Light Green Redux: Great Wolf Lodge

I'm on a retreat this week, so I thought I would share a few "Light Green Classics" over the next week.
Here, enjoy memories of one crazy travel destination where you do NOT want to take the family. At least, you won't if you're green.


Due to a travel snafu (in the truest sense of that word), my colleagues and I recently ended up staying at the Great Wolf Lodge in Grapevine, TX. This resort contains an indoor waterpark and is relentlessly family-friendly, more like a theme park with beds than a hotel. In fact, the hallways in the residential areas were the scene for a hotel-wide scavenger hunt, in which kids pointed wands (for which they had to pay) at various animatronic wilderness creatures.

While I wasn't exactly thrilled to be there, I thought I'd make the best of it, even after I realized that my still-painful sprained hand would probably keep me off the waterslides. Therefore, I was pretty psyched to see that the Great Wolf was Green Seal certified - Silver, and had a green promotion called Project Green Wolf.

Some kid ran in front of the shot --
 because some kid was always running
 in front of you at this place.

As far as I could tell, being a "green" hotel consisted of many of the same green features that are becoming standard in hotels these days: recycle bins were prevalent, compostable cups were provided for coffee, and signs suggested that you re-use towels. The to-go bags in the restaurant said "Please Reuse!" - but they still used styrofoam to-go containers. All-in-all, it seemed like fairly typical stuff, although their website says that they do re-circulate much of their water, and use high-efficiency light bulbs and appliances.

Mommy, how come when we're camping
the trees don't have TVs?

The longer I stayed there, however, I realized that no matter what sorts of conservation measures the resort takes, their very essence is anti-green (What's the opposite of green? On the color wheel it's red. Well, Great Wolf Lodge is red in its heart). Throughout the entire place, animatronic animals were singing and smiling at you. Fake trees provided indoor shade ...


... and their trunks bore flat-screen televisions advertising features of the resort. If anything says "Screw the woods," it's an indoor tree that grows televisions. I began to feel insulted that the designers of this place seemed to think they could fool you into thinking you were actually caring about the environment when you were doing everything possible to get away from the real thing.

I'm sure that most Native Americans
lived in log cabins.
With pet owls.

To add to the careless re-creation of the American Northwest as a family attraction, an animatronic Indian princess told bedtime stories every evening, perpetuating kids' images of American natives as savages who talk to animals. As an educator who has spent a great deal of time trying to disabuse my students of their stereotypes of native culture, the idea of a bunch of (mostly white) kids sitting down in front of this display turned my stomach. And I like tasteless talking robots.

The woods are messy, dark, mysterious. They can be dangerous, ferocious, tranquil, or generous. One moment they may be dappled with sunlight and the next they might be sucking you into a swamp or confusing you with a false trail through the trees. But the things they will never be? They will never be plastic. They will never be filled with smiling wolves and owls. They will never be indoors.
Unless we teach our kids that places like the Great Wolf Lodge are an acceptable alternative to the real thing. And then, indoors may be the only place we have left to run.

Pocket House

How much house do you need?

I've been thinking about this a lot lately, as I've been considering moving. One day I want more space. The next I think that I have way too much space and I need to cut way back.

A lot of people have been asking this question lately. In fact, the New Yorker recently had an article about "tiny houses" (houses that are under 200 square feet). There's a small but growing number of people who are thinking that the American dream of a big house with lots of yard is not only unnecessary, but can also be bad for the environment.

Well, this week I had the opportunity to experience a house that was not "tiny" but was very small. I visited Portland for a wedding, and stayed with good friends in the "Pocket House."

The Pocket House is an "urban cabin in Portland's backyard." Basically, it's a small (435 sq. ft) vacation rental with a kitchenette and room for 5 adults (two full beds plus a futon). It's situated near both the Mississippi and Alberta strips (that means cool little cafes and shops are just a hop, skip, and a jump away).

We really maxed out the Pocket House in terms of capacity (4 adults, 2 babies, plus 2 young adults camping in a truck bed in the driveway). But it never really felt as though we were squished because of the great use of space. Any time you were thinking something like "gee, where am I going to put this?" you turned around and there was a little shelf just where you needed it. See below: the sleeping loft. Note the shelf behind the ladder.

