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My husband is on the road this week, travelling for business.  His flight was in the middle of the afternoon and so he drove himself to the airport, leaving his car there.  While I haven’t sold my car (yet), it was in a fender bender and is awaiting a new taillight.  I don’t feel comfortable driving without one of the taillights and not sure that it would even be legal.  To add to the situation I haven’t been grocery shopping in awhile. 

So my husband’s car is at the airport, mine is out of commission, and we have very little food in the apartment.  What is a girl to do?  And no, the answer is not order out for pizza delivery.  I figured out that if I wait to take the local train home (instead of the express), I can get off one stop earlier where there is a grocery store.  This allows me to pick up a few ingredients for dinner and easily carry them home (especially with my canvas reusable bags) without much extra effort.  My amount of walking to get home would be roughly the same since we live half way between the two train stops.  I just have to remember to take my bags with me in the morning.

What’s my point?  When someone is put in a situation where they have to be bit more creative on how to get things done, solutions will come forward.  In this case, I’m not driving my car to get those few things I need from the grocery store.  It just requires a little bit of planning ahead.  Makes me wonder what other things I could figure out how to do without driving.

So I’ve been contemplating lately what to do about my wedding dress.  It has been almost 3 years now and it is still in the dress bag (and it has even moved from my house to my apartment).  As expensive as wedding dresses are, I did not spend that much, maybe $300 at most including alterations.  I don’t necessarily want to save it for my daughter (if I ever have a daughter) because I know styles will change and I want her to be able to wear what she wants.  I also don’t really see the point of preserving it in a box, to only remain in a box for the rest of my life and my grandkids wonder what I was thinking.  So here I sit with a really nice slightly used wedding dress, trying to figure out my best choice and I have found a few options.

• Goodwill – Definitely a charitable organization that could sell it.  I do donate clothes to Goodwill all the time.
• Burial Garments – There are two different charities I’ve found that will take old wedding dresses and turn them into burial garments for infants.  They may also accept old prom dresses, so if you have those laying around you could donate those too.  The two I found are Heavenly Angels in Need and From Wedding Gown to Burial Gown, Give an Eternal memory.
• Brides Against Breast Cancer – This is an organization that will take donations and sell the dresses to make money to fight breast cancer.  They travel around the country and also accept gowns to be mailed in.
• I’ve also heard of people turning their gowns into a christening dress for their children.   

Come November I will see the folks at Brides Against Breast Cancer in Drexel Hill (outside of Philadelphia).  They also have upcoming events in Cleveland, OH and other areas all around the country, so check out their calendar.  I like the fact that they specifically deal in wedding dresses.  While I feel the charities that create burial garments are doing something really great, I just get depressed thinking about it.  Any of the above options will ensure that your wedding dress will get another use, and that is a very green option.

I’ve recently done some transactions on Craigslist and that makes me feel pretty good. As part of our recent move, there was some extra furniture we didn’t plan on moving. Some of the furniture was nice stuff and some not as nice but since I wanted to sell the good stuff I figured I would just post all of it. Surprisingly every single piece was spoken for and I got my asking price for all but one piece. Since I was limited on time (with the sale of my house), two of the people missed showing up and I just couldn’t reschedule. After that, turns out that my husband’s cousin is just now establishing his own place since he recently graduated. So the items I didn’t move from the Craigslist posts are now being put to good use at his apartment.

The whole idea here is that when you are done with something, just because you don’t want it any more doesn’t mean that no one wants it. So instead of throwing away items you don’t want, especially those big items, see if someone else wants it. Whether it be family or a stranger willing to pay you for it, I bet you could find someone. Nothing else, consider donating items.

Beware if you start posting on Craigslist, it can be addicting. I’ve done lots more searching for things I may want for my next house. I suppose that time will come when I start buying.

Have you been avoiding the CFL bandwagon because of the mercury content?  A while back I started switching over to CFLs and at that point I was concerned with how I would recycle them, but had faith something would come up before the bulbs burnt out.  Recently the answer has come to us.  Both Home Depot and Ace Hardware have instituted recycling programs for CFLs.  The EPA also has a site with listings of where you can go to recycle the burnt out bulbs, broken out by region.

The other thing I have heard about CFLs is, what to do if one of the bulbs break.  There was someone I used to work with that had somehow broken two CFL bulbs this past spring and he would tease that he had a mercury spill at his house.  CFLs do contain mercury, but very very little.  However, EPA has given some guidelines on how to properly cleanup from a CFL breaking.  The basic gist, don’t blow it around (including don’t vacuum it up), just pick up the pieces to throw them away and the little pieces left can be picked up by using duct tape.  If you do have a spill, check out what the EPA has to say just to be cautious.

So my friend Doug had a car that was on it’s last legs so to speak.  It had reached the point of one repair too many and he decided to donate it.  I think donating it was a great move so that it can get further use out of it supporting a good cause.  While his car was slowly dieing, he was nudged into taking public transportation to get to and from work.  Not surprisingly, he really liked taking public transportation.  Looking back, he is saving a ton of money and seeing a number of benefits that I wanted to share with you.

Let’s start with the money because I know more people are persuaded by it.  Here is what his car was costing him before he started using public transportation:

• Monthly car payment = $0 (already paid off)
• Gas = $72.54 per month (9 gallon tank, 2 tanks per month @ $4.03 per gallon)
• Insurance = $70 per month
• Parking Fees (Downtown Cleveland) = $145

So before using public transportation he was spending $287.54 per month just going to and from work.  My initial reaction is that it isn’t that bad.

Now let’s look at what he spends without his car.

• Monthly RTA pass = $70 

So by switching to take public transportation to work everyday he is saving $217.54 every month.  That is impressive.  These numbers don’t include basic maintenance either, like oil changes. I can’t think of another way to save that much money every month.  What would you do with an extra $200 a month? 

While the money says a lot, it isn’t the only thing.  There is the whole aspect of the emissions the car puts out.  Without having the car, he is making less frivolous trips to places like the bookstore.  This means he isn’t spending money on gas, again no emissions, and he isn’t buying as many books.  He doesn’t stress about driving and can also get some work done while sitting on the bus/train.

This has been Doug’s story of going to public transportation in Cleveland.  I made the same switch when I moved to Philly.  I haven’t sold my car yet, but it is on my to do list.  I love taking the train here.  I’m getting more exercise (about 2 miles of walking a day) and I can’t make an excuse to skip it.  I don’t have to stress over the traffic getting into downtown.  I’ve also been reading while on the train, catching up on my Stephen King collection, or sometimes I watch podcasts (if I remember to charge my iPod).

I realize some people feel very attached to their cars and don’t feel that they can give them up.  They wonder how they would get to the grocery store.  In Doug’s situation, his wife still has a car, so they use it for running to the store.  In my situation, my husband and I want to go down to one car as well.  There really isn’t a reason why we need two cars for the two of us, especially when I take public transportation and my husband works from home.  You can go down to one car per household without much of an issue.  There are also other services in larger cities like PhillyCarShare and ZipCar, so you don’t have to have a car at all, but if you need one, one is available.