Jun 24, 2009

I’ve not done this bloggin’ before so bear with me as this old(er) dude launches hizelf into the 21st century … not that I’m about to do any twitterin’ or the like.

I was so sick and tired of hearing the word “Green” applied to stuff like, “This broom is a green product because it is human-powered and cleans your home without using electricity” that I almost passed up the real opportunity to be of green service in the plumbing industry when it came along.  Thankfully, I did not — enter ”Green Plumbers, USA”, an offshoot of ”Green Plumbers, Australia”.   

Skeptical at first, I decided to attend one of their trainings in Sacramento, California to see for myself what they were all about and found they were the real deal.  Subsequently, I made the investment of time and $ to attended 1 more workshop in Sacramento and 3 more in Las Vegas.  What I learned literally shook me, and made me glad I’d not fallen in to that old trap of “contempt before investigation”. 

Bloggin’ should be short, so for now I’ll simply say I had only the vaguest impressions about the connection between water use and energy.  If I was surprised to find our local Marin County water districts were the heaