I’m at that stupid age where all your friends decide to get married at once. You know how it is: where you get to pretend that you LOOOVE pink silk bridesmaid dresses (I do love it, Rebekah!) and that you are excited to celebrate unity and togetherness ad nauseum by flying around the country for frantic three-day visits. Being the nerd I am, I’m not actually concerned about retaining my mental sanity in the midst of the summer of love. Honestly, I’m concerned about my carbon emissions.

Seriously. I bought this plane ticket a few days ago and was offered the option of, for $5.99, purchasing a one trip “TerraPass.” Apparently, with my four trips this year, I am using 129 gallons of fuel, and producing 2,527 lbs of CO2! TerraPass offered me the option of paying to offset these appalling numbers and using that money to fund wind farms, landfill gas capture, and the like. These seemed like worthy causes so I paid my carbon dues for the flight, but I still felt sheepish and slightly evil about flying in the first place.
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Last week a friend sent me an e-mail containing “The Story of Stuff” video, a wonderful look at how consumerism shapes our worldview and the topic of Ian’s post below. After getting a major in environmental studies, I love to pretend that I’m enlightened in relation to consumerism, my eco-footprint, sustainability, and the like. While watching the video I realized that I, like most humans, need constant reminders to remember my environmental ethics. It’s the holiday season, and naturally I went out and bought stuff. Granted, I mostly bought eco-friendly gifts. I attempted to support local artists. I even tried to find things that would be useful for a long time after the holidays were over. (I’m sure my family will be sad not to receive reindeer sweaters from me this year. Who doesn’t love those?) But innately, even if I wrap things in the same cloth bags I use every year, consumption was at the center of my holiday traditions once again.

What is it about this season that can force a fanatical environmentalist like myself to buy my brother a belt buckle with a piece of a beer can embedded in it? Read More »

826CHI dwells behind the Boring Store, a store advertising approximately nothing, boasting a complete lack of customers, and stating that it might carry apertures, openings, perforations, pits, cavities and punctures, holes and hollows. Within, one can find (if one looks hard), all the supplies a secret agent could possibly need in the big city: underwater voice amplifiers, glasses with cameras installed, and of course, the signature 826CHI mustache on a stick, an essential insta-disguise for anyone hoping to remain undetected. The Boring Store and its important merchandise provide much-needed funds for a non-profit offering free services to any school aged children in Chicago, but the real magic happens in the back room.

On this particular Thursday I watch a hoard of fidgety 4th graders peering through the window that divides the Boring Store from the “publishing house.” Straight ahead they glimpse a closet, chained shut and plastered with signs proclaiming “KEEP OUT By Order Of ADMIRAL MOODY.” “NO TRESPASSING ALLOWED!” “PELIGRO! NO TRASPASAR!” The students look nervous.

The other volunteers and I look nervous too. We explain to the students coming in the door that we work for a publishing house with the meanest boss alive. This could be our last day; we may, in fact, be fired if things don’t work out. Admiral Moody insists that we publish at least one good story a day, and refuses to accept anything with violence or unhappy endings. We desperately need the help of a 4th grade class to achieve this goal, and so we quickly herd them in front of the photographer (who snaps their “author photo”, complete with the requisite serious face and serious looking mustache on a stick that all authors of course wear) and then seat them on a rug to await orders. Read More »