The Pocket House has lots of eco building features as well as the fact that a smaller naturally means a smaller footprint. I'm thinking that smaller might be a worthy new American dream.

Could you live in 400 square feet? What about 200?

Education Corner: All I Really Need to Know (About Education)

... I Learned in Spain

(or: in which the musings about Spain continue until you want to throw things at me).

As you may or may not know, I used to be an elementary teacher and still am at heart. So everywhere I go, I notice what kids are doing. When I was very young -- about 8 or 9 - I got it into my head that I (and everyone else) was responsible for setting the tone for what kids think about the world. Even at that age, I knew that I wanted younger kids to believe that the world was a place of peace - or could be - and that they were surrounded by love.

As you might imagine, I was a huge nerd.

But I began really observing kiddos, smiling at them, saying hi, frightening their parents. This behavior continues to this day.

When I was in Spain, I took the opportunity, whenever possible, to notice what kids' schooling was like. Since we were in the capital of Spain, visiting a lot of "the sights", we got to see a lot of school kids out on field trips.

Here are my very unscientific data points:

French teens are relentlessly hip. This is to be expected, I suppose.

A tiny ham sandwich is a delicious after-school snack. We walked past several schools just as they were letting out for the day, and a lot of the parents brought their kids a ham sandwich as a snack (it was about 5 o'clock, and if the kids eat dinner at the same time as the adults in Spain, dinner was a long time off). It's the perfect sort of snack - carbs for short-term energy and protein for longer-term. Contrast that to the snack of radioactively orange "cheese" crackers that most of my students got.

Exposure to the arts at an early age is a good thing. As we approached the Museo del Prado, we saw this group of tinies:

Then, inside, we came upon a group of kids who looked to be around 7 years of age, plopped down in front of Velazquez's Las Meninas. Their teacher was speaking animatedly to them about the painting, and then all of the kids broke into song!

This really struck me, because often in America: a) there's no consensus that art is relevant (just the other week, Bill Maher said: "Highways and hospitals save people's lives, and art is a diversion."); and b) often, we don't expose little tykes to fine art because we want to wait until they can "handle it" and "take it seriously." Plus, you know, we're Puritans, and if we let our kids go to the art museum, they'll see marble penises.

But at the Prado, there were tons of little kids on school field trips. Their teachers obviously carefully planned their museum itineraries to feature the pieces that spoke to the kids' background knowledge and age.

On the same episode of Real Time With Bill Maher, on which Bill made that lame statement -- and I usually agree with him -- choreographer Bill T. Jones was speaking up for the need to fund arts and include the arts in education. He said: "The government is responsible for the material welfare of the people... government is also responsible for a certain type of education of the people. ... Art - when it is really doing what it should do -- teaches abstract thinking; it teachers teamwork; it teaches people to actually think about things that they cannot see."

Panelist Dana Loesch (grr) stated that people who like the arts will contribute to them. Gee whiz, like the parents of my students who couldn't always afford to feed their kids? Do you know why the kids got free breakfast? It's because their parents were contributing so much to the ballet.

I think back to my 8-year-old self, and the message I wanted younger children to hear about the world. If we made art a priority for our kids, I think that message would be conveyed.

Slow Down, Part 2

Of course, when I was in Spain, I was on vacation, so it was easy for me to slow down. When I looked around me, however, I saw that I wasn't the only one. Even in the big city of Madrid where there was lots of hustle and bustle, I was surrounded by folks who were taking the time for a late afternoon bocadillo de calamares (squid sandwich) and a beer.

Light glinting off rows of glasses hanging up at Mercado de San Miguel (the San Miguel Market) in Madrid. Here you can have a cafe con leche, a pastry, a glass of wine, or buy an octopus to cook up for dinner.

The famous Spanish siestas were evident, as the cities slowed down (many businesses closed) in the late afternoon.

And even in the middle of a rainy Wednesday, folks had lined up for Mass, taking time to feed their spiritual selves:

This made me think a lot about our American way of being. We like to hurry. We say "work is my life." We hurry so that we can earn money and buy more things to fill our giant houses.

But if you live in a city apartment, like these ones in Barcelona, how much stuff can you really have?

And if you can't fill your house with any more stuff, then why not slow down?

