Diamond-Cut Life

Since I’ve been working pretty hard lately, I’m taking a mini-vacation here in Scottsdale, Arizona (next to Phoenix), visiting my friend Jean for a few days. The idea is to make my own little self more sustainable, and sure enough, my spirit is going “Ahhhhhhhhh” in response to the rugged desert beauty, the brilliant sky, [...]

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I’m writing on the south bank of the Columbia River here in Boardman, Oregon (population 3,500). I went running last night at sunset . . . oh my. Beautiful; what a joy. I found deer tracks on the sandy beach and looked to the west, where Mount Hood was a tiny, rosy peak in the far distance.

Oregon’s only coal-fired energy plant was just a few miles to the south. This

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My husband Thor and I love to have people over for dinner. At the same time I’m addicted to sociability, I ‘m also passionate about choosing food with the smallest possible carbon footprint (similar to ‘embodied energy’). Our guests keep coming back, so I gather our cooking tastes pretty good.

Here are the major guidelines we use:

• Buying local food lowers carbon footprint more than the ‘organic’ label
  Example: Australian wine doesn’t make

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Last night some friends and I had one of our periodic ‘Green Girls’ dinner parties at my friend Colleen’s house. We had a blast sharing news, laughter, viewpoints and encouragement around sustainability. Colleen’s meatless eggplant mousakka was a hit.

We all eat more than 1,000 meals a year, for a big percentage of our carbon footprint. If we want to lighten our carbon footprint, the principle to embrace is

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