Roundup for the week

A couple of quick notes from this week's inbox...

Seminole Heights Community Garden - Big planting weekends coming up! Get your new food in the ground so you can enjoy the big fall harvest! Check out the latest at developments at http://seminoleheightscg.ning.com - You've got to see it to believe it - a pumpkin patch in our hood!

I (Heart) Africa on Thursday! A benefit by One City Ministries for children and families in Uganda. They will have music, art, and some african crafts so have a good time for a great cause. This is at Grace Family Church in Lutz from 7-10 Thursday Aug. 27th.
www.onecityministries.org

Going Green Tampa Bay
The USF sustainability conference is holding its green festival on the same weekend at the Marshall Center. It should be a great time with lots of exhibitors and speakers. More details to follow but check it out for yourself at
www.goinggreentampabay.com

Last but not least! - Park(ing) Day
September 18th will invite an invasion of miniature parks downtown on the Franklin corridor. Come see what a dozen or so parking space park conversions look like when we pay the meter and sod the street.
www.parkingday.org

One last note,
Many of you know about the TSM crew's big trip to the birthplace of coffee coming up. It starts tomorrow, so go easy on our help in the shop while we are out. Send us emails if you need something. We'll be back after Labor Day so wish us luck!

-Charles and Amy

Eco-Friendly Stores in Tampa Bay

Today's awesome photo from downtown Tampa is brought to you by Elawgrrl via her Flickr site. Check out the rest of her catalogue here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/elawgrrl/sets/72157606737215731/

This morning I sent out a call to all of our customer list asking them to take a few moments and vote for us in Creative Loafing's Best of the Bay. This year they have a category for Best Eco-Friendly Store. Our advertising has always been word of mouth and viral email-forwarding based on people that have seen what we offer and believe it is worth telling others about. To be honest, I don't know of that many stores like ours in the Bay. If we lived in San Diego or Brooklyn, that might be a different story. In Tampa eco-friendly stores are still blazing a trail that feels well-worn in other cities. We have visited places like Good Use in Boulder, Colorado and Sustainable NYC in New York where we love getting ideas and comparing notes with other shops.

In Tampa, you can find eco-chic clothing and gifts at Why Not Boutique on MacDill and in St. Pete you can find greener flooring and paints from Healthy Home for your remodeling and building projects. Tampa Bay Outfitters has some great green options for the outdoors. Finally, just this last week, I made it to Worm's Way Garden Center on 56th St. in Tampa and found an amazing array of organic gardening supplies as well as the natural ant killer, diatomaceous earth, that I'd been hoping to find.

We have also seen stores come and go here in our almost three years in business. We are always on the lookout for places that are doing the right thing. Let us know of other eco-friendly stores in the Bay in the comments and watch, as we will, for the results of the vote. I'm just proud to say that we have enough stores to actually have a category for the first time! Keep supporting all of us little green guys and we'll do all we can to keep you happy with quality products and knowledge. I would hate to see Wal-Mart or Whole Foods win the greenest store in Tampa Bay.

If you still haven't voted, then here's the link:

http://bestoftampa.technomile.com/bestoftampa.php

Vote now at Creative Loafing!

-Charles

Here's an Idea - Bikes for Clunkers

Photo from Tour de Fat

Okay okay, I know it's not a fair trade, but just give me a minute to make my case. First off, cash for clunkers is burning through cash like a freshly bailed out Wall Street exec on a trip to the Caymans. The money will only last a few more hours apparently, so why let this help so few people and take in so few clunkers?

Second, the automotive companies are not the only American businesses worthy of saving. How about some of our great biking companies like Trek or Cannondale? These are entrepreneurial and what could be more American than biking? Okay, so maybe the Tour de Fat isn't as big as the Tour de France yet, but it is growing - go ahead look it up when you're done.

So here you go - you bring in your clunker- something horrible with at least 6, hopefully 8 nasty cylinders and a poorly functioning or nonexistent catalytic converter. Free helmet if this is your daily driver. Anyway, so you then get a brand new, CO2 free, commuter bike! At the rate of let's say 400 bucks a piece, we could put 5 million bikes on the road for $2 billion (check my math, but I'm pretty sure on that). So then, you have taken 5 million cars off the road in exchange.

This is a ridiculously green proposal! Now you have to build new bike lanes and bike racks (jobs for americans) and you might even get a shower at work! Productivity bonus! If you think this is crazy, then just go ahead and burn through the rest of that cash, but just think about it... 5 MILLION BIKES. That's something to get stimulated about.

-Charles

Community Garden Membership Meeting This Week

Photo from Robin Milcowitz

I visited the Seminole Heights community garden last weekend with my nephew to do a little sweaty volunteer work. It actually ended up being one of those extremely sweaty, change your shirt twice kind of days. Kyle was up for helping, so we went down and did some mowing and trimming. We also got to move some huge piles of horse manure for compost creation. We offered to do general labor because we are pretty new to gardening and can't really be trusted with actual edible plants at this point. However, our tomato and pepper plants in our little garden at home are starting to show early signs of food production.


