"Love is in the air," or so it seems from the Democrats. I was not able to watch the debate last night, but from what I gather from the post debate commentary and from what I have seen, it looks like it was a love fest. How is anyone going to know who to vote for if Hillary and Obama only show a united front instead of trying to make themselves different. Maybe the point is that there really is no difference and you just have to go with the one you think you can look at and listen to for at least the next 4 years, if not eight. I still think that we should be able to vote on the President and the Vice President separately like we vote for the Governor and Lieutenant Governor separately here in Texas. There have been many times when the two have been from different parties. You say that nothing would get done that way. Is anything getting done now? and Would that be a bad thing? If government can't learn to work together, they can't raise taxes or mess anything else up.

On the Green Front Today is February 1st and I would like to let you know that I have bought no new clothing of any kind for one whole month. I think that is a record for me and it is a record that I intend to keep going. I have not set a goal as to how long I can go without shopping; this is like AA for me so I am just taking it one day at a time. The only consumer goods that I have purchased are food, books and yarn. Maybe one day I can tackle the book thing, but I have to have yarn or how else can I have a blog about crocheting. Yarn is a necessity of life just like food.

I have found that Grad school is not "green" friendly. I have to write a report that requires a ton of research and I cannot read off the computer screen, plus I need to mark my reading up, so I have to print everything out. I am being very picky and printing only the things that are necessary and I am of course using recycled paper, but still I feel bad every time the printer starts running. What I don't use for my paper, though, I will use the backs as scratch paper when the project is completed.

I found out about a cool "geen" site this morning. It is called Green Gadgets and can be found at http://www.greatgreengadgets.com/gadgets/ . It has a lot of information and on TV they were showing a new little solar power supply gadget that you can get to recharge your cell phone with. Now how cool is that. We have enough sun here where I am at that I would think that we could solar power just about anything. If I only had the money I would have solar panels on my house and I would be selling energy back to the power company. (Can you tell that I have solar power envy?)

I learned something new from my daily Ideal Bite newsletter, the little stickers on your fruits and vegies can tell you whether or not the produce is conventionally grown, organically grown (I knew this one), or Genetically modified (GM). Here is how it works:

"A four-digit number means it's conventionally grown."
"A five-digit number beginning with 9 means it's organic."
"A five-digit number beginning with 8 means its GM."

Now we can be comfortable with buying our fruits and vegies and eating them too. Unfortunately there is still no labeling on processed foods to let us know if they contain GM ingredients. I don't think the FDA is going to require it ever, either, so the best thing you can do is to stay away from processed foods, which is healthier anyway, or find ones that are labeled that they contain no GM's. These no GM processed items can be found in the health food section of you grocery or at places like Whole Foods and Trader Joes. (I am also envious of those of you who have access to a Trader Joes. We don't have them here as Texas is the home of Whole Foods.)

On the Crochet Front The hippo is complete, which is good since the party is tomorrow. I will take pictures to post on Tuesday.

Send comments. I love to get them and I love to know who is out there and what you like.

Peace,
Laura