Damn it! Why, or why, didn’t we get off our asses and pitch Time the “Sex and the Eco City” piece in this week’s issue? It’s all stuff we’ve covered before! [Shameless self-promotion alert:] Vegan condoms? Check. Hand-powered vibrators? Check. JimmyJane products? Check. Phthalates? Check? Safer material options? Check. In fact, we covered it all in our 2006 book Sex Toy: An A-Z Guide to Bedside Accessories — but that was back when sex toys were still “dirty.” Oh well. Maybe there’s still time to pitch the New York Times.
As far as good ideas go, this one is right up there with sliced bread and TiVo: 1) Take the best, most popular vibrators that ever existed. 2) Make them out of hygienic, non-porous, phthalate-free material (unlike all their knockoffs). 3) Give the vibes a cool design touch by making them all white. And voila! You’ve got a great sex toy collection (not to mention a great sex toy gimmick). Jimmyjane, who’s always made and sold safe and stylish sex toys (like their Little Chromas), began this “Usual Suspects” line last summer with the Iconic Love Ring, Pocket Rocket and Rabbit (1st, 3rd and 5th toys above). And now they’ve just added three more: the Iconic Bullet, Smoothie and Duckie (2nd, 4th, 6th) — all of which are super affordable for such a high-end brand! If you or someone you love has a subscription to I.D. magazine and uses a Herman Miller chair at work, then this set will make a great indulgent treat.
We Naked Love bloggers are suckers for a decent sex toy, especially if it’s made by Lelo, the Swedish “pleasure objects” company with impeccable taste and an eye for ergonomics. They’ve just come out with a new gizmo for guys — yes, guys — butchly named “Billy.” Apparently, men were enjoying another one of their toys designed for women called the Liv…up their butts. Not its original intention. So Lelo did the right thing and created a similar vibe made specifically for the anatomy of males (and their sensitive little prostate glands) and designed with a “security ring” to keep it from, shall we say, disappearing into they abyss. Billy is made with FDA-approved and phthalate-free body-safe materials and is rechargeable — how green! Plus, it comes with a user manual and a 1-year warranty — two very rare birds in the sex toy jungle. The Billy is available for sale as of Tuesday on Lelo.com (your friendly neighborhood sex shop should be carrying it soon, too), so gentlemen, start your engines!
Living in both San Francisco and New York the past decade has allowed me to take advantage of some fantastic farmers’ markets. So it came as a surprise for me to learn that only 1% of the total food produced in the U.S. comes from farmers’ markets. (Perrin seemed just as confounded in her post about the New Amsterdam Market.) Why aren’t more people enjoying these bounties?
New Yorkers don’t have pools. We just don’t have the space. But all of that is changing thanks to MacroSea, a design firm that is reinventing the swimming pool. Taking recycling to the next level the group has remade three trash dumpsters, converting them into swimming pools.
The concept of taking existing storage containers and making something new from them has been done before. Take a look at this New York Times slideshow of a Texas home made from shipping containers. But the idea of using a trash dumpster for a swimming pool is a new one. Too bad the pools are currently invite-only.
THE LAZY ENVIRONMENTALIST, hosted by Josh Dorfman, screens Tuesdays at 9PM on Sundance Channel.
It’s been “interesting” to witness the varying degrees of interest on the part of my immediate family members to my Lazy Environmentalist endeavors. I mean, I’m pretty sure my Mom has read my books, but I can’t say the same for my dad or my brother. And while it’s pretty simple to sign up for a subscription to Sirius Radio, no one in my family ever did so during the two years I hosted my radio show on that network. But things changed as soon as I made the Lazy Environmentalist TV pilot. “Josh” was no longer just “off doing some weird-eco-save-the-planet-thing even though he has an MBA and could be cashing in by now.” To the contrary, suddenly everyone wanted to watch what the Lazy Environmentalist was up to. And not just once either; they wanted to watch it over and over again, share it with guests on holidays and with pretty much whoever else visited my folks’ house for any reason whatsoever be it to deliver the mail or even exterminate bugs.
THE LAZY ENVIRONMENTALIST, hosted by Josh Dorfman, screens Tuesdays at 9PM on Sundance Channel.
From a Lazy Environmentalist perspective, I have to admit that I’m not altogether unhappy to see gas prices rising again. For better or worse, the most effective way I’ve encountered to convince people to make environmentally sound choices is to appeal directly to their wallets. So when gas prices rise, fuel-efficient alternatives start to look much more appealing. In “Lazy Driver” I’m working with a really busy courier service – delivering on the order of several hundred packages around Los Angeles per day – to figure out how to boost the fuel economy of their cars (to reduce greenhouse gas emissions), reduce fuel costs and still enable deliveries to be made in time.
Speaking about his long-time friend and mentor, Robert Redford told a crowd in New York City that he learned a great deal from the late Paul Newman, especially generosity. “Back then it was really about actors playing roles. It wasn’t until later that it became more about actors’ personalities,” Redford told a packed theater at Lincoln Center.
The crowd enthusiastically hung on Redford’s words. This was no doubt because of the star power of the great actor, director and Sundance Institute creator (particularly because the audience skewed toward his generation), but perhaps even more so because the crowd was packed with committed environmentalists. This was a special, intimate conversation between Redford, a longtime green leader, and veteran radio journalist Bob Edwards (formerly of NPR and now of Sirius radio), hosted by the New York-based Natural Resources Defense Council (Watch video of NRDC head Frances Beinecke accepting a 2009 Heart of Green Award).
THE LAZY ENVIRONMENTALIST, hosted by Josh Dorfman, screens Tuesdays at 9PM on Sundance Channel.
Working with John Tran, the mayor of Rosemead, CA, was particularly fascinating. To be sure, The Lazy Environmentalist typically focuses on helping individuals conveniently make environmentally conscious choices that fit their lifestyles. However, this same philosophy can also be applied to a town or city. In fact, sometimes the best way to help people easily and enjoyably reduce their environmental impact is to focus on making changes at the municipal level. For example, Rosemead’s recycling rates are very low; only about 25% of recyclable trash is diverted from the landfill and actually recycled. So in “Lazy Mayor” I present Mayor Tran with a municipal recycling solution that can lower the town’s costs while also making it easy, convenient, and financially rewarding for Rosemead residents to sort the recycling in their homes. It’s the kind of win-win-win solution that saves taxpayer money, financially incentives people to participate in environmental action, and benefits the planet in two major ways: 1) it reduces greenhouse gas emissions and 2) it reduces our demand for virgin natural resources from which to make new products.
THE LAZY ENVIRONMENTALIST, hosted by Josh Dorfman, screens Tuesdays at 9PM on Sundance Channel.
In this episode I’m challenged to help green a wedding that’s already well into its planning. The challenge itself was really fun especially because the groom shared my aversion to all things both “eco” and “beige.” That was one of the first rules that the couple set – no beige at the wedding no matter what. And thank God! I see no reason why environmentally friendly choices shouldn’t be outstanding and make a wedding even more beautiful or tasty or memorable precisely because of the fact that they are eco-friendly. To my way of thinking, green should be an experiential enhancer.
