Goal For The Green

Modern life is filled with modern conveniences. Unfortunately, many of those conveniences come with a price we would rather not pay. They can provide a low quality experience when you use them and, very often, you also get to feel guilty about the environment afterwards.

Let’s say your boss has tasked you with throwing a soup party at the office, There is no means to wash a bunch of dishes afterwards. Besides, these are your co-workers, not your children. Cleaning up after them is not really part of your job duties, even if when you are asked to organize an event. There is a modern convenience to solve this problem: Disposable bowls.

The problem is that if you get Styrofoam bowls and put hot soup in them, you can actually see how the Styrofoam melts from the heat and you can taste how it has contaminated the food. Even if you do not believe that has negative health consequences, who on earth actually likes the taste of Styrofoam? It makes for a lousy dining experience to have your soup with a little bit of Styrofoam flavoring. Afterwards, you get to feel guilty about what you are doing to the environment.

Alternately, you could get plastic bowls. They are more heat tolerant in that they are less likely to melt or off-gas. They also have no insulation, so holding a disposable plastic bowl full of hot soup is a good way to get burned. They also do not solve the issue of guilt. Plastic is also something that will do bad things to the environment after it arrives at a landfill.

Another alternative is paper bowls. They are better insulated than plastic, will not leave behind a chemical taste, and there is some hope they will properly biodegrade when they go to the landfill. This sounds like a winner, until you actually throw your party and discover that paper has a bad habit of not holding up well when wet. This is a potential disaster of a party.

The superior answer here is compostable bowls made from sustainable materials like bamboo. They will hold up well when filled with hot soup. Like paper bowls, they have natural insulation to protect your fingers from the heat, and there will be no chemical taste added to your food. Furthermore, when they get to the landfill, they will properly and fully biodegrade. Problem solved.

When searching for carpet cleaners Brooklyn homeowners use, there are some questions that you need to keep in mind in order to find the best service possible. The first thing that you should find out about is whether the company offers a free estimate or if you have to pay a fee for someone to come to the home to examine the area that needs to be cleaned. If you have to pay a fee, then it should be deducted from the total price of the cleaning.

Most companies will stand by the quote that they give you. If the company does offer an estimate and you decide to use the services, then you need to make sure you have a document stating what will be done, the average of how long it could take and how much it will cost. You also need to ask about any warranties or if damages are covered by the company. Find out how long it takes to clean an area of the home and how many people will be doing the job. Another thing to keep in mind are the kind of materials used when cleaning. If you have any allergies or young children, then you need to make sure the products used are safe.

Some companies will have large pieces of equipment that are used to clean the carpets in the home. Find out if you will need to provide any of the cleaning products or if the company will supply everything. If there is a specific scent that you want used, then ask if you can provide the items. The company might take a small amount off the total price if all the workers have to do is clean instead of provide all of the supplies.

See if the technicians are certified in the work that is done. Ask to see any kind of references that will give you enough assurance to know that the company provides the best work possible. When you hire the company, you should probably be at the home for the first few times that the technicians clean if you plan on using the company on a regular schedule just so that you can see how they operate.

Great things happen when visionaries
direct their talent and passion towards the design of an automobile.
Inventor Buckminster Fuller did so in the 1930s, and the result was
the creative, unique Dymaxion Car. It first appeared at the Chicago
World’s Fair in 1933, and bravely defied the conventions of the day.

Today, only one Dymaxion Car remains,
which can be found at the National Automobile Museum in Reno, Nevada.
Though you won’t find this rare machine among the ranks of

classics cars for sale, it still transfixes classic automotive enthusiasts.
Staff at the Lane Motor Museum in Nashville, which uses the slogan
“Unique cars from A to Z,” have been so transfixed that they’ve
spent the past eight years creating an exact replica of the Dymaxion
Car. On Tuesday, they announced that the recreation was complete, and
will be displayed from Thursday, February 26th.

“The Dymaxion just makes sense for us
to have at the (Lane Motor Museum),” said Jeff Lane, director of
the Lane Motor Museum. “The design is well ahead of its time and
its looks definitely fit the uniquely different philosophy we build
our collection around.”

It’s no wonder that the restorers and
technicians found the Dymaxion Car fascinating enough to recreate.
The car had the distinct, aerodynamic shape of a raindrop, a shape
that contrasted with the boxy shape of most cars of the time. It also
featured a cantilevered chassis that supported two fixed wheels at
the front and one steerable wheel at the back. The back wheel
operated like a boat tiller.

The car’s V8 engine was mounted at the
back, but the Dymaxion had front wheel drive. It was designed so that
it could perform a U-turn on a dime. It carried up to 11 people,
could achieve 30 miles per gallon, and could reach a top speed of 90
miles per hour. It must have been a very strange, supremely unique
experience to behold and operate such a car.

Odd or not, the Dymaxion Car was
supremely efficient. In today’s age of fuel efficiency and resource
preservation, the Dymaxion is an ideal model to look to. One might
even say that the design was well ahead of its time.

The Dymaxion Car will make its maiden
voyage from Nashville to northern Florida for the Amelia Island
Concours d’Elegance on March 15th.