Georgie and I live in mutt of a house, partly thanks to our extensive renovation when we moved in. But it was built in bungalow style in 1938, and given a second story in the '70s.

I don't think these will continue in parallel, mostly because we (try to) do more on the positive side. But still, both with the foreshadowing from yesterday's post, and the fact that we have a very visible sign of unreconstructed vehicle thinking, it seems only fair to come right back with it.

Although Mitt Romney was my dad's choice for the presidency until he exited the race, the governor's politics and lack of conviction meant I'd never support him. So I never really thought about what it might be like to have a neighbor as the president.

But this morning, for the second time in a couple of months, I ran into him in the market. The other time, I was with Georgie but he was alone, cruising the produce section of the Shaw's Market in Belmont. This time, I was alone but he was with his wife, Ann, when we met up at adjacent cash registers at Wilson Farms.

I've been thinking for a while about making a "sticky" post that would talk about all the things we do in our household with a green purpose, and all the things we need to change.

But today, I decided to start a series of shorter posts to cover the same ground, instead, and am beginning with the obvious, our "status symbol": 

1. We have a Prius.

My first book review in several years appears in this morning's Living/Arts section. The book is "World Made By Hand," by James Howard Kunstler, whom I'm heard on a panel before the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association show in March.

What he brings most to the page, in my opinion, is a deeply explored vision of how the world will or may change as the result of the changing energy landscape. In the novel, a scenario of this new world, there are very few spices, for example, not even pepper, because it is grown overseas.

... not a whit, and if you don't, this link will be of little use to you.

But apparently someone at Treehugger does. In this post, they say...

There's been plenty of anecdotal indications that Americans are driving less, but now the US DOT has provided some data.

Americans drove 20 billion miles less in April than in April of last year.

I think of the "still-president" (see: Jon Stewart) as one of the worst in our history, and like to think I was in the first million or two to think it. SPB says, of course, that history will treat him much more kindly than anyone outside the White House now expects. Not just good, but a visionary, even.

James Carville has a good idea (blogged about yesterday on Gristmill.com), and I-I-I know (that's me-me-me) because I had the same idea. In March. In writing.

From Grist Mill comes this tidbit, a gift for the environmental thinker who had any doubt whom to support in the presidential election. A supporter told John McCain that his energy policy could be summed up as "nuclear, drill wherever you find it," and McCain answered "you just gave my speech. Thank you, my friend."

Wow.