CHECK OUT THE EATING GREEN CALCULATOR

Here's something fun, free, and educational to do online: check out how your diet is impacting not only your health, but also your environment online.

It's over at the Eating Green Calculator.

You're asked how much you eat in a week, according to categories (How many eggs? How much yogurt? etc.). Then, press a button and voila -- you learn:

• the environmental burden of the animal products you eat in a year (number of pounds of manure in a year is interesting to know); and
• the estimated daily nutrient intake from the animal products you consume (calories, fiber, saturated fat, cholesterol).

It's fast. Check it out.

ARE CLOTHESLINES ILLEGAL IN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD?

When I was a newlywed, we lived in an old duplex and I remember hanging the sheets out on the ancient clothesline out back ... I think back to how sweet and soft those cotton sheets were, and how homey it made things. I have fond memories of that clothesline.

Today, I might be breaking the law for using it.

Apparently, all over the U.S. and elsewhere (Canada, for example) legislation as well as homeowner's association regulations, etc., have been implemented to purportedly protect property values. The Kansas City Star quotes one Baltimore, Maryland, resident complaining that a neighbor's use of a backyard clothesline "makes our community look like Dundalk."

Apparently, having to see your neighbor's clean laundry on the line quietly became unacceptable in modern society. Until now.

Slowly, communities are taking back their right to dry their clothes on a line in the back yard. Just last week, the New York Times reported on Southampton Town Board member Anne Throne-Holst, who successfully spearheaded a campaign to rescind the "anti-clothesline" legislation that had been on the books for six years.

In Colorado, the state legislature passed a new law that allows backyard clotheslines, effective this month (August 2008), as long as they meet homeowner associations' aesthetic guidelines.

Meanwhile, up north, those crazy Canadians are actually risking it -- it's being reported that they are just blatantly breaking the law, using their backyard clotheslines with pride.

Apparently, clotheslines are extremely controversial. So much so that an actual movement has been growing -- the 'Right to Dry' movement, where neighborhood by neighborhood, folks are standing up for their right to have and use clotheslines in their backyard in lieu of their electric or gas dryers.

So, are clotheslines okay in your neighborhood? Check with your homeowner's association, as well as your local representatives. Maybe you're forbidden to have one right now.

COOL GADGET FOR FUEL EFFICIENCY THAT MIGHT REALLY WORK: the Moment-O-Meter

It's called the Moment-O-Meter. It's not that big, and this device looks nice enough. It's a small plastic rectangular box that attaches to your windshield, and tells you to coast (green light) or hit the gas (red light) in order to maximize fuel efficiency thorough "sensible" driving.

Its website suggests savings of up to 50% in fuel used. The device is currently sold out over at Amazon.Com, but you can see a photo of the gadget there.

What's different about the Moment-O-Meter from the majority of fuel-saving gadgets that are so often ridiculed as being hoaxes by hucksters, is that the Moment-O-Meter isn't impacting the car, or the fuel, or the road -- it's impacting the DRIVER. (It was developed and patented by a retired aeronautical engineer, who created the machine to help his schoolteacher daughter with her gas budget.)

Bottom line, the Moment-O-Meter is encouraging behavior modification, because coasting, driving at lower speeds, as well as refraining from stop-and-start driving, really does save fuel. Sounds smart.