I moved recently from a townhome to a ranch-style house, and I love it. Though, the benefits of the townhome became immediately apparent when I had to mow the lawn for the first time. Yard work of any kind was alien to me in the townhome, and before the townhome I rented an apartment, so it had been a good 15 years since I had to mow the lawn, or pull weeds, or hire some guy to come out and spray the dandelions dead. Due to all the rain we've been getting, I've been mowing every four days and with gas prices the way they are, I wondered if an electrical mower would be viable.
I had used an electrical mower on my grandmothers yard many, many years ago, and I hated dragging the cord around. I wanted a battery powered mower that was as powerful as a gas powered one, and I wanted something that was a mulcher. After searching the web tirelessly, I found it. The Neuton Mower was battery powered, powerful, had a mulcher attachment, and has a trimmer! And it was easy on the environment and quiet, so I was in love! Then I got to the price: under $2,400 for the base model. Talk about wind out of the sales. You can get a pretty affordable gas powered mower, but I wanted an electrical because I hate paying 3.34 a gallon even if it is for a small tank. But can you imagine paying $2,400 for a mower!
This got me thinking about other products out there marketed to being "green". I've got progressive roots, and I like to think I'm doing everything I can to be environmentally conscious, but it has dawned on me that the reason so many people look at progressive liberals as "elites" is because you have to be pretty rich to be "green".
My wife thought she would buy environmentally safe diapers for 'lil Dude. The environmentally conscious crap goes for 30 bucks for 60 diapers, while you can get 100 diapers of the main brand for the same price.
Have you ever shopped at those "healthy" grocery stores? You know, the ones where you can smell the pretentiousness the moment you walk in the door. There is a reason one of the chains is called "Whole Paycheck" by those that shop there. You easily pay double in those stores as you would at Safeway or Wal-Mart.
Honda is coming out with a hydrogen fuel cell car. The car will get incredible gas mileage, and is the future of automotive engineering, but in 2011 it will be ready for consumers with a price tag of $1,000,000. That's not a typo. I'm sure the price will go down. I hope it will go down. But even the Toyota Prius and other Hybrid cars start at $20,000! They are not marketing to me, that is for sure.
I recently have been told by the doctor that I need to start eating better. No more burritos, hamburgers, soda, or anything else that tastes good. I have to eat veggies and all that crap, and I can't eat anything white like white bread, rice, pasta, etc., it has to be whole wheat. AND, I can't have anything with trans-fats in it, which takes a lot of stuff out of your diet. But to get rid of all the bad stuff and add all the good stuff is extremely expensive. Eating bad is much easier on your budget, sad to say. Eating healthy is expensive, and I'm tempted to agree with John Stossel when he says the whole "organic" craze is a racket.
Being green is easier said than done. For right now, it is for the rich. It's easy for Bush to have an environmentally super-duper home, and for Leo DiCaprio to ride around in a super green car, because they have the money to do it. The rest of us have to do what we can with a budget. I take a van pool to work, and I recycle as much as I possibly can, and I walk to the store instead of drive. And yeah, I feel like I'm doing my part, but don't give me this crap about how we need to buy flex fuel vehicles and eat only organic food, and wear hemp. Please.
Finally, a wise woman once compared the current fad of buying carbon credits to offset your carbon footprint akin to religious zealots paying the church for absolution, and she is right. I'm not worried about my carbon footprint, I'm just trying to pay my mortgage and keep my family safe and fed. If I were rich, maybe I would feel the need to buy some green absolution, but for right now, I think I'll go buy me a gas powered mower and say the hell with it.
