Unlike some other faddish turns, this is a good trend.

IVAA pal Jill Chongva of Jill Chongva Design has launched a place to share and learn about how you can green up your work place. It just debuted this afternoon, so you can be among the first to contribute over at www.ecosavvybiz.com/. So, pull on your green jeans and start sharing.

As an example of how this movement is infiltrating the mainstream, our household recently decided to convert to compact fluorescent light bulbs. After purchasing a year’s supply or so, we called our sanitation company and our city to ask about their disposal policies on these items.

We learned that our community does not yet have a place for consumers to safely dispose of these bulbs when spent. In fact, our city takes the position that we should just throw them into our dumpsters.

Our private sanitation service says to throw them in the trash barrels no more than two or three at a time, double wrapped in plastic bags. I wonder what their policy will be in twenty years when we have boosted our aquifer’s mercury content to an unsafe level.

As a homeowner on a well in an unincorporated area, I am concerned with those shortsighted policies. Now begins the process of talking about this to others. I’ll fill you in on where that goes. I could sure use your help and advice.

Meanwhile, here in the high desert of Arizona our annual rains have arrived. This means singing cicadas, afternoon thunderstorms, great sunsets and sunrises, the rich smells of the earth and plants as they are moisturized, and …. runoff.

This year we’re trying the practice of rainwater harvesting. It’s VERY low tech and our set up can’t really be called a system. But it’s an effort at capturing that rain and keeping it on our property.

To read more about sustainability from people who are leading the way, check out these resources:

• Sustainable Route
• Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands by Brad Lancaster (who is right here in Arizona)
• Millison Ecological Home and ecohood, both of which are sustainability projects by Prescott, Arizona resident Andrew Millison.

The Loosely Speaking Technology Recycling Contests have gone dormant for a few months. Let’s just say they are estivating, like what toads do during droughts. Thanks to a prod from Jill, I’ll try to get those going again.