summer time, and the livin' is LAZY

23 days between posts... my, aren't I turning into quite the lazy-butt!

In my defense, things are moving quite fast in all this heat, so fast it's hard to keep up.

I have decided to rent out the Graybar condo. Despite all the remodeling we did (and how darn cute i think it looks!), we were unable to sell it and frankly, folks, I'm just ready to move on. I'll be moving over toward the 12 south district (walking to the frothy monkey and the devi clinic? yes, please!) and two very sweet girls will be moving into Graybar.

Needless to say, moving out is taking up a lot of head space! Mixed in with all of that are money-thoughts. The Prius has been the "biggest" green thing I've done, and it has been cause for lots of thinking about both my place in the big world and my little concerns about money and quality of life.

The past 8 months have been a time of great changes for me in the way i think about my life and my goals about how i want to live it. Living like a hotel guest in the condo while it's been on the market has been at the center of these thoughts... one big thought was "should I sell the Prius?"

Cons:
- I only have to fill up once a month most of the time
- what am I gonna buy to replace it? some old clunker that breaks down all the time? I've been using the Prius to drive to Memphis & Chattanooga for my new job and it really pays off b/c the company reimburses mileage at $0.505 a mile!
- if i get a bike, what the hell am I going to do when it rains? when i have to look nice (i.e. not sweaty?)
- I just bought a new set of tires for it
- I am seriously attached to the cute little thing

Pros: (here's where it gets interesting)
- According to the Kelley Blue Book site, I could actually private-party sell my car for just $1,413 less than the loan i took out on it originally... that's $2,554 more than I currently owe on the loan. What i boils down to is that I could basically sell the prius and it would have only cost me $6K to use it for 17 months.
- If those numbers are correct, I could get a bike and stop using gas pretty much altogether (just renting a car when i need to drive out of town - and if those numbers are correct, I could rent a car 40% of the year.)

So.
I'm really having a hard time with this.
Given that the condo has not sold, while the renters will be covering my mortgage costs, I still have the debt i incurred in remodeling the little beastie. Not having a car payment would mean i could pay those suckers down much faster than I will currently be able to.
But, I whine to myself, I like her so muuuuuuuuch...

Well, a happy Friday to you all. I'm looking forward to a weekend of a little packing (I probably have 2 boxes of stuff in addition to the furniture) and a lot of taking advantage of my last weekend to be blissing out on the back patio. This time next week, chickadees, I'll be out of that condo until at least July 31 2009.

"I hit a dog..."

While I'm mildly ashamed to admit that I watched Jackass, I will staunchly and loudly proclaim that the one scene where they rent a car, modify it and then crash it was hysterical - mostly because when they return it, they say "I hit a dog." Not that hitting a dog is funny, but, you know.

Anyway, thanks to xkcd.com for another idea of what to do with a rental car...

thanks, Mr. Hunt

So, back when i was buying the Prius, I thought long and hard about the impact that its actual production (well, the production of any new car) would have on the environment. I had heard about the toxicity of the batteries and the problems with producing them, and I knew that buying anything new is not really a green activity.

However, it's always nice to get some concrete numbers to go with what you already sort of know. Many thanks to Jeff for the link.

I did pretty much know this when i decided to purchase the little bugger, but I hoped then, and I do still hope, that my purchase wasn't stupid. I hope that by hopping on the hybrid bandwagon, I helped just a little to push forward hybrid and electric technology.

::sigh:: I don't know. I've already put 25K on the Prius over the past year, so, according to the article, I'll have overcome that new/old car carbon gap. Of course, if I just stopped driving altogether, that would be even greener...

Good news abounds as we head into March

Well, today is a red-letter day in my greening little world - it is my last day at my current job, meaning that I will be starting my new job on Monday! I told you before about some of the green-issues I had with my job, but another one was that I was still driving too much for my tastes - about 20 miles round trip a day - make that up to 40 if i went home or out for lunch.

The new job (can you hear me squealing with excitement?) is only .6 miles from my intended new condo (still waiting on the old one to sell before I can get into the new one, but even if the world ended and I moved back in, it's only 3.3 miles from the old one!)! I WILL GET TO WALK TO WORK!

I cannot tell you how exciting this is. As much as I love the little Prius, she's been put through her paces with these 40 mile drives back and forth from Murfreesboro, and walking to work will seem like HEAVEN (I hear Sinatra crooning faintly in the background...)

