Um. Zipcar.

So I know that after my long absence from blogging, a comeback post talking yet again about Zipcar is far from exciting. Sorry. My well has run a little dry lately, without much of a drive to blog. Christmas and New Year's were amazing - nearly two weeks home with the fam was just what the doctor ordered. Things in D.C. are swell, and we're all excited/nervous for the chaos that is certain to come with Inauguration Day. Edison is still, you know, Edison. Maybe one day I'll find something more to blog about. Oh, by the way - congratulations to Brian for becoming an official blogger for the Tyra Banks show! Seriously: PROUD FRIEND!!!

But the point of this post is simple: Zipcar really was the right choice for me, even more than I thought it would be. I just took a glance at my five months' worth of bills from Zipcar, since I started using the program in August, and I was pretty much floored. Check it out for yourself:

• Aug. 9-Sept. 8: $178.34
• Sept. 9-Oct. 8: $215.19
• Oct. 9-Nov. 8: $39.05
• Nov. 9-Dec. 8: $319.56
• Dec. 9-Jan. 8: $158.91
• Total: $911.05

Five months' worth of all the car usage I have needed, including preplanned trips and last-minute jaunts, for less than $1,000. Compare that to when I owned my own car. My monthly car payment was $411. Insurance was $144.71. Those two costs alone, over five months, would have totaled $2,778.55. I have saved $1,867.50, if you don't count gas (which I don't pay for with Zipcar), maintenance and upkeep, registration, parking permits, etc. etc. Add in gas alone and I'm sure I have saved well more than $2,000. That's a lot of money! Hooray for that!

That's all. Something more exciting coming soon. Well... coming eventually. If you're lucky. :)

Things have been kind of bumpy...

You know it's serious if I'm willing to post such a flattering picture of myself in order to solve this problem. I'm officially fed up with shaving. Look at that bloody neck! Just wait until tomorrow, when the blood is gone but it's replaced with what look like giant zits. My face was just not built for shaving.

But shave I must. I have tried lots of solutions. I used to use an electric razor. In college, it actually worked. I don't think my facial hair was as coarse back then, and I also don't think I was ever actually all that cleanly shaven. I've tried an electric razor again recently and it just doesn't cut it. But I have constant razor bumps on my neck, and every time I shave with a regular razor, those bumps become spots of blood which become even bigger, uglier bumps. And I'm serious - I've tried everything! I shaved in the shower for a while. A little better, but not much. For the last couple of years, I actually shave in the bathtub, which is a little better but wastes so much time and water and is just silly. I've tried lots of different shaving creams. I've tried bump-be-gone after shaves. I have avoided shaving against the grain. I've tried shaving slowly and methodically, and I've tried shaving fast and furious. But no matter what ... this is the result.



It's times like this that I wish I had a larger blog readership. I think I'm going to need lots and lots of advice before I solve this problem, and I just don't think I have enough blog readers to offer that advice. But let's try it anyway. Guys, how do you shave? What works for you? Surely some of you have dealt with this! I have resorted to shaving every three or four days recently in order to give my face a few days to recuperate, but I don't really think I should have to spend the rest of my life looking sloppy 75% of the time and looking like a vampire victim the other 25%. This must end! What can I do?!

No. Way.

People are amazing.

Wow

Greenbuild 2008

Well, we did it. Greenbuild 2008 is over, and it was a success! The Greenbuild International Conference & Expo is our annual green building industry trade show, and this year it was in Boston. It was my first visit to Boston. We got there Sunday afternoon and were there until Friday afternoon, and every day I was in the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center from as early as 4:30 a.m. to 7 or 8 p.m., but there was still a little time out on the town - mostly just for dinner and then early to bed. So I can't really say I've seen a lot of Boston, but what I did see was fantastic.

The U.S. Green Building Council (my employer) has hosted Greenbuild since 2002, when there were about 4,000 attendees. This year, we had more than 28,000. More than 850 companies and organizations exhibited on the HUGE expo floor, showing some of the coolest, latest and greatest in green building technologies and products. We had more than 100 educational sessions, an opening plenary session keynoted by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, our first-ever Green Homebuilder's Day with Kevin O'Connor from This Old House and tons of excitement. Working a show is a lot different from attending one – I didn't actually get to see any of the education sessions or plenaries, though I will watch the plenaries online later – but I did get to hang out with Steve Thomas from Planet Green's Renovation Nation and help him find cool stuff to film for an upcoming episode. I saw the kids from Greensburg, the show about a small town in Kansas that was destroyed by a tornado and is now rebuilding the whole town green. I talked on the phone with Kevin O'Connor. :) I hung out in the press room and had some awesome dinners and had a blast with coworkers. Greenbuild is exhausting but really exciting.

I was too busy to even get any photos, so I had to steal a few from a coworker's Facebook. First, this gives you a tiny idea of what the exhibit floor looked like. Seriously, HUGE:



And here's the Leadership Awards party at the Boston Institute of Contemporary Art, a big party the last night of Greenbuild where we celebrate the winners of our annual Leadership Awards. It's a really great way to unwind after a long week:

Très adorable

I've been wanting to post something as a palate cleanser from my non-stop blog explosion on Election Night, so that the entire front page of my blog wouldn't be all politics. (By the way, I know there are lots of people who visit this blog for when I post pictures of Hank and Roxy and the whole family. My Election Night rampage pushed my most recent round of picture posting onto the second page of the blog, so if you missed that post, be sure to click "Older Posts" at the bottom of this page.)

Anyway, I haven't seen the kids for a few weeks, but I found this really cute video of some kid I don't know. It's nice to see how imagination translates into any language! :)


Once upon a time... from Capucha on Vimeo.

On another note, I am off to Boston Sunday morning for Greenbuild, our big international conference/expo that we host every year. I'm going to be running around like a madman for the whole week, so don't expect any action on this blog for a while. But I plan to take pictures if anything exciting happens, and I'll fill you all in when I get back!

America rejoices

I wish you could be here with me on D.C.'s 18th Street tonight. This video does it little justice. Strangers hugging, strangers of different races and ages. There were people hanging out of windows, playing trombones. Taxis and buses and carsful of whites and blacks and Hispanics and Asians, honking, screaming, crying. Grown men, black and white, crying on the street. Hope is back in the nation's capital. Hope is back in the nation. My batteries died in my camera, as they always do. But trust me: The ultimate American story was told tonight, and I was here to watch it. So were you, wherever you live. I know that your candidate may not have won. I hope I'm not rubbing it in your face. I truly believe tonight was a win for American conservatism, which has suffered so much under the recent partisanship and nationalistic extremism. Tonight was a win for moderation. Tonight was a win for a humble international policy, a reasoned domestic policy, fiscal responsibility, cultural unity and the death of that ridiculous Bradley Effect. We will heal our environment. We will regain our position in the world. We will be that city on the hill again.

Know hope!