Create Your Own ecosystem

January 9th, 2012

Are your notes and musings brilliant enough to last, I don’t know, FOREVER?

With a conventionally made notebook, you might be running the risk of being remembered for all eternity for this week’s grocery list or that note you left for your roommate (“Stop using my deodorant!”) when said notebook ends up in a landfill.

I can say with some certainty that my “exceptional” ideas (“Bring back the sneaker skate.” “Breed a non-shedding cat.”) aren’t usually remarkable enough to be revisited next week, let alone in the next century. This is just one reason a totally recyclable notebook is vastly appealing to me: It will go away.

Ecosystem journals, planners and notebooks are touted as having a unique past, present and future. The book’s past are its various parts, which are made of 100 percent post-consumer recycled paper, while its present is whatever thoughts and ideas you record on the pages. Its future is in your hands: either recycle the book when you’re done or, if you are feeling like a smartypants, save it for future reference.

According to the company’s website, by using this paper in 2009, ecosystem saved 3,046 full-grown trees, 1,299,751 gallons of water and 283,974 pounds of greenhouse gases.

The notebooks come in a variety of styles — blank, lined and with graph paper — and can be customized to your heart’s desire. Just go to the company’s website and design your own notebook. Notebooks start at $6.95.

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RuMe: For When My Lotion’s in Motion

January 6th, 2012

I have a problem with packing light. As in, it doesn’t happen.

Lately, my toiletries have become a significant source of weight in my bag. It seems that the older I get, the more I like to be prepared for anything when I travel. An unexpected illness? I’m the one with the Pepto Bismol, Advil and the nasal spray. A hangnail? I’m packing nail scissors and an emery board. Having a stressful travel day? Bubble bath, a travel candle and an eye mask. Check, check and check.

All of these toiletries mean that I have been guilty of using a ton of Ziploc bags when I travel, lest my moisturizer or suntan lotion explode mid-flight. I try to reuse them but inevitably they wind up getting torn or just plain gross.

Enter the RuMe Baggie, a reusable, water-resistant zip top bag that now holds all of my lotions and potions when I travel. Designed as a reusable food storage bag, the fabric is food safe, machine washable and made in a Fair Trade factory in South Korea.

Whether you plan to zip up some salted peanuts or some bath salts, the RuMe bag is a great alternative to a plastic baggie and is much much cuter. It comes in a variety of vibrant prints and two sizes: the classic baggie (above) and the Baggie All, which sports three zippered compartments.

The bags cost $4.95 and $9.95 respectively.

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Stay Cool With GreenSmart

September 15th, 2011

I try to practice the adage that “less is more” on a daily basis. I am pretty successful at it, except when it comes to dessert. And cheese. And… cough… well, you know. But never mind about that.

In any case, when it comes to housewares I truly try to keep the clutter at bay, generally opting for multipurpose items or just doing things the old fashioned way rather than have a whole bunch of gadgets and gizmos lying around my house. So when GreenSmart threw its Manatee water bottle sleeve into a package with some other samples I thought, Meh, don’t need that. After all, who wants to keep the water in their bottle warm? Duh!

So, yeah, I’m not that smart. That the sleeve was also designed to keep beverages cold — EUREKA! — hit me halfway through Bikram class on Tuesday, a class during which I was fairly certain I would die from heat exhaustion. When I was finally able to find my Klean Kanteen through the blinding sweat, I discovered that the stainless steel bottle was the same temperature as the air… which, in a BIkram class, is roughly the temperature of the sun. The 110-degree water was less than refreshing. Read the rest of this entry »

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Sweet Treats

September 9th, 2011

I am a huge dessert fan, as evidenced by the size of my ass. Actually my entire body seems to have expanded in the last few weeks after a two-week vacation, which featured Pabst Blue Ribbon and waffles as major food groups. In an effort to undo some of the damage I did at the buffet, I have been watching what I eat. But a girl needs her treats. Read the rest of this entry »

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Get All in a Lather

August 22nd, 2011

I love me a multipurpose product. So when Kiss My Face sent me a soap that required months of testing because of its many uses, I was tickled.

