7gen Bloc

This interesting chart floated my way the other day from an equally intriguing website called Permatopia. Here’s what its creators have to say about it:

White Rhino forwarded me the latest CSR Newswire in which there is much crowing about all the climate crisis action that’s happening this week from the U.N. to Bill Clinton’s Global Initiative to WalMart to New York State. (The only black mark on the week comes, as always (* heavy sigh*), from our country’s own point man, who just can’t seem to learn how to play well with others.)

This dispatch arrived last night from our good friend and 2006 Change It participant, Joseph Kaifala, who wanted to share some of his thoughts on what’s happening in Africa.

At 10,000 feet, near the peak of Mt. Washburn, the snow leaves a soft dusting on the ground. The silence is totally enveloping. The calls of bear and elk periodically break the silence. Man is incidental to this endless wilderness. Life above the tree line is harshly peaceful. This is my first adventure into Yellowstone National Park. From the highest peaks, the landscape seems to dwarf the vistas of my home in Vermont. Black bear and bison are hanging out by the roadside.

Living in Vermont surrounded by Vermonters, it’s hard to know what the rest of the world thinks of our little state.

Many years ago I read William Styron’s “Darkness Visible,” a brilliant and courageous book about Styron’s lifelong struggle with depression. I highly recommend this short but wonderful story. My mother, brother and I all have dealt with the intensely debilitating effects of depression. Last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine story, Darkness Invisible, reminded me of how easy it is to keep discussion of this chronic disease in the closet.

A couple of quick media notes to finish out the week… Seventh Generation gets a nice plug near the end of this look at what it means to walk one’s sustainable talk from GreenBiz.com. Jeffrey made Grist’s list of 15 Green Business Founders everyone should know about. And our dish liquid won raves in official mom testing at Parenting magazine.

See…this is what I’m talking about. This is what I meant in my post of the other day. We gotta think big and we gotta think outside the box. That’s how we’re going to get where we need to go with this whole wacky climate crisis thing. Screwing in a couple of compact fluorescents and making our next car a Prius, while good and necessary and satisfying and righteous, aren’t going to cut the melt-down mustard. Not meaningfully. Not ultimately.

Chrystie forwarded this bit of virtually perfect British fun to me this morning, and I nearly lost all bladder control. A sure sign that sharing is necessary. May it be used to offset any end-of-the-week energy lag you are currently experiencing…

Not one for surveys, but when I saw this article that 44% Of UK Shoppers Would Buy Brand With Smaller Carbon Footprint, I wondered if a carbon-footprint-label would be something shoppers in the US would pay attention to and that would influence their shopping choices. Would love to think about a 7th Gen product's footprint-label for all of our products. Would this make a difference in your shopping choices? thoughts? Thanks. WR