For those of us who work for others, however, the questions are a bit harder. I work for a non-profit fighting for educational justice. All of us believe that achieving that justice is urgent, and so people in my organization work incredibly long hours (by virtue of a gift for efficiency, I work quite a bit less than many of the people I know, which is a great blessing - but I do consider it a random gift of the universe). How do you decide, when your work is so important, whether you can give yourself the opportunity to slow down?

I don't know the answer to that question. What I do know is that I'm sitting on the deck blogging, while my neighbor sits on her deck reading. Both of us have drinks, and neither of us are in a hurry to acquire more stuff at the moment. There's even a palm tree waving in the breeze. Maybe a little corner of Spain has made its way to the US after all.

Slow Down and Smell the Cafe

This week, I took one of the first non-family-related vacations (to Spain) that I've taken in several years. Now, there's nothing wrong with family vacations. I happen to love them. However, there's something to be said for slowing down and disconnecting from your "real" life.

Let me amend that observation.

The fact is, there's no such thing as "unreal" life - it's all just life. Yet separating from the day-to-day routines can help us observe ourselves from the outside just a bit, help us situate ourselves in the world. We think about differences and similarities between ourselves and others, about how we were taught to see the world, about the way others see that same world.

The little traveler in Park Guell, Barcelona.

As we were ferried by taxi to the airport in the pre-dawn hours yesterday, the moon was a giant orange globe stamped just above the hills outside Barcelona. One of those incredible moons, where you can see the outlines of craters and lunar seas. Many hours later, I arrived in Texas just after dusk and wondered, for just a moment, whether the moon would look the same. But of course it wouldn't. Latitude and longitude, accidents of birth, words we hear since childhood -- all of these shape the way we think, the way our neurons connect.

It seems, however, that on a world as fragile as ours, it's a desperate need for each of us to try to understand the perspectives of others, wrought by the million little moments in their lives, the particular angle between their position on earth and the moon at any given moment.

Travel is just a little step in the direction of understanding. It's also illuminates how challenging that understanding can be. This week I'm going to share a few little musings from my travels. Feel free to throw a shoe at me for being pretentious. I'll just duck and take it.

Reflections on Summer Odyssey 2010

My summer odyssey - 19 days of traveling the West Coast, visiting friends and family, working and playing -- is almost at an end. I am excited to get home, relax, sleep in my own bed and pet my cat. However, it has been a wonderful journey.

One of the things that has been best about this trip has been getting to spend time in nature. I make my best effort to get outdoors in Houston, but during the humid summer months I do most of my exercising indoors. The lovely weather in Portland and Northern California has allowed me many opportunities to examine the flowers, look up at the redwoods, and see a pod of dolphins jumping playfully in the ocean.

Wildflowers in Northern California -- it's pretty amazing what nature produces.

I've also enjoyed the ease with which a greener lifestyle is available in many parts of the West Coast (as someone who grew up in more rural areas of the West, I know it's certainly not available everywhere).

In Portland, my friends Caitlin and Connie, along with niece Carys, walked over to the amazing New Seasons Market in the Concordia neighborhood. I love grocery stores, and this one tops my list -- locally-owned, staffed by friendly people and offering lots of local and organic foods. We filled our small shopping list, then wandered the aisles pointing out different items and trading recipes, looking at the quirky selection of books about urban homesteading and DIY, and generally enjoying ourselves.

A VERY rainy spring resulted in profusions of flowers bursting out in Portland's yards.

Portland is known as a mecca for greenies. In fact, Popular Science named it America's greenest city in 2008, and it regularly shows up on other lists. As you walk the streets, you see sidewalk medians decked with mini-gardens and the city is a cyclist's paradise. It also contains Washington Park, a 400-acre oasis in the middle of town with hiking trails, Japanese garden, rose garden, zoo, and Arboretum. In Portland, you're never far from reminders of our dependence upon the natural world.

After Portland I headed south to the Bay Area, to stay with my friends Ron and Sara and "nephew" Desmond, and to attend a team retreat for work. The Bay Area is also crunchy, although as a large urban area, it has lots of challenges to green living -- for example, public transportation can be almost prohibitively expensive here and the cost of living means many folks are forced to drive from distant suburbs to their jobs.