Peace Soap is a liquid Castile — or olive oil — soap that can be used in the shower, to do dishes and laundry, even to wash veggies before eating. The soap is made from simple, natural ingredients, including coconut and hemp seed oils, which keep it from being drying. The Grassy Mint scent is mild and clean and leaves everything from your skin to your counter tops smelling fresh and delicious. Read the rest of this entry »

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To Dream, Perchance to Float

August 17th, 2011

Is there a scent that transports you? For me, the smell of jasmine makes me feel all dreamy and floaty. And who doesn’t want to feel dreamy and floaty?

I also love candles but I think that most scented candles are, in a word, nauseating. Artificial scents don’t just smell gross, they are gross; the chemicals used to recreate the scent of a mountain breeze or an apple cobbler can be dangerous, especially for those with problems like asthma. Read the rest of this entry »

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Here Comes the Sun

August 15th, 2011

My bathroom cabinet is where natural sunscreens go to die. I test them only to find that they rub on as white as clown makeup, or that they are too greasy or that they just don’t work. Frankly, it has been a big struggle over the last few years to find a healthy sunscreen — i.e. one without parabens — that works as well as their chemical-laden counterparts. Read the rest of this entry »

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I’d Hate Her But I Loves Her – Josie Maran

April 25th, 2011

I know what you regular readers are thinking: Josie Maran, Josie Maran, enough with the Josie Maran. But seriously? She ain’t just pretty. She smart too.

She’s so smart, she makes me pretty.

I was already a convert to the whole argan oil thing that Josie promotes when, last summer, I found myself in New York City at the Sephora store on 86th Street. I meandered over to the Josie Maran counter to see if there was anything new in the line when it dawned on me that I hadn’t ever tried the tinted moisturizer. So I picked one up.

For some background, as someone who is just short of being an albino and as a woman who doesn’t want to age like her father’s childhood baseball mitt, living in California has been a big pain in my ass. Even here in San Francisco, the sun is just EVERYWHERE. Read the rest of this entry »

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A Very Green Festival

March 4th, 2011

Last night I had the pleasure of attending the launch of the first annual San Francisco Green Film Festival, a labor of love for Rachel Caplan, the festival’s founder and executive director.

Caplan is the former festival director for the San Francisco Ocean Film Festival, the first and largest showcase for ocean-related films in North America. After realizing that San Francisco did not have a green film festival of its own – shocking, right? — Caplan founded the San Francisco Green Film Festival to provide a forum for films and discussions that link media arts with environmental activism.

The festival kicked off with a kick ass event: First, a screening of the documentary “Bag It” at the Landmark Theatres Embarcadero Center Cinema, then a fantastic party at the the beautiful LEED-certified Bently Reserve.

Wonderful from start to finish.

Read the rest of this entry »

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McDonald’s Offers Up One More Way to Get Fat

February 24th, 2011

Food master Mark Bittman has a column in yesterday’s New York Times about McDonald’s sudden interest in serving “healthy” food.

The fast food chain’s most recent menu addition: Oatmeal that has more fat and calories than its regular hamburger and is more expensive than its double cheeseburger.

S to the I to the G to the H. Seriously?

As Bittman writes, “Real oatmeal contains no ingredients; rather, it is an ingredient. As such, it’s a promising lifesaver: oats are easy to grow in almost any non-extreme climate and, minimally processed, they’re profoundly nourishing, inexpensive and ridiculously easy to cook…Yet in typical McDonald’s fashion, the company is doing everything it can to turn oatmeal into yet another bad choice…’Cream’ (which contains seven ingredients, two of them actual dairy) is automatically added; brown sugar is ostensibly optional, but it’s also added routinely unless a customer specifically requests otherwise. There are also diced apples, dried cranberries and raisins, the least processed of the ingredients (even the oatmeal contains seven ingredients, including ‘natural flavor’).

The article continues, “Oh, please. Here’s the thing: McDonald’s wants to get people in the store. Once a day, once a week, once a month, the more the better, of course, but routinely. And if you buy oatmeal, they’re o.k. with that. But they know that, once inside, you’ll probably opt for a sausage biscuit anyway.

And you won’t be much worse off.”

Check out the article in its entirety on the New York Times website.

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