We had a good time at the garden and shot some photos when it was all done. I always come away from the garden with some new knowledge from the seasoned folks that are consistently working there. Thanks Cindy and Piet! The horse manure apparently has lots of nitrogen but needs to be converted to something a little more user-friendly for the plants to accept it (my limited understanding). So they planted a lot of black eyed peas in this manure heavy compost to do the work. They intend to plow under the peas and use that newly bountiful soil to generate a fall harvest. I hate to see some of the sad poolies (what they call the kiddie pool container gardens) in such a poor state, but summer gardening is tough. I've seen plants wilt in one hot day without watering. The poolies with the peas look amazing though! Huge chia pet mounds of green just shooting for the sky! I hope that this meeting can help re-energize us all and get us back in the garden starting with the big Labor Day planting coming up.


We're not gonna let our first tough summer beat us down! See ya at the garden. Check out the meeting if you're in the hood.





-Charles

This was sent from Robin, the organizer of our local and new community garden in Seminole Heights. Details from her email follow below.

Hello! We have some new things happening! Be sure to check out all the events and take a gander at the front page too! We're adding gardening tips & Green News & Stuff blog entries daily. C U Soon!

Time: August 5, 2009 from 7pm to 8:30pmLocation: Seminole Heights United Methodist ChurchOrganized By: Robin Milcowitz
Event Description:Our first guest speaker is from the USF Engineering Department and they'll be talking about a program they'reworking on that converts trash to energy.Our second speaker is Willow Lamonte! She'll be giving an in-depth talk about organic gardening and she'llalso be answering your questions and helping you with basic trouble-shooting advice. She'll also be bringingin her books and some additional items to show us that she uses in her own garden.We'll have some drinks available. Please feel free to bring some light snacks to share.We'll have our T-shirts available to purchase and bumper stickers too!Don't miss out on this great event!This meeting is also a way for us to reconnect with people we don't get to see at the garden very much and allow people to come in and let us know how you think we're doing. Things we could do better and even some new things we aren't doing yet. We hope you'll join us.


Thank you!

"Beer Summit" leaves out a green beer

Photo by Matthew Levine


It seems like everyone is chiming in with what they would like to see served at the "Beer Summit," as they are calling the upcoming informal meeting at the White House. Apparently the choices of those appearing have left out our local small brews and they have everyone second-guessing Pres. Obama'a choice of a Bud Light. Now that Bud is owned by a non-American company, apparently it is a big deal. Don't get me wrong - I got through college on cheap beer, and Barack is free to keep on drinking that stuff if he likes. A cold light beer on a hot day sure hits the spot. However, I have recently learned some info about one of my favorite "grown-up" beers that I feel makes it a much better choice.

Growing up in Texas has its perks and bordering Louisiana has them as well. Heading down to New Orleans to get some culture, me and my brother discovered a little Louisiana brewery called Abita Beer. They make such brews as the popular Amber, Purple Haze, but my absolute favorite (which just happens to be on tap at New World Brewery) is Turbo Dog. I don't know how they named it, but I like to picture some little cajun kid with a super fast three-legged dog hollerin' "Come on Turbo Dog, less git goin!" as they walk down a railroad track.

Anyway, the point of all this back story... Abita has been quietly working to make beer as green as possible and not just on St. Paddy's day! They have a beer brewing system that captures the steam and reduces the energy used by something like 70%. They also use recycled and reduced packaging sizes and supply the local farmers with leftovers from some of the grains and hops used for feed. They even built their own wastewater treatment plant where they can convert a lot of the waste to bio-gas for their own boilers and reduce the water sent to the local sewer plant by 85%. On top of all that, they added auxilliary power units to their delivery trucks which cut down on idling when the trucks are sitting still!

I'm not sure why I would drink anything else, but just try it for yourself. Maybe you'll even feel a little better about that brew in your glass. You'll not only be supporting an independent brewer, but also a rare green leader in the not-so-eco-friendly world of beer.

By the way, if you see Pres. Obama, why don't you offer him a beer, and maybe something with some flavor?

Cinci Goes Green?

Photo courtesy of Treehugger.com

(I'm so jealous of this beautiful storefront just so you know.)

Amy calls me and says, "You're not gonna believe this, but I'm standing in a green shop in Cincinnati!" Amy's from Cinci and is up there having a "girl's weekend" as I write this. Although we have seen some suppliers from the Ohio area with cool green stuff, for the most part, I would need some convincing to think Cinci had embraced "enviros." The funny thing is, we were crazy enough to start an eco-friendly store in Tampa which is know for what... cigars? So why not start one in the home of hills and chili on your spaghetti?!

If you get a chance, check out the site at Park and Vine. It looks great and if you're in the neighborhood, show 'em some love. We are already considering adding to our offerings based on her scouting trip. Mix-it-yourself cleaning products, bath and body, and kitchen supplies are just a few of the categories that we are working to flesh out. We'll keep you posted.

Here's the link----> http://www.parkandvine.com/

-Charles

I'm Just Setting That Monitor By The Road!