It is, however, easier to reduce household waste here. I'm actually fairly happy with the city recycling program in Houston -- and it's improving through a pilot program which will add glass to the items we can recycle. However, in much of the Bay Area (including the small town of Aptos, where we had our retreat), compost materials are also collected. This is true in many parts of the West Coast and America's larger urban areas, but it's still far from the norm.

We saw a pod of dolphins just off the beach in Aptos. It reminded all of us how we need to protect the oceans.

(No really, it did. We even talked about it.)

In Aptos, we got to enjoy one of the West Coast's particular brands of grandeur -- ocean and mountains in close proximity. I firmly believe that spending time outdoors is good for the soul and helps ground one in the necessity of living life in balance with the earth (hippie talk is done now). Hiking, walking on the beach, and just sitting outside, we were refreshed and ready to face the less-tranquil parts of life.

"Where flowers bloom ...

... so does hope."

- Lady Bird Johnson

I never spent much time contemplating Lady Bird Johnson. In high school, I vaguely remember that one of my teachers did an impression of Lady Bird, with her careful diction, talking about wildflowers along the highways.

Silly first lady, I remember thinking, worrying about flowers.

Boy, have I changed my tune.

Lady Bird was an environmentalist before "green" was cool. She advocated for the preservation and cultivation of native plants, particularly in her Texas. And why, you might wonder, is this important?

I'll let these words, from the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, speak for me:

"Wildflowers do much more than add beauty to the landscape. They help conserve water, reduce mowing costs, provide habitat for birds, butterflies and other wildlife, protect the soil and save money on fertilizer and pesticides. Also, as Lady Bird Johnson said, native plants 'give us a sense of where we are in this great land of ours.' "

Native plants are meant to be a part of the landscape. Lady Bird understood this, which is why, here in Texas, our spring is marked the way it should be -- by the blooming of bluebonnets and Indian paintbrush. Each year, in late March and early April, families celebrate the season by taking photos of thier kids sitting in the bluebonnets. This dependence on nature, even for a photo opportunity, is one that I fear many of us have lost.

Should you get the chance, go visit the Wildflower Center in Austin, TX. The beautiful buildings are made of recycled materials and native stone:

And you can hike the trails, forgetting that you're just minutes from suburban Austin:

Thanks, Lady Bird!

The Amazing World We Live In

This is a picture of my phone.

(Isn't it cute? It's purple.)

What you can't see too well, is that my boarding pass for a flight to Phoenix is displayed on my phone's screen.

Greenies, this is the paperless revolution.

You no longer have to print your ticket or boarding pass (in some airports... for some airlines). You can simply download a barcode to your phone and wave it at the fancy machine at the TSA podium.

It's a really, really cool age we live in. Who needs a printed map anymore? -- we can send our driving directions to our phones. We can do our taxes online, and my doctor types my words into a computer, verbatim, saving paper and making my medical records more accurate.

I still love paper (I've got a little bit of a notebook fetish). But let's face it -- in the future, no one will need to hear the screams of the trees ...

(Um, in case you think I'm some weirdo -- I don't actually think the trees scream. It's metaphorical. Metaphorical screaming. It sounds like this:

)

Girl, Up In the Air

Did you see that movie Up in the Air? George Clooney plays a dude who spends three hundred days a year on the road and gets a hard-on from rental car rewards cards.

Let me tell you, sometimes I can relate.

I mean, I travel only a couple of times a month, but that's enough to make me feel that I live in different world than the other people in line at TSA. It's enough that it's really not right, the thrill I get from waving my "A-list" card and cutting to the front of the security line. Like Ryan Bingham, Clooney's character in Up in the Air, I love it.

I love hotels.

I love the little van that takes you to the parking lot.

I love the TSA workers (they're just doing their jobs, people! Smile at them!).

What I do not love about travel, however, is that in Travel-world, America's disposable culture is taken to the nth degree.

For example, there used to be a time when you could pack your own lunch and carry it onto the plane with you. And you still can, as long as nothing in your lunch is of a liquid or gelatinous consistency. If it is, it will be taken away. (My boss once had a can of tuna taken away because it was packed in water). As a result, most of us buy our lunches and drinks once we've passed through security, and then throw away a wad of wrappers, plastic dishes, and disposable flatware.

And what about the hotel? I admit, I don't bring shampoo most of the time, because I know a tiny disposable bottle will be provided for me. I don't take it with me to recycle. I leave it in the hotel room. Really - what am I expecting? It's not as if little mice are going to fill re-fill it once I leave. The hotel staff are going to throw it away.

