Greeneroo

Reducing Paper Waste, a great place to focus at the Bear’s Lair Camp which continues this summer with the introduction of GreenSpec-Listed and LEED-Qualifying high-speed hand dryers! These dryers will have a dry time of just 12 seconds while using half the energy of other hand dryers AND perhaps most importantly, the Blue and Gold pool kids will be using significantly less paper towels this season. This will be the first step in evaluating the functionality of this concept at camp – it is hoped that we will integrate more hand dryers throughout all the camps to continue to reduce the Lair’s overall paper consumption.

We salute UC Berkeley Prof. Harley Shaiken and State Treasurer Bill Lokyer for their Blue Ribbon Commission that made the case for converting the NUMMI factory to build HEVs and PHEVs — see the White Paper at http://www.irle.berkeley.edu/press/20100310_nummi.html .
Still to be determined are how many of the skilled (and unionized) NUMMI employees will be rehired, and how quickly. And having visited the giant NUMMI plant and met with UAW members and officers  http://www.calcars.org/photos-people.html#JC , we would love in the future to be involved in efforts to use part of the facility to retrofit older Toyota vehicles into PHEVs and EVs.

This is an excerpt from a calcars newsletter, please check out www.calcars.org for more information.

Clean the beach and catch Jack Johnson’s free concert on the pier!

Get inspired, do a good deed! The Santa Monica Bay and Beach needs your help!

The green musician and his label Brushfire Records have organized a beach clean-up Saturday morning, May 22 on Santa Monica Bay with Heal the Bay as a splashy way to kick off the release of his latest and fifth studio album To the Sea and the summer tour. It didn’t take any time before 2,000 volunteers registered for the clean-up but there are still ways to get involved and see the show on Monday, May 24.

The Sunrise Lions Green Car Show   Saturday June 5, 2010 10:00 am – 3:00 pm

• This is the 2nd Annual Green Car Show
• Location “Court House Square” Downtown Redwood City on Broadway between Middlefield & Hamilton
• For more information Contact: 650-703-1113

Exhibits explore an array of green cars offered in today’s market

In just one visit,  you can:

• Compare fuel cost & environmental emissions
• Learn about possible tax credits
• Check out financing options

Refreshments, fun, lots of information. Come join us!

This event is sponsored by the Lions and is an annual fundraising event in support of Redwood City and San Mateo County community charities.

On June 23 there will be a private screening with the makers of The River Why - -  seating is limited- Tickets will sell out! Get yours here.
Join California Trout and Friends of the River as we partner with the film makers and crew of The River Why for a private benefit screening and reception on June 23, 2010. Based on the acclaimed novel, The River Why is an adventure story of a young man who leaves his big city home to live in a secluded cabin on the banks of a wild river.

All event proceeds support conservation work to protect California’s wild flowing rivers and the native trout, salmon and steelhead they support.

Sponsored by Leland Fly Fishing Outfitters and Patagonia

Tickets: $30 Individual (film screening)
$100/VIP (reception and reserved seating)

Info: June 23, 2010
Letterman Digital Arts Center
1 Letterman Drive
The Presidio, San Francisco
5:30pm VIP Reception at Presidio Social Club
6:45pm Film Screening at Industrial Light and Magic Theater

For more information call 415-392-8887 ext. 107 or purchase tickets here.

Blazing Saddles in SF rents regular bikes, but also rents Electric Bikes. How Fun!! Pedaling the world’s second hilliest city on a bike? Leave that to Lance Armstrong. Instead, jump-start your two-wheeled tour of San Francisco by bike! This is a reliable 20-year-old company, the bike is reliable too: UltraMotor A2B will take you up and over the city’s 50-plus hills with style and grace at about 20 miles per hour. The 24-hour rental includes a map, helmet, lock, front bag, back rack, and a bungie cord. And with a 24-hour drop-off location on Hyde Street, you’ll have plenty of time to sleuth out 49 square miles of otherwise intractable land.
Blazing Saddles does occassionally have half-off deals through LIVING SOCIAL DEALS and you can sign up for the emails.  The regular cost is about $75 a day.