And that 40 mile drive is weighing even more heavily on me with the rising gas prices (gas in the 'boro hit $3.09 last weekend, the highest I've seen it down there - the highest I've ever seen was $3.33 on the corner of Belmont and 21st after Katrina). And timely as ever, my uncle popped this in my inbox this morning - Volkswagen is unveiling a hybrid that's supposed to get 69.9 mpg.

So a happy Leap Day to you all! VU Baseball began last week, and the Music City Classic is underway as I type. Come on Spring, get sprung already!

Another Prius post

Part of the reason I saddled myself with debt to have my Prius was because of the impact I hoped my purchase could have on the development of technologies to further our independence from petroleum fuels.

What I didn't consider, really, was what a large part the 'image' of having a Prius would play in this. Now, I am confident in the fact that my 'image' played no part in the initial purchase - I don't care much either way about how it looks, how I look in it, or what people think of me being an owner... not only that, but the mere fact of getting a new car causes me a bit of embarrassment (because I really cannot afford it, therefore calling my decision-making abilities into question?). There was a Slate article a while back that talked about yuppies buying Prii because they wanted to look socially responsible...

According to a marketing survey [in a New York Times article]... more buyers bought the Prius this year because it "makes a statement about me" (57 percent) than because of its better gas mileage (36 percent) or lower carbon dioxide emissions (25 percent) or new technology (7 percent).

Well, that wasn't me. I don't care what people think about me, I just care that they think.

One of the coolest parts of having it (aside from the mpgs) has been talking about it! When people find out I have a Prius, or see me with it, they ask questions, and I get to explain why I have it (and then plug my blog, heehee).

UC Davis did a study on the effects of image on ownership of HEVs - how cool is that? (thanks, NoImpactMan!) It's about the benefits of owning an HEV that aren't actually benefits of the vehicle, but of what it means to own one. (note a nifty new acronym - HEVs, 'hybrid electric vehicles')

Check this out:

HEVs served as communication mechanisms in all households, either by projecting their images or by stimulating owner evangelism. In addition, for a handful of participants, the symbolic benefits of their HEVs were significant enough to justify substantial functional compromises.

Even when I feel shy about talking about how I think we should all recycle, even a little bit, or we should stop buying so much crap (and I do get shy), I'm totally cool with talking to people about why I think they should buy an HEV. What a funny way to become comfortable with acting 'evangelical'!

scary but cool experience - call your congressman!

Okay, so thanks to the wonders of Facebook (O, Facebook, what would I do without you?), I found out that H.R. 3221 is going to be brought up for a vote this week.

Here's part of the note from the creator of the group 'Advocates for Energy and Environmental Policy' Gabriel Koch...

At some point this week (the specific day has not been set), the House of Representatives will vote on whether to increase fuel efficiency to 35 miles per gallon and whether to use 15% of our electricity from renewable energy sources.

PLEASE CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES, both where you attend school and where your home is, and ask them to vote for this bill, H.R. 3221. You can find out who your Representative is and what their number is at www.house.gov

If you have a second, pick up the phone and call your Rep.

Davidson County is District 5 (with some of the south in District 7 - check out a map here.), and our Rep is Jim Cooper. I called his D.C. office today at 6:30PM EST and someone answered!

It was a spur of the moment thing, so I'm not sure that I sounded as well spoken as I might have liked, but the guy who answered was really nice, and took my name and address.

I am not sure if I've done anything useful, given Toyota and Detroit railing against it, but it was really easy (if sort of scary - I got a little stage fright!), and felt very green indeed.

So! Go forth and call! And if you can do it with free long distance, even better!

Irritating news from the auto-industry

I just got wind of an article in Newsweek about Toyota and how their actions speak louder than their words when it comes to being green. (Thanks, NoImpactMan, for the link!)

Basically, Toyota is talking a big game (have you seen their Why Not? ads? - if you go here and click on the Advertising navigation link, you can see the commercial), but they aren't fully committed to lowering mpgs.

Toyota—in contrast to Honda and Nissan—sided with Detroit to try to block legislation currently before Congress to boost fuel economy for all new vehicles to 35mpg by 2020, up from 25mpg today. Toyota, in a familiar Motown refrain, says achieving such a hard target is not technologically feasible

I think that "technologically feasible" here actually means "financially feasible." They can't reach the target number for their quarterly earnings if they have to go so high on mpgs. Yet another reason I wish more companies could go "B" (here's info on B-Corporations from a previous post) - because that bottom line is most likely the reason Toyota is waffling so badly. The Prius isn't enough of a money maker (because of the gas-electric propulsion system), so Toyota is also producing vehicles like the 14 mpg Tundra pickup, which has a profit margin of $10K. The thing is, I probably would have paid $5K more for my Prius! Yes, a big reason I bought it was the mpg factor, but another BIG factor was that I wanted to support green technology! So if more money is required, LET'S DO IT! Argh!

