a look around your house, find some old sneakers, find the nearest dropoff location, and recycle your old shoes.
August 26th, 2008 Posted in food, green business, health, organic | 3 Comments »
Last week I came home to find a large cardboard box from Papa Spud’s. What is Papa Spud’s, you might ask? Welp, Papa Spud’s is a company that delivers mainly local, mainly organic fruit and vegetables to Raleigh and its surrounding towns. Almost all their produce comes from inside North Carolina, which means that you’re supporting local farmers plus cutting down on the transportation pollution.
Here’s the plethora of nutritious vittles that greeted me when I tore open the box. Please note the insulating lining that keeps the produce nice n’ cold.

- 3 big yellow peaches from NC
- Pint of grape tomatoes (NC)
- 2 slicing cucumbers (NC)
- 2 big eggplants (NC)
- 6 red dale potatoes (NC)
- and from California, a ginormous bag of red seedless grapes
Since I opened the box, I’ve tried all of the foods and have only an eggplant and some grape tomatoes left. It was dang good, with no messed up fruit or vegetables. The grapes and peaches were especially good. I’m about to finish up the eggplant and tomaters tomorrow.
Oh yeah, they reuse their insulated boxes. Each week, you put them outside on your doorstep, and they pick them up when they bring your new vegetables. A simple, efficient, non-wasteful system.
Anyhoo, if you live close to Raleigh, you should go check them out. Their website explains how you can start getting local, organic food delivered to your house this week. The best thing about it is that it encourages you to try some new healthy foods, plus support yo’ local farmers, all without leaving the comforting womb of your own home.
August 25th, 2008 Posted in eco footprint, green business, inventions, off the grid, science, solar power, transportation | 2 Comments »
To see the video and read more about the Zephyr-6, head on over to BBC News, and tell them EcoJoes sent you.
A solar-powered plane flew for a little over 82 hours, shattering its old record. The lightweight plane, known as the Zephyr-6, was flown as a demonstration for U.S. military, which is looking for new ways to provide air support for its ground troops.
Dang, 3 days in the air just from solar power. This might be even better than the solar powered bra. Pretty amazing. If they could somehow make solar-powered passenger planes, we could cut down on air pollution while also reducing our dependence on non-renewable fossil fuels. It’s a win-win situation.
August 25th, 2008 Posted in green business, inventions, off the grid, solar power | No Comments »

I don’t have much to say about this, except that if I was a girl, I would be wearing one all the time.
Triumph International Japan has finally done it; our world’s environmental problems are as good as solved now, for they have done the un-possible — invented a solar powered bra. I haven’t seen a “green” invention this innovative since the new milk jug design came out and confused some people.
The bra is green (in color and philosophy), and has a solar panel attached to it that can be worn around the stomach. It generates enough energy to charge small electronics, like a mobile cellular phone or mp3 player or what have you.
Not only does this bra collect solar power, but it also has plastic pouches that can be filled with water in case you get thirsty. So I guess it might save some water bottles?
But alas, this ingenious invention has some downsides. It can get messed up if it rains on the solar panel, and also, it doesn’t work if it’s covered up with actual clothes. To me, it looks like someone just glued a flexible solar panel to a tanktop. We will be closely monitoring Triumph International’s continuing work on this creation…