I've been thinking about this a bit, and I've thought of a few ideas that I'm going to try out to green my travel -- some I've already tried out. Here they are:

• Bring an empty water bottle. Of course, you can no longer bring your own liquids into the terminal, hence the price-gouging of three dollar bottles just past the X-ray machines. But you can bring an empty bottle and fill it up at a water fountain. However, it might get your bag an extra check as they make sure your bottle is actually empty (or so I've learned).
• Check a bag when you have time. Even when I bring a carry-on size suitcase, I sometimes check it. This way, I can bring my regular bottle of shampoo, rather than purchasing a small bottle (more plastic!). I also bring a few other non-disposable items, such as my reusable coffee mug and reusable flatware. Those items can go through security, sure, but why lug them around when you don't have to?
• Load up your computer with entertainment. I usually have work to do on the plane, but for those of you who are lucky enough to have free time and would purchase a stack of magazines, why not download a few episodes of your favorite shows instead? If your computer has a decent battery, you shouldn't be using too much energy, and you'll probably save money as well as paper. And if you're going to use your computer ...
• Don't plug in if you don't have to. I'm totally guilty of juicing up every time I see an outlet in the airport, just because I know I won't have access in the air. However, now that I do have an excellent battery, I'm trying to curb this habit.
• Reuse those hotel towels. Of course, the practice of not washing hotel towels every day to "save the planet" is the practice that helped spawn the concept of "greenwashing." Who cares if it saves the hotels money? It's still better for the planet.
• Walk. I love walking in unfamiliar cities, but many work travelers fail to notice the distinctions between towns because they cab it between the hotel and restaurant, hotel and conference center, etc. What's sadder than hearing someone say, "I don't know the difference between New York and Paris - they all look the same"? But you'll never say that if you walk.

Do you have any green travel tips?

To Market, To Market ...

On our travels, we took in the Portland Saturday Market. In general, I am a big fan of markets -- people get to walk, look at handmade stuff, eat street food, and generally enjoy the day. The Portland Saturday Market, being in Portland, also contains more than its fair share of locally-grown foods, locally-brewed ales, and organic-crunchy-hippie stuff. And I am, as the folks at work described me once "a cute little hippie girl" (though where they came up with "little" I have no idea), so I'm down with the whole market concept -- note giant henna sign in the photo above.

Upcycling is big at the market right now. I mean - BIG. You can't even spit without hitting something made from something else. That's pretty awesome as far as I'm concerned, because we could probably go the next ten years without making anything new, and everyone would still have way more stuff than necessary.

Sara and I liked the artwork of Theo Ellsworth (Check out his website: Art Capacity). He was sketching away at his booth (at least, I assume it was him) and wasn't particularly chatty, but we both admired his prints and books, many of which had themes of nature and mythology -- two of my favorite things. We both took a card to perhaps buy some prints in the future.

The market is located at the Tom McCall Waterfront Park, and I can't believe how much both the park and the market have grown and changed in the last few years. With its "Keep Portland Weird" attitude (yes, I know, Austin, that was your line first) and enviro-hipster mindset, Portland is becoming the place to be for all those with lumberjack beards, retro bicycles, skinny jeans, and iPods filled with Swedish garage-punk-hip-hop that you haven't even imagined possible. Although I occasionally the city might reject me, like a heart from an incompatible donor, for not being hip enough, it's actually a lovely place with leafy vistas, cool old buildings, good food, and lots of interesting nooks and crannies.

Oceans or Mountains?

Quick.

Don't think about it. Just answer.

Oceans? Or Mountains?

Did an answer pop into your head, sure as fish on Friday? Or are you thinking ... oceans or mountains what?

See, I have this theory that people are either oceans or mountains. It's not a personality theory, but a theory of which of these is sort of your "home." No mushy-gushy mythological mumbo-jumbo about primal natures or anything (unless I've had a couple of martinis). Not any big statement about male/female dichotomies. It's just that of these two - oceans or mountains -one will resonate with a person more than the other.

I've asked this question many times, and only one person has ever refused to answer, trying too hard to analyze just what I was asking. Everyone else has always come firmly down on one side or the other.

