It’s time to let go.

It is now mid to late fall…and it’s time to let go of 2013 “garbage and badness.” Baffled? What Ollie and I are talking about are the parts of the year you don’t need anymore. The ones that no longer serve a purpose, they may be bad times, they may even be good times but with parts that need to go, or maybe you are just done with them. Maybe you NEED to be done with them, and you have been resisting?  With the ever looming holiday season quickly upon us, the time to do the work is NOW. Clean out your mind, your life, get set up for a fresh 2014.  We all know that this doesn’t happen overnight, making it another good reason to start now. Sure, you can do the obvious like a deep clean of your physical house and that’s a good start. But lets be real, clutter is clutter, and mind clutter is even worse than house clutter. Mind clutter keeps you from doing things you may need to do, want to do, dream of doing, but are too “cluttered up,” therefore stuffed and stifled stopped you. It happens to all of us, so try not to feel too bad about it. There are many parts to this mind/life cleaning. It’s much harder than house cleaning…it often takes more courage. You most defiantly will need to discard some things, and you still have to take responsibility for them. Pay attention. Sit down and do the needed work. You will then be able to start the new season with a freshness. Winter is the time where we tend to slow down and regroup. Just like the earth, we rejuvenate our roots…. Why would you possibly want to wait until Jan 1, to do this? How about having a truly fresh start at the calendar new year. That means, no more hemming and hawing. THIS is the time. Act like a tree, drop off those old leaves and get ready, make room, for new ones. It seems fitting that Ollie – Minister of Truth delivers this message with me…. Ollie and falling leaves

Resting

 

Just a reminder- the Botanicals Beauties& Beasties will take the rest of the weekend off – They need their beauty rest. See you all on Monday.  However, they are likely to do some tweeting! @botanicalbb

REUSE your energy REDUCE your waste RECYLE your stuff

Bummer :

NY Yankees 9 – Boston Red Sox 4

Next Chance vs. New York Yankees, Apr 10 8:05pm ET

Fun Facts Friday – and the last day of Power Source Week.

Help for Japan:
Donate to the Red Cross http://american.redcross.org/site/PageServer?pagename=ntld_main
Donate to Doctors without Boarders: http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/donate/overview.cfm

How much of our electricity is generated from renewable sources?
How much of our electricity is generated from renewable sources? http://www.eia.gov/energy_in_brief/renewable_energy.cfm

* Did you know that just one wind turbine can produce enough electricity to power up to 300 homes? Or that biomass is actually stored solar energy?

* It almost always takes less energy to make a product from recycled materials than it does to make it from new materials. Using recycled aluminum scrap to make new aluminum cans, for example, uses 95% less energy than making aluminum cans from bauxite ore, the raw material used to make aluminum.

* Gains in Home Energy Efficiency Offset by More Electronics and Appliances

Total residential energy consumption rose approximately 13% over the past quarter century. This was lower than both the rate of population growth (+24%) and new housing starts (+36%) due to energy efficiency improvements in heating and cooling equipment, water heaters, and major appliances. Efficiency gains were offset by increases in the number of homes with clothes washers, dryers, and dishwashers. Additionally, a growing number of U.S. households now have multiple televisions, computers, and refrigerators.

The percentage of homes with central air-conditioning has more than doubled since 1980, with nearly 60% of homes having a central system. All areas of the United States show a significant increase in air-conditioning equipment and use in recent years. Cooling now accounts for 8% of total residential energy consumption in the United States, double its 1980 share.

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  • 500–900 AD: The first windmills were developed in Persia for pumping water and grinding grain.
  • in 2007 : Wind power provided 5 percent of the renewable energy used in the United States.

1860 :Auguste Mouchout (FR), a mathematics instructor, was able to convert solar radiation directly into mechanical power.
2001: Home Depot began selling residential solar power systems in three stores in San Diego, California.

1898:Marie Curie (FR), 2x Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry & Physics, discovered the radioactive elements radium and polonium.
2007: Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant Unit 1 was the first U.S. nuclear reactor to come online in the 21st century. Shut down in 1985, the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) decided in 2002 to restart the unit. It had the capacity to supply electricity to about 650,000 homes.

B.C.:Hydropower was used by the Greeks to turn water wheels for grinding grains more than 2,000 years ago.
Today: Between 6% and 10% of U.S. electricity comes from hydropower, depending on water supply and annual rainfall. In total, the United States has about 80,000 megawatts of conventional capacity and 18,000 megawatts of pumped storage capacity.

all from Energy KIDS (http://www.eia.doe.gov/kids/index.cfm)

Rest up – see you on Monday.

Just a reminder- the Botanicals Beauties& Beasties take the weekend off – They need their environmental and beauty rest. See you all on Monday.

However, they are likely to do some tweeting! @botanicalbb

REUSE your energy
REDUCE your waste
RECYLE your stuff