Easy ways to save water and be Green

Are you feeling guilty that you're not doing enough to be green? Here are five simple tips you can do on a daily basis at home.

1) While brushing your teeth don't keep the water tap on.

2) If you are single employ a 1 flush per 2 pee policy. Couples can do this also if they are understanding.

3) Buy a stop watch and measure how long you stand in the shower. Next day reduce it by a minute. Continue this for a few days. You can easily achieve a 20 percent reduction. (Thats 2 minutes less on a 10 minute shower)

4) While shaving shut off the water tap. (Guys can save a lot of water)

5) Don't turn the tap all the way to the maximum position.

Save the environment and save money on your water bill.

Save money on clothing

Money is tight and so are my clothes. I decided to manufacture my own clothes to save money. Sitting at a sewing machines was not an option. Thanks to the internets I was able to find alternatives that jive well with my college life.


The Cork Tuxedo:




The Coke Tuxedo:






The Ramon Noodle Dress:






The Condom Dress:














The Balloon Dress:








The Skittle Dress:

Can you get rid of your land line?

After convincing a couple of my friends to get rid of their landlines I thought I should share the findings with you.

If you have a cellphone and broadband you can easily get rid of your land line. For all your regular in town calls you can use your cellphone. If you do a lot of long distance calling, especially to Asia, then you will need to buy a VOIP service such as Vonage or SunRocket.

The good thing about Vonage is that once its setup even my Mom can use it. No need to worry about the PC being on or anything like that. Depending on what plan you get your savings could vary from 20 dollars a month to 4 dollars a month. Further savings can be realized if one is not afraid of the computer and can handle services like Skype and Gizmo.

But if you call a few select countries (e.g. Europe, Canada) then you can use your cellphone in conjunction with services like allfreecalls for the price of a local long distance call. With allfreecalls you can even place a call to Iran and shout at the Grand Ayatollah.

In case you dont have broadband then you need to see if you can live without calling people in Asia.

UPDATE: allfreecalls has gone out of business for the timebeing. (March 4, 2007)

UPDATE: allfreecalls is back in business as yak4ever with a few changes. (May14, 2007)

How I saved over a 1000 dollars with 3 phone calls.

I have the pleasure of traveling about 1-2 weeks every month due to my work. As such I decided to take a closer look at some of my expenditures. Within an hour I was able to cut down 1212 dollars per year. Whats the secret? Just look at what you're spending on and ask yourself if you are really using the service.

My first cost cutting measure was downgrading my Netflix plan (Ok, I did'nt call them but I used their website). Their service is incredible, but I was only watching one movie a month. There were a couple of months where I had the same Michael Moore DVD gathering dust. So I went from their $17.99 plan to the $4.99 plan. This plan still allows you to see 2 movies a month. By downgrading I got a saving of $13 per month or $156 per year.

My next call was to Vonage. Vonage is a Voice over IP company. They have an unlimited calling plan for $24.99. I realized that I use my cellphone for all my calling needs. The only reason I have Vonage for is long distance calls to Asia. I discovered that Vonage has a relatively obscure plan called the basic zero plan. Its only $4.99 for a month. They charge money per minute but thats pretty negligible (3.9 cents). Net savings: $20 per month or $240 a year.

My best call was to Comcast cable. I went from a $109/month plan that included HBO and broadband to a $41 plan. The new plan does not have HBO or the zillions of channels I was getting before, but it still has broadband and all the basic channels. Savings of $68 a month or $816 a year. Of course they only gave me this deal after telling me about two higher priced deals but in the end persistence paid. You have to keep asking the operator if this is the best plan available.

Total savings:

Netflix $156
Vonage $240
Comcast $816

For a grand total of $1212. How much can you save?