Remember way back in April when I wrote about the city of Ottawa’s TREE Program? Well, my delivery day is fast approaching!

I received a letter today explaining to me that my tree would be delivered to me sometime between September 22nd and October 2nd and will include everything I need to plant this tree right away: a sapling, some soil, a pot, some soil nutrients and compost.

I wonder what kind of tree it will be? They make no promises that you’ll get a tree of your choosing (you choose 3 options on your application) but they do say that they try their very best to get you one of your choices. I chose, in order:

1. Japanese lilac
2. Hackberry
3. Crabapple

I’ll be taking the tree up to my parent’s house to plant on their farm. My mom is very excited to see what we get and has a place picked out for it already. What a better way to show my commitment to going green than to plant a tree! I’ll be sure to post some pictures/video when the tree comes. I’m so excited!

What are you waiting for, Ottawa residents? The next tree delivery season is May/June so be sure to fill out your application now! Don’t have anywhere to put a tree? You can also fill in a form recommending a spot for the city to plant a tree for you.

I don’t eat much of this stuff. I’m not actually a big fan of vinegar based coleslaw. Maybe I’m not selling the recipe well… so, why post a coleslaw recipe? Because everyone in my family loves this recipe – it’s in high demand at my house. It’s rare when there isn’t some made up in a container somewhere in the fridge.

And I’m told you’ll like it too, readers. I will guarantee it’s like to coleslaw you’ve had before. Are you brave enough to try after that ’sales pitch’?

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup Organic Virgin Olive Oil
• 1/3 cup Organic Apple Cider vinegar
• Parsley
• Herbamare
• Pepper
• 1/4 large white cabbage
• 1/4 large red cabbage
• 1 shredded carrot
• 1/4 large onion chopped
• 1/4 cup sliced black olives (optional)
• 1 inch feta cheese crumpled (optional)

Method:

1. Thinly slice the white cabbage. Then chop to pieces of one to two inches. Put in mixing bowl.
2. Do the same with the red cabbage.
3. Add the shredded carrot and chopped onion to the red and white cabbage.
4. Pour the Olive Oil over the contents of the bowl. Then add the Apple Cider Vinegar. (The oil is added first or the vinegar just pools on the bottom.)
5. Season to taste. Add the optional black olives and feta cheese.
6. Mix. Let sit 10 minutes before serving for enhanced flavor — let the vinegar soak in a bit or else you’ll have vinegar cabbage soup!

Oh, Apple. And here I was impressed with how green-conscious you were!

This, my friends, is not an iPod or an iPhone. It’s not a flashy new computer part or some delicate piece of equipment that needs a buffer for bumps.

Nope.

In this box are two serial numbers, two stickers, a packing list, and a pamphlet that was sent to a staff member over at TreeHugger.

Really, Apple? This information could have easily been emailed.

What a waste!

[via]

That’s right — interesting little tidbit I’ve just run across. Though it might not be news to you regular Apple fans, in an effort to save paper and be more environmentally friendly, the Apple Store actually offers to email you your receipt instead of automatically and mindlessly printing it out and stuffing it in the bag like many other stores.

I’m not personally on a crusade against paper receipts, but only because it really hadn’t dawned on me exactly how many of my receipts that I actually just crumple up and throw to the bottom of my purse.

Apple, as a whole, is not doing so well on the big green scale (according to Greenpeace), but hey – this is a start, right?

Mold. At the first sign of it I tend to throw food out… unless I convince myself that I feel bad for letting it mold (beause it was either expensive or delicious), in which case I put it back in the fridge and hope that magic food fairies will come and fix it so that I can eat it and get my money’s worth.

On fridge clean out day, I always cringe at the sight of the half-full garbage bag filled with spoiled and unwanted food. Am I wasting food items that don’t necessarily need to be wasted?

This article on Boing Boing caught my eye: When is it OK to eat moldy food?

The USDA (that’s the United States Department of Agriculture, not the United Square Dancers of America, of course) recently did a study on moldy foods and released the Safe Food Handling fact sheet.

Surprise, surprise — in the end they do recommend throwing out most moldy foods. But the advice within the chart for how to salvage other foods is great!

Generally I live by the “if it smells bad or feels slimey, I won’t eat it” rule but after reading the chart I’ll never eat a moldy dollop of sour cream again. (Bleh!)

Be sure to check it out for yourself, you scrape-it-off-the-top types.