Daily Archives: December 25, 2008

The classic Capra film, It’s a Wonderful Life, is the topic of many articles this year, as a parable for our times. Consumerist asks Was George Bailey Just A Subprime Lender? and the New York Times writes Wonderful? Sorry, George, It’s a Pitiful, Dreadful Life.

We have used the Christmas classic as an analogy a few times, to varying degrees of success.

Image of IBM’s Zurich Research Lab System, via IEEE Spectrum Online

If you’re going to be online and using data centers, you might as well use their waste heat to warm up the room in which you’re web surfing, right?

IBM thinks so – they’re figuring out how to use the waste heat from their data centers to warm up neighboring buildings.

Photo via Natural High Lifestyle Store

For someone who works from random locations, and is lucky to find a decent flat surface upon which to set up a laptop, I was happy to see this product on the radar.

TreeHugger has pretty well gotten its fill of gifts for the year, but it’s never too early to start looking forward to next year’s festive holiday season. And we’ve already found what we want: the Indulgence Shower.

Half way between the navy shower and the low flow showerhead, this smart concept cuts way back on water consumption — 56 percent less t

Organic Apparel for Home or Travel
If you spend much time listening to the radio or watching the news, you’d be forgiven for thinking that shopping is dead – and certainly the environment may benefit from a little less blind consumerism as we pass the holiday season. But the good folks at Indigenous Designs, whose organic, fair trade apparel has long been available in stores like REI, and have even hit the pages of the

Desmogblog brings us Rob Cottingham’s cartoon, but cut his great headline, which we repeat above.

Our previous post on coal and Christmas: Coal now too Expensive to Put in Stockings and for a little cheer, listen to the only surviving recordings of Clean Coal Carolers from an Industry Run By Morons

Photo Via: New America Media

As part of an outreach program to help parents better understand the effects of lead on their children, there’s a great group of folks that deserve a bit of recognition this holiday season for their efforts to educate and protect kids in California from lead poisoning.

It turns out they’re working off part of a $1.5 million settlement between major toymakers and the state of California after the public outcry over lead in toys that turned into a nightmare for parents, legislators and toymakers not so very long ago.

And in particular, this group of educators from the Center for Environmental Health is focused on th

Luckily, Christmas dinner is already over in Scandinavia (celebrated most often on the 24th) so those of us required to take a portion of stinky, slimy lutefisk, a dried and soaked cod, are safely past our obligations at the buffet-like Christmas table.

The lutefisk ritual is just one of many cod-based traditions. In Sweden torsk, as cod is called, is one of the most popular white fishes, and it shows up in a multitude of traditional dishes, stews and soups (and the ever popular fish stick). It is also nearly

This year, Barcelona city council decided to set an example and opt for low energy Christmas lights around town. The most intriguing ones are the 6 metal Christmas trees that are either solar or bike-powered. The Babylonians however believe they are being tricked…

Wilbur the turkey

Meet Wilbur, the luckiest turkey in England, perhaps the world. He was raised, along with 49 other friends and family, on a pick-your-own turkey farm. His goal in life: to be eaten on Christmas Day. But alas, or should we say, happily, that was not to be. Customers rejected him: “underweight” they said, a “misshapen” body, no tail feathers, he has a limp. Others complained that he looked too sad and bedraggled.

So Wilbur has the last laugh. His owner is keeping him as a pet. Henceforth and forever more he will roam free on the farm and spend the rest of his days happily and peacefully. As his new best friend said: “Wilbur will become o