Goin' Green

As this year winds down, I reflected upon some of the things I did and realized I had started to go green. Yup, I, Mr. corporate executive had made the transformation. This year I heard a lot about things going green; there’s green energy, green buildings, green technology, green industries, and even green investing in green companies.

I didn’t plan out that I was going to go green this year. I wasn’t trying to save the planet or keep the polar ice caps from melting. But when I looked back, I could count several things that came out green. Here are some examples;

- I expanded my garden this year, doubling its size. I planted lot of vegetables and low and behold the green ones produced the best! The yellow ones did ok. The orange ones did so so, and the red ones where a total failure. When I blanched up the green ones to freeze them, they turned even greener. While the garden is gone by, we’re still eating the green ones from the freezer.

- I had a pretty good year day trading in the stock market. Its kind of a hobby and I took about $20K and turned it into $30K. This was not a paper gain, but real green cash I made from buying and selling stocks. It made my wife was green with envy.

- I refurbished one of the upstairs bedrooms and painted the room a light green color. It’s actually a very light paint color called “Summer Eclipse”, but it’s still green.

- I just installed insulating cellular shades in another room. I chose the color Verdi, which I think is Italian for green. They look more like sage, but it’s still green. They’re supposed to save me cash on my heating bill. They also qualify for the Federal energy savings tax credit which means I will send less of my green cash to the government.


- I started shopping at Sam’s club to save even more of my green cash. I also purchased some large re-usable green colored shopping bags to make it easier to lug all my purchases.


- At our home, the ground is now white covered with snow. But shortly, Anne and I are going to Florida for two months where it stays green year round. I could do without a white Christmas and would rather have it be green.

As you can see, I made a pretty good effort at going green. I may not be savings the polar bears and Al Gore may not think much of my efforts, but in a few weeks when I tee up a golf ball and hit it towards the green, it’s going to feel pretty darn good.