2715 Hyde Street
San Francisco, CA 94109
(415) 202-8888

It has been SO WINDY; let’s go enjoy it!! This is a happy way to get outside and explore your environment. Many of the projects involve recycled materials and there are many sites that discuss recycling and reusing  of kites (even recycling the sails on kite boards).

All these beautiful kites will inspire you: Photo Gallery
More! There are also pictures of  paper models on the site.

If you love the creative spirit of generating art, you’ll love this – embroidery projects. Marzlie says her favorite part of the embroidery hobby is creating the embroidery file from clipart. She loves creating them, it is like playing with vector graphics. Not making a vector graphic, but working in the part where you create the file that will be sent to the machine side of the software works just like working in vectors. Working with existing features, assembling them into a whole. She says, “I can’t draw original art, but I love to work with it.”, this is so artistic and creative it makes me want to sing and yell and jump around!!!

Right now Marzlie is creating what is called a kite arch. This is where you create a lot of same size small kites, sew them on to a common string, stake the string down at each end and the kites go up in an arch shape if there is wind. She says, “I have made these out of scraps this from making the prototype kites John taught at the World Kite Museum in February. I amdefinitely of the waste not – want not persuasion.”

MAKE SURE TO Save the Date for the Kite Festival, which is held the 3rd Full Week of August Each Year, this year it will be August 16-22, 2010.

Located : 303 Sid Snyder Drive, Long Beach, WA 98631   Call: (360) 642-4020

Long Beach is in the SW corner of Washington, about 20 miles north of Oregon, the point where the Columbia River meets the Pacific Ocean.

If you want to join the green revolution, consider SOLAR! JobTrain in Menlo Park is continuing their solar classes to meet the high demand. These extensive classes are free and require a commitment of several weeks, 8 hours a day. For more details and to attend an orientation, check the website. Many graduates go to work at SolarCity which is hiring now. The work is hard and rewarding, the training prepares you for the pre-employment written test. There is a lot to learn, but this is a growing industry. Several graduates from the solar classes have given their insights and feedback to make the current classwork and students better and more prepared.
JobTrain is located at 1200 O’Brien Drive in Menlo Park, CA 94025. You can follow them on FaceBook. www.jobtrainworks.org

Additional information about JobTrain: Weatherization classes  and Solar Panel Installation classes.

We gathered together to discuss Nature and our favorite places, to learn more about nature from each other. What a wonderful focus…. we did NOT fix anything or even try to, we enjoyed thinking about the outdoor places we love. It was a welcome break for all of us, no committee meetings, drafting proposals, blogging for hours, “getting out the word” or campaigning. It was so nice to just “BE” and relax.

I came home with a wonderful book from a local author: Circling San Francisco Bay, A Pilgrimage to Wild and Sacred Places, by Ginny Anderson.

I learned more about this amazing place I call home. I felt renewed and grateful to think about the spectacular places and natural environments that surround us. It was powerful to focus on what we want. I found that I have only just begun to explore.  THANK YOU Ginny and Cynthia.

If you always wanted to volunteer at one of the most beautiful places in CA…now is the time!! Located in Woodside CA, just off Highway 280 with a mansion, 10 acres of formal gardens and hundreds of acres in all this, this place is a dream.

Register to attend Filoli Volunteer Open House May 22 9:30-11:30 in the Visitor Education Center www.filoli.org  650-364-8300 x300
There are 1200 volunteers, and dozens of activities to choose from.  If you like to garden or love history / libraries or enjoy interacting with visitors or serving up tasty food… there is a place for you. We have a group of dedicated weeders and another group that builds, installs, counts and reports bluebirds, the variety of assignments is immense. Come to the open house to learn more.

CONTACT INFO

Filoli Center
86 Cañada Road
Woodside, California 94062
www.filoli.org
Phone: (650) 364-8300
Fax: (650) 366-7836
Email: friends@filoli.org