Jeremy Herndon

I’ve been taking a look at how to save some money lately.  In these shaky times, I think it is important to save every penny we can!

We recently received the electric bill, and that was motivation for me to start looking at ways to reduce our electricity usage, even now without the added extra expense of running a central air conditioner.

First thing I’m going to do is install a thermal insulated blanket for the water heater.  I bought one at the hardware store for about $20.00  Our family takes a lot of showers, and we run the dishwasher every day (yes, it is full when we run it, and we have it set on air drying!) and we do a LOT of laundry,  so I think insulating the water heater better will help reduce our electricity usage.  I’ve read that doing this will save 4-9% in water heating costs!  And that will be good for the environment, too!

I was reading that President Obama has asked the EPA to consider allowing California to require better fuel efficiency in cars. I think that fuel efficiency should be required in all of the states, not just California! I don’t think there is a valid reason in the world why so many cars and trucks get such poor fuel efficiency! The technology is out there; we should be using it!  One of the reasons the big 3 car companies are struggling right now is because they keep producing gas hogs, so people are buying foreign cars that get better mileage!  They need to wake up and smell the coffee!

My aunt has a 2008 Toyota Prius that she has put a lot of miles on.  I’ve been envious of her Toyota Prius ever since she bought it.  She likes to brag about how she gets 50 miles per gallon with her Prius Hybrid, so she says she doesn’t worry about the price of gas.  Well, I think that even though she gets such great mileage she should still worry about the price of gas!  After all, when the price of gas goes up, so does the cost of everything that we buy – food, clothing, everything!  I guess she’s just a little bit naive about how the world really works!

I’d like to buy a hybrid vehicle the next time we buy a car; I like the looks of the Honda Insight.  The reviews on that sound promising!  It may be a couple of years before I have enough money to buy any new car, though, so I’ll be interested to see what else comes out on the market!

I was reading an article on the Discovery Channel’s website about how some scientists have created a study that proposes burying the leftovers from crops (for example, corn stalks) at sea.  They say that this would help to reduce the carbon emissions problem that creates global warming.  I don’t see how this would benefit the earth because I think that this would be polluting the ocean, wouldn’t it?  Wouldn’t that be disrupting the lives of the creatures that live in the ocean?  I think this is a bad idea.

There is absolutely nothing more annoying to me than to come home and find that all of the lights in the house are on, but no one is in most of the rooms!  I can’t seem to educate certain folks that we need to save money by turning off lights when we leave the room.  Well, I just found out that Black & Decker is releasing for sale motion detector light switches that will turn the lights off automatically after a few minutes of detecting no motion.  The price sounds reasonable, about $30 per switch.  They are supposedly going on sale in April.  I’ve signed up to receive an email notice from them when they come out!  I am DEFINITELY going to buy several!

In my campaign to save money I’ve been thinking about replacing our exterior back door’s deadbolt lock with a remote control keyless deadbolt.  There are many times when one of the family members goes out at night and leaves lights on out by the door simply because it makes it easier for them to see the lock to insert their key to get into the house.  There are plenty of other lights around that area to help them see their way to the door.  (Those are motion sensor lights.) 

I’m thinking that it would be really nice to have the remote because there are a lot of times folks have their arms full and can’t easily unlock the door with their keys.  Pushing the remote button on their keychain would let them enter the house more easily.  It would also let them into the house quicker if they felt threatened in some way.  I’ve been looking around on the Internet for price ranges and styles and it seems that they will cost about $100.  I was glad to see that some of the systems have additional remotes available so that all of our family members can have one.  Naturally these locks will also work with a key if necessary.

I’ve seen pictures of the Smart car on the Internet, and on television, but not “for real” until today.  I was waiting to pull out of a parking lot and a large tractor trailer passed me by, followed by a Smart car.  What a huge difference in size that was!  It was a cute little thing, a bright red, but it brought back memories of many years ago when I saw the results of a little car being in an accident with a tractor trailer and it made me shudder.  I don’t know how safe I would feel in such a little car!

Do you know what parthenogenesis means?  I didn’t until I read it in an article that was talking about how a second case of asexual reproduction in sharks was documented this week in Virginia Beach.  It seems that a female blacktip shark, having been the only kind of her species in an aquarium, gave birth without benefit of having a mate.  The article also mentions that last year a hammerhead shark in a zoo in Omaha also gave birth without benefit of mating.

I found this to be quite fascinating!  I knew that there were some animals that could do that, but not sharks!  Considering how many people are afraid of sharks, this could be very scary news to some people.  I would not be surprised to see this story on the Colbert Report’s threat down sometime soon!

I have an uncle who lives in England, and he sent me an email telling me that horrible storms have hit the UK, killing five people.  The country is under flood alert.  I don’t remember hearing about this on the news anywhere, and it makes me wonder why.  I don’t know if I just wasn’t paying attention, or if it just didn’t get very much coverage here in the US.  It seems to me that sometimes “we” are a little bit too self-centered and egotistical and don’t pay enough attention to what is going on in the rest of the world unless it has a direct impact on “American Interests” – which means corporate profits!

I’ve heard that Hurricane Gustav is heading for New Orleans, and the Mayor of New Orleans has ordered a mandatory evacuation of the city.  The experts are saying it is going to be the worse hurricane they’ve seen to date and if they don’t evacuate then they are going to be sitting on their rooftops surrounded by water, waiting for rescue.  He essentially told the residents “if you don’t get out, you’ll be on your own.”

I just can’t even imagine living in an area that is so susceptible to that much damage from such frequent hurricanes!  I know a lot of people were born and raised there and feel like they are “stuck” there, which really is too bad.  It would be nice if the government would come up with a program to buy their homes and turn those areas into parks so that the people could afford to move someplace safer!

I was reading an article on a news website that I found called livescience.com that states that many schools have decided to stop supplying trays to their students.  They think that this will save energy, by not having to wash the trays.  The article indicated that they students are not very happy with the decision, as it makes carrying their food to their tables a lot more difficult.