So my friend at works says "Do you guys take in things to recycle?" Well, yes and no. We recycle things that we can use, so wood and metal pieces are useful to me when I'm making furniture. What isn't really desirable are things like computers and old monitors or even old cell phones. I must not be alone in feeling that way because these are rapidly becoming a ticking time-bomb in our landfills. We must consider that most of these devices contain heavy metals and batteries when dropping them in the trash or hiding them in a black bag on the curb.

From the EPA's site:

"Of the 2.25 million tons of TVs, cell phones and computer products ready for end-of-life (EOL) management, 18% (414,000 tons) was collected for recycling and 82% (1.84 million tons) was disposed of, primarily in landfills.

A lot of arm-twisting is leading to companies accepting back some of the electronics they sell, such as Best Buy and Dell. The other interesting development is companies that are making money from these castoffs. That same friend sent me a link to a website called http://www.myboneyard.com/ that pays you based on a schedule of the type of equipment and condition.

Kind of cool, although we both agreed we can't figure out how these guys make any money because they pay for the shipping as well. So they give you a shipping label and then cut you a check. It doesn't seem like they pay much, but for an old Ipod that just keeps getting moved around the home office maybe it's worth it to get a check for $13. If it would have gotten tossed in the trash instead of in the mail, I'm sure the planet thinks it is worth it.

-Charles

2 Weeks Left for Passport to Indies Challenge

Photo courtesy of garden.org

There are two weeks left for the Passport to Indies Challenge. Make sure you don't miss this chance to rack up some gift certificates from our local independent businesses. The next time you buy your mom lunch at the Taco Bus, she won't have to know that you paid for it just by visiting places that support the local economy! Talk about a win-win! We have the Passports in our shop or you can download them from Creative Loafing. Click here ---->
http://tampa.creativeloafing.com/tiba/TIBA.pdf

Some of the basics about the benefits of buying local from our friends at Vinyl Fever:

"So, use Independents Week (month) to explore your local independent businesses and see how much of your purchasing for that week (month) you can do with them. You'll keep your money circulating in your community three times as long or more than when spent at chains, where it leaves immediately for "the home office". Studies prove that when your money is spent at a locally-owned, independent business, 45 cents of every dollar gets recirculated within the community, vs. just 13 cents from a chain store. This enriches everybody. " - from Vinyl Fever's awesome weekly email -

That's right folks, the money stays right here in the bay area. So get out and discover some of those indies that you have been resisting. Skip your regular Starbucks and go find Cafe Hey this week - we know you've been thinking about it...

What the heck is Cap and Trade anyway?

So we have this huge climate bill going through the Senate right now. I know, hopefully you all know about it, but if you don't, now's the chance to catch up on your reading. So what is this that has our esteemed Sarah Palin writing for the Washington Post? Yep, if you didn't catch that - riveting... in the ghostwriter for a lame duck governor sort of way. Anyhow, she doesn't like it. Pretty much, no republicans like it. The biggest problem people seem to have with this is that energy prices go up. And they might. There's a good chance that the utilities will start charging more for what they have to do to deal with it. Keep in mind that here in Florida, Progress Energy customers have a surcharge on their bills for a nuclear plant that isn't even starting construction yet. But besides pesky little raises like that - they always do the right thing, right?

So...We will build an artificial market with a cap on the total amount of pollution and force companies to trade credits (buy and sell) in order to keep from producing more pollution than the country should on the whole. The money generated, hopefully gets funneled toward energy projects that keep us from generating even more pollution like wind, solar, geothermal, and all that. The arguments against it really don't get into what is the most basic issue - not doing something is not an option when it comes to carbon dioxide emissions. They mostly avoid it and just say something that sounds like - Don't tax us! We'll find some more cheap oil! We promise!

So anyhow, to avoid this becoming a rant, I found this video a few months ago and if you can handle this geek's rapid fire delivery, it is a pretty basic explanation of cap and trade. Hope it helps.

-Charles

Composting stinks!

So we started composting this last year in hopes of doing some real gardening. We do have a small garden (six plants so far) and a pile of compost. We started composting really naively with a pile of leaves in the yard a few years ago. Then I read to mix in compost and manure mix from the garden center. That seemed to help break down the leaves. This year we found a little book called, appropriately, The Little Book of Compost. This book has recipes for compost and lots of help on how to do it right, including what should and should not be composted. Veggies good. Cooked food - not good. Coffee grounds - good. Meat scraps - not good. So at first we just dumped this stuff on the pile. Then came the ants and then the flies. Not so good. I got the feeling we were doing something wrong. Then some veteran composters at the shop suggested I get a bucket to dump the stuff in first and let it break down a little first. So now we have a plastic lidded trash can outside for the compost. We also have a small plastic bin on the counter for scraps when cooking or changing the coffee. That's when it started to stink. The key is, I think, to not let that little bin on the counter sit too long. Dump it more than once a week. We also bought some Bio Bag Composter bins we are going to try. They say it helps evaporate the water and keep the compost from getting sludgy and too wet. We have some in the shop now so if you want to join the experiment, just stop by and pick one up.