Michael Prager

I'm becoming a fan of Home Energy magazine, although so far, not enough that I'm willing to pay for it. The couple times I've seen it, it was offered for free at trade shows.

Several times while I was reading the current issue, I thought, "this is good, I should share this," so here I am.

During the presidential campaign, I noted a graphic series of handouts available at Starbucks that explored the most contentious issues.

It was produced by Good magazine, and so was this.

My grandfather, who didn't go to college but nevertheless started a business in 1929 that thrives today, had a sign on his desk that said, "don't ask me, I didn't go to Harvard."

Well, I didn't go to MIT and I'm pretty sure I never will, at least not above the level of conferences, museums, and Edgerton Alley, a portion of a classroom building hallway devoted to luminary Harold "Doc" Edgerton, inventor of the stroboscope and the "E" in EG&G, who has been an influence on me since I saw him in a Junior Explorers Club session at Boston's Museum of Science when I was 12 or so.

But I am learning from MIT nevertheless, and another such opportunity is coming up on April 24, a one-day conference on sustainability. I regret that I won't be able to attend, but you can, I'm envious of your opportunity.

I wrote about Second Rotation a year ago, after encountering them at D2E, the green lifestyles show that returns to Hynes Convention Center April 3-5. They now apparently are going by the name Gazelle.com.

The Boston Climate Action Network, in conjunction with Boston Workers Alliance, The Green Roundtable and NEXUS, and Boston Building Materials Co-op has put together a neighborhood weatherization party next weekend in Jamaica Plain.

I include this link to my other blog, even though it has nothing to do with sustainability.

When you write for a big newspaper, you get fact-checked by your readers if something slips through the lines of defense that editors represent. That sometimes happens on a blog, too, but since I haven't yet reached the hundreds-of-thousands-of-readers-per-day stratum, I also try to send my posts to the people most described or affected, so they can point out my errors, should there be any.

I sent last week's report on NESEA's public forum to Henry Gifford and Brendan Owens, who each, very nicely, pointed out facets of the report they thought could be better.

Last night at Boston Green Drinks, we heard a presentation from Mark Orlowski and Elizabeth Ginsburg from the Sustainable Endowments Institute, and for me, apart from the details imparted, it was another lesson in how many different ways the sustainable future can be sliced.

The state has decided to move ahead with two of the three zero net energy projects recommended last week by the Zero Net Energy Task Force.

I reported previously that the governor had asked for one such recommendation, and that the task force had recommended three, in Westborough, Danvers, and Lowell, so this step is both a doubling of the state's original commitment and short of the panel's recommendation. 

The Westborough project is the headquarters of the Department of Fish and Game's Division of Fisheries and Wildlife. It is about 34,000 gross square feet.

Longtime readers know I'm a committed Michael Pollan fan, ever since "Omnivore's Dilemma," which, to me, is not only brilliant in the extreme but also a model for my professional aspirations

At Tara Pope Parker's blog at nytimes.com, Pollan is collecting our collected wisdom on sage and healthy eating. It appears that the post went up on the 9th, and that in less than a week, more than 2,100 readers have left their tips, including me.