I'm mountains.

I should be oceans. I'm a Pisces for God's sake. Nevertheless, the thought of mountains just fills me with warm fuzzies. Nothing against oceans. I absolutely love water. I love fish. Seaweed. Amphibians. It's just that a burbling brook, tumbling waterfall, or crystalline lake floats my personal boat more than the seven seas ever can.

Nevertheless, I'm starting to "get" the ocean people a bit more. This week, I spent time at my dad's near the Washington Coast, and our days were filled with the things ocean people love - going barefoot in the sand, whipping each other with seaweed, finding shells and crab exoskeletons.

Of course, the great thing about the Pacific Northwest -- you don't have to choose. We've got both, meeting and melding. Hike up on the cliffs above Dead Man's Cove at Cape Disappointment to take in the breathtaking view of an ecosystem in its full glory:

I was excited to spend my trip with two little tykes, my nephew Henry, and my "nephew" Desmond. Because if we want our kids to grow up to be able to answer the question -- "Oceans or Mountains?" -- to really know which one thrills in their deepest hearts of hearts, we have to leave them oceans and mountains to experience. We have to get them out to roll in the waves and hike up the cliffs. If they don't have the chance to do these things, then why will they care if they vanish?

So.

Which one are you? Oceans or mountains?

Ours to Save

Riverside State Park, near Spokane WA

Service Review: Great Wolf Lodge, Grapevine, TX

Due to a travel snafu (in the truest sense of that word), my colleagues and I recently ended up staying at the Great Wolf Lodge in Grapevine, TX. This resort contains an indoor waterpark and is relentlessly family-friendly, more like a theme park with beds than a hotel. In fact, the hallways in the residential areas were the scene for a hotel-wide scavenger hunt, in which kids pointed wands (for which they had to pay) at various animatronic wilderness creatures.

While I wasn't exactly thrilled to be there, I thought I'd make the best of it, even after I realized that my still-painful sprained hand would probably keep me off the waterslides. Therefore, I was pretty psyched to see that the Great Wolf was Green Seal certified - Silver, and had a green promotion called Project Green Wolf.

As far as I could tell, being a "green" hotel consisted of many of the same green features that are becoming standard in hotels these days: recycle bins were prevalent, compostable cups were provided for coffee, and signs suggested that you re-use towels. The to-go bags in the restaurant said "Please Reuse!" - but they still used styrofoam to-go containers. All-in-all, it seemed like fairly typical stuff, although their website says that they do re-circulate much of their water, and use high-efficiency light bulbs and appliances.

Some kid ran in front of the shot -- because some kid was always running in front of you at this place.

The longer I stayed there, however, I realized that no matter what sorts of conservation measures the resort takes, their very essence is anti-green (What's the opposite of green? On the color wheel it's red. Well, Great Wolf Lodge is red in its heart). Throughout the entire place, animatronic animals were singing and smiling at you. Fake trees provided indoor shade ...

... and their trunks bore flat-screen televisions advertising features of the resort. If anything says "Screw the woods," it's an indoor tree that grows televisions. I began to feel insulted that the designers of this place seemed to think they could fool you into thinking you were actually caring about the environment when you were doing everything possible to get away from the real thing.

To add to the careless re-creation of the American Northwest as a family attraction, an animatronic Indian princess told bedtime stories every evening, perpetuating kids' images of American natives as savages who talk to animals. As an educator who has spent a great deal of time trying to disabuse my students of their stereotypes of native culture, the idea of a bunch of (mostly white) kids sitting down in front of this display turned my stomach. And I like tasteless talking robots.

The woods are messy, dark, mysterious. They can be dangerous, ferocious, tranquil, or generous. One moment they may be dappled with sunlight and the next they might be sucking you into a swamp or confusing you with a false trail through the trees. But the things they will never be? They will never be plastic. They will never be filled with smiling wolves and owls. They will never be indoors.

Unless we teach our kids that places like the Great Wolf Lodge are an acceptable alternative to the real thing. And then, indoors may be the only place we have left to run.

Travelogue: Atlanta

One of the perks of my job, as the loyal Light Greenies (all 10 of you!) know, is that I get to travel - A LOT. This week, my travel took me to Atlanta, where I was looking for greenie goodness.

