Nine weird ways you can help the planet ...

... Or, how going green can help you lose weight, relieve stress, save your marriage, make new friends and just have more fun

"After one look at this planet any visitor from outer space would say, 'I want to see the manager.'" ~William S. Burroughs

This year marked the 40th anniversary of Earth Day. We’ve all heard about the little things we can do to help save the planet--changing our light bulbs, recycling our newspapers and bringing reusable bags to the grocery store are just a few. I recently watched the movie, “No Impact Man,” and it inspired me to think of some more unusual and fun ways in which we can all make our lives a little greener.

1. Play baseballr
The best memories I have from my childhood are not of sitting around the TV with my family watching “The Cosby Show” or “Alf,” but from our battles of Rummikub or spoons or playing Bloody Murder (hide and go seek in the dark) outside with my cousins in the summer. Get your relatives or neighbors together for a game of baseball, or kick the can, or soccer or whatever it is you all like to play. If it’s raining, play a board game, put a puzzle together, or make a blanket tent in the living room and hang out and play cards. In addition to bringing the family together, all of these things save electricity by getting you away from the TV and the kids away from their video games. There are a couple of scenes in “No Impact Man” where the main couple was having a blast playing charades with friends in their living room—by candlelight.

2. Go shopping! ... At thrift stores. I’m all over this one. At my last thrift store shopping adventure, I got seven books for just $6, some stylin' shoes for $7, a cute beach dress for $5 and a work shirt for $3. Buying used clothing, books and household items is all part of the ‘reuse’ concept and the proceeds from many thrift stores go to a good cause. Oh, and while you’re at it, you might as well go through your own closet and drop off some of your unwanted stuff.

3. Try new recipes
“There’s no denying it--Eating fewer animal products can be the single, greenest move you can make,” Colin ‘No Impact Man’ Beavan said in the movie. Eat your veggies! Eating more vegetables, fruits and grains can help save the earth, not to mention your health. Raising animals for food uses large amounts of land, water, grain and fuel, and produces more greenhouse gas emissions than growing plants. Learn to cook with more vegetables or even dare to make a raw meal here and there. I’m not a vegetarian, but I recently completed a 21-day raw food detox program and I’ve found that raw food can really be quite tasty. In addition, eating more fruits and veggies saves waste because you’re not purchasing food in paper and plastic packaging. Stop by the local farmer’s markets and roadside stands when they start to pop up this summer. Or better yet, grow your own!

4. Drink tear
Before I started on my raw food detox, I had a shameless Coke (as in Coca-Cola) addiction. I’m not allowed to have sugar while I’m on this program so I’ve replaced my Coke habit with tea. I boil a stock pot full of water at night, throw in a tea bag, and in the morning I pour it all in a pitcher and stick it in the fridge. I now have delicious iced tea for the next few days. (My favorites are green tea and peppermint tea.) In addition to being healthier for me, this also helps the environment because I’m not buying plastic bottles of soda. Bonus green points: If you're from this area and you purchase Celestial Seasonings tea, that’s even better because it's made in Boulder and hasn’t traveled too far to get to your teapot.

5. Have a candlelight dinnerr
The family in “No Impact Man” went for months without power. I am not suggesting that. But wouldn’t it be fun to have a candlelight dinner every now and then, or to eat outside under the stars and the tiki torches? Another easy way to save power: Turn things off when you leave the room. Yes, this sounds ultra simple, but I bet I'm not the only one with the bad habit of leaving lights on when I go to another room, and leaving my phone charger plugged in when there is no phone connected to it. Unplugging appliances when you aren’t using them saves energy. Leaving lights on in rooms that you aren’t in just doesn’t make sense.

6. Shower with a friendr
Just kidding … kind of. But do take showers instead of baths when possible. Determine how much water you use when showering by plugging the tub the next time you take a shower. For me I found that I used about a half a tub full of water in a typical shower. I will admit that in addition to Coca-Cola, my hardest habit to break has been taking baths. I am constantly cold and taking a bath seems to be the only way I can warm up, so I used to take a couple a day. I’m learning to pile on the layers of clothes when I’m at home, or if I really need to take a bath, I fill the tub only halfway with water so the amount of water I use will be equivalent to that of a shower.

7. Skip to the storer
I live just six blocks from a beautiful, new King Soopers grocery store. I have lived in this house for nearly a year now and had never walked to said King Soopers. I finally made the walk recently with a friend and we had a great chat on our way there and back—it was time together that we never would have had if we had driven to the store. Bike, rollerblade, walk, skip or scoot to the grocery store, school, or work if it’s close enough. I remember when I worked in NYC my boss used to fly into the office each morning on her rollerblades, and two other co-workers skateboarded to work. Get creative. Make it a family walk to take the movie back to Blockbuster or ride your bikes to the park instead of driving there.

8. Vent your frustrationsr
The people closest to me can tell you my biggest pet peeve: coming home to find a plastic bag full of three or four phone books on my porch, then a couple of weeks later, coming home to find another three or four phone books from yet another company upon my porch. If you, like me, are not a phone book user, call the phone book company to ask them to not deliver you any more phone books that you will never use. The same goes for junk mail—if you don’t want it, call the offending companies and tell them. Ask them not to send you their catalogs, their credit card offers. Personally, I am also forever frustrated with a certain environmental group that all too often sends me a thick envelope full of papers asking me to renew my membership. I really would think about it if they didn’t send me this waste of paper every month.

9. Make new friendsr
Another advantage to greening yourself is becoming a part of your community. When you’re outside more, you get to know your neighbors. I lived in my condo in Omaha for three years before I knew the names of any of my neighbors. One summer, I decided to plant a garden and within a couple of days, I met Theresa, Marie and Glenn, and got to know them well over the next few months as we pulled weeds alongside each other and compared the size of our bean plants. You can get involved in an environmental group, plant your own garden, work in a community garden or plant trees with your neighbors.

You see, there are so many easy things we can do to help the planet, and so many of these help us in return, by providing us with better health and better relationships. You just can’t go wrong by going green.