I'm sad that my Prius purchase went to a company that is not full-on behind the green movement. I still love my prius mightily (she's getting about 55 mpg right now), but I'm disappointed that the company I thought I was supporting in their efforts is trying to undermine my efforts (which are so small compared to what they can do).

Man, maybe it's the weather, but my posts are depressing lately. I promise posts that are more optimistic soon!

Yeah, jobrad, gettin' on the green bandwagon!

Check out Joseph Bradley's latest post: he dug up an article about a Hummer that's getting 60 mpg... that's no 150 mpg, but for those testosterone-driven amongst us, it's a start.

Taking the bad with the good, part 3: the Prius

Hymotion will be making their Hybrid conversion packs available to individuals in early 2008!!!

So I thought that today I would tell you all the story of my Prius, dubbed Thumper by my friend Saralyn.

Back in May, things were going well for me. I was up for a "fast track" promotion and I had finally decided that not only I was ready to make the commitment of buying a car, but I also knew which car I wanted.

The Toyota Prius had been on my mind for several years (all through driving two cars that I hated, that guzzled gas and coolant), and after much thought and research, I decided that it was worth the monthly car payment, and I took the leap. I bought a Prius (hahaha - "bought" meaning "put myself into debt for")

1. Though the payment would take up the entirety of my expendable income, I would save $60 a month or more in gas (depending on how many trips I took down to Murfreesboro & Georgia to see my family), and I should be getting a tax credit for the purchase, but it remains to be seen how much (I'm crossing my fingers so hard i'm cutting off circulation!)

2. Though I would have the mental stress of a new car (worrying about every little scratch and ding, driving thoughtfully instead of balls-to-the-wall abusive like with my other cars), I would have the opportunity to add a Prius to the road, helping to "spread the word" and talk about the technology.

3. Though the eco-cost of producing a new vehicle would be large, I would be supporting the hybrid technology, putting out fewer emissions and using less gas.

It was a lesser of two evils situation, and I chose to take the leap.

The landing has also been a take-the-bad-with-the-good experience, and here's why:

I didn't get that promotion (what a lesson in putting the cart before the horse), so now I'm consuming lots of mac-and-cheese, bananas and water at home, and I'm going into debt. This is pretty bad, because I love to eat fresh and organic. I love the new Whole Foods and would gladly spend my entire paycheck there, eating salads and breads and milk. So eating like a college student really stinks.

On the good hand, though, I am IN LOVE with the Prius. She runs so smoothly that it's fun to drive, I fill her up once a month normally instead of 3 or 4 times, and I get into conversations about her all the time. She gives me an excuse to talk about why I bought her, which lets me talk about Greener Nashville, shopping locally, eating organic... all the things that I love to talk about right now because I'm so obsessed with them. I feel good when I get in the car in the morning, instead of dreading that i'll be stuck on the side of the road, the car overheating because it guzzled a gallon of DexCoolant in just a month (thanks, Pontiac...). She also has a lot of trunk space (ahhh, we have so much in common).

So, owning the Prius has been both a bad and a good thing, but I do feel that it was the right decision to make. I was even more convinced of that when I saw the news about Hymotion's conversion packs.

Hymotion's Battery Range Extender Modules (BREMs) convert Hybrid Electric Vehicles (HEVs) into Plug-in Hybrid Vehicles (PHEV) with 100+mpg fuel efficiency...

Right now, they're only available to fleets, but soon they'll be available to anyone. Obviously, they're going to cost thousands of dollars, but tax credits will supposedly be offered to those buying them (the bill has only been introduced, so this isn't for sure yet).

Back when I was thinking about buying it, I was sad that there wasn't a plug-in option. Yes, the energy from an outlet in my home is coming from fossil fuel (about 60%), but in buying the BREM, I would be one step closer to being independent of fossil fuel, just like i was a step closer with the purchase of my Prius.

I do think that buying less is one of the strategies I want to use for reducing my carbon footprint, but also think that the development of technology is going to be an important way for us, collectively, to reduce our consumption. It's not realistic to think that we will all completely stop driving, stop using electricity and stop eating food from far-away places. So, if we can do both at once - reduce our consumption while funding the development of new things, maybe we can get somewhere.

I just have to keep the idea of small steps in mind, because size is relative. After all, the Prius purchase was a big step for me, but a very small drop in the bucket for the alternative fuel industry. I hope that that big step was the right step to take.