Unfortch, as Trent at Pink is the New Blog would say, not a lot of green was to be seen. Well ... correction: green trees were to be seen all over the city; green bucks were to be seen in the neighborhood of Buckhead, where I was ensconced in a luxury hotel. Apparently, this neighborhood can be described, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "Where old money lives, new money parties."

So green was all over the place, but GREEN-with-a-capital-G? I'm not so sure. Here, in a nutshell, are a few highlights of my journey:

I stayed at the Intercontinental Buckhead. The advantage of working for the government is that sometimes you get to stay at crazy-nice places because the government gets a standard rate for whichever down-filled pillows it decides to lay its head upon. The Intercontinental was BY FAR the nicest hotel I have ever stayed in. I mean, I had a bathtub and a shower and they were in two separate rooms. The place even had turn-down service, which has pretty much disappeared for those of us who aren't Donald Trump.

However, in terms of greenness, the Intercontinental was eh. Of course, they had the standard cards in the bathroom telling you that if you hung up your towel they wouldn't wash it, to conserve water, detergent, and energy. However, there was no recycling in the rooms or hallways, which is becoming almost standard in hotels these days. And while I don't think eco-warriors need to go veg, the restaurant -- Au Pied de Cochon (roughly translated, by someone who took high school French long ago, as "by the foot of the pig") -- featured a lot of veal, along with actual pigs' feet, which, I have to say, was a turn-off. I understand that meat is "in" right now, and I myself am not a vegetarian. I simply don't eat mammals, though I really don't have anything against eating Bessie and Wilbur. Nevertheless, I never ate at Au Pied de Cochon due to the prevalence of baby cow on the menu.

The bar, however, was quite nice, and they served a free snack plate which included beet chips. Yum.

All in all, the Intercontinental Buckhead was lovely, but if I had to pay $360 a night to stay there, I'm not sure I would feel so sanguine.

Luckily, I had a friend in Atlanta who took me to Ecco. This was exactly the type of modern yet cozy place I love. I had the organic chicken thighs with salsa verde (having spent way too many years working with 7-year-olds, I giggle a little when I say thighs). No side dish was included, but the waiter suggested spinach with pine nuts and tomato. Now, any kid who thinks spinach is "gross" or "yucky" has never had the spinach at Ecco, because that was the highlight of a meal that also included roasted chicken thighs (giggle, giggle). Not everything on the menu was green or organic, but I like a restaurant that gives you a choice. Our waiter was chill and let us chat and chew, without any pressure to be up and out. Thanks, Roo, for taking me to Ecco. Roo also claims that Ecco is Bill Murray's favorite stop in Atlanta, which makes it uber-cool.

I flew in and out of Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. Apparently, ATL is the busiest airport in the world. I'm always on the lookout for recycling bins at airports -- they make sense, since so many travelers are carrying water bottles and/or newspapers. However, ATL had no reycling bins that I could see. In fact, they had scary garbage cans which groaned mechanically every time trash went in -- I think they were compactors. It's hard for me to believe that the reduction in trash size off-sets the energy consumption needed to smash and bash after EVERY SINGLE piece of trash is discarded.

My plane was grounded due to an oil leak, but the folks at AirTran quickly found us another bird. I had planned to nap on the way home, but all of the on-and-off the planes resulted in me being wired. Instead of sleeping, I read an article in The New Yorker entitled "The Sixth Extinction", which sort of terrified me. The article chronicled various mass extinctions throughout history, and then described the extinction which is going on right now. I won't go into all the details, but this extinction involves bats, frogs, fungus and humanity's urge to expand into new territories. Basically, we're the asteroid that's going to hit the earth and blot out the sun. It's the sort of thing that conservatives will pooh-pooh, either as God's will, or not important.

Lest you think that my travelogue makes me a Negative Nelly, I have to say that Atlanta welcomed me and charmed me, and it's only through my green goggles that the city seems to be struggling to catch up to the greening of the American culture. I hope that it's only a matter of time before Atlanta is lean, mean and green.

Dateline: Long Beach WA

I'm visiting family in Long Beach, WA, a town where I've spent many a long weekend through the years. Before my dad ever lived here, I often visited with a college friend, staying at her family's beach cabin. Here are a couple of thoughts inspired by this most-recent trip.

1) Recycling might be a simple matter of tossing a plastic bottle into a bin for most of us, but in rural areas there are few options. On the peninsula where my dad lives, there are a few reycling centers. That's fine for people who have some time on their hands, but what about everyone who's bogged down with work, school, taking kids to baseball, etc.? That makes recycling dark green, not light green.

2) We saw two dead porpoises on the beach. My friend, who also visits Long Beach, saw three dead porpoises recently. So ... what's happening to the porpoises? It can't be good. Apparently, a lot of marine animals in the area are killed when they are hit by ships -- a whale washed up on the beach not long ago. Longtime residents of the peninsula are saying that razor clams are more scarce than they used to be(clamming is a major tourist draw in the area, bringing thousands to town when there's a clamming season). All this makes me think that the human impact is growing more serious for marine life off the Washington coast. Because clams, whales, and the like are a big part of the economy, I'm thinkin' that even if you don't give a crap about porpoises, if you want to keep jobs on the peninsula, you've got to care.

3) I don't like clearcuts.

Service Review - Wyndham Garden Hotel, Austin, TX

I stay in a hotel at least once every two weeks, usually more often. One time my friend Andy called while I was unpacking in yet another Radisson or Holiday Inn Express and asked what I was doing. I said something like, "You know, sometimes it's fun to just stay in a hotel, watch the TV, be by yourself."

And he said, "No. It's ALWAYS fun."

I have to say, he's right. Business travel has never lost its allure for me. It can get to be hectic sometimes, but I always enjoy a new place. I never get tired of flying over Texas and seeing the landscape, or of the tiny coffee makers in hotel rooms, or of local news in a distant city.

As much as I like hotels, they do, for the most part, have some generic qualities. None have ever inspired me to review them, or deserved to be in a blog about the environment.

Until now.

The Wyndham Garden Hotel in Austin may look, on the outside, like a typical business travelers' hotel. But the moment you walk inside, you're greeted by the uber-friendly staff who seem genuinely happy to see you. As you check-in, they explain this doo-hickey to you:

Of course I didn't have my camera when I needed it. Sorry about the phone photos.

You put your key into this slot in the wall, and it tells the computer brain of the place that you're home. When you do that, you're able to control the thermostat. When you take the key card out, control reverts to the hotel so they can save energy. Pretty savvy, eh? Saves them money AND saves the planet.

My room was spacious and comfortable, and the bed had pillows of a variety of softnesses (trust me, this is a big deal if you travel a lot). The bath products were lovely and citrusy-smelling. A big bonus - the alarm clock had very explicit instructions on how to set it. Again, this is a big deal if you travel a lot. It's hard to sleep if your unconscious is anxious about whether you set the alarm correctly. I actually bring my own alarm clock quite often. So, this alarm clock resulted in a good night's sleep.

The hotel also had all of your usual eco-friendly amenities:

And some that aren't so usual, such as the recycling stations in the hallway.

Of course, nothing is perfect, so there were a few kinks that need to be worked out. The service staff was stretched a bit thin, working the restaurant, the espresso bar, and room service. But they were very friendly, and the restaurant was certainly a cut above your usual highway hotel. They had lots of vegetarian options - my veggie burger was yum - and possibly the world's best bourbon bread pudding.

All in all, **** (out of 5) to the Wyndham Garden Austin.

Cherry Blossom Festival

Traveling Light ... Green

Traveling 3 or 4 times a month for work, I know that my environmental impact is more than it would be if I just stayed home. Of course, there are the obvious impacts - like air travel. There are lots of other things, however, that increase my footprint when I'm on the road. For instance, I having to drive a rental car means I'm usually driving a bigger, less fuel-efficient car than I do at home. I don't have my re-usable bags, so I may have to use plastic at the store; sometimes I can't find a place to recycle.

Luckily, many hotel chains have found the green in green -- dollars, that is. Here are a few examples from my hotel in Dallas:

Early on, hotels figured out that water conservation is good for business. If you hang your linens up, they don't wash them every day. It's unnecessary to wash them when the same person is staying in the room, and wastes water.

I thought these dual-use garbage cans, with one compartment for trash and one for recycling, were a great idea.Compostable coffee cups!

The bathrooms had a cool Texas theme. This has nothing to do with the environment, I just like stars. Sunsets are cool too.

I am going to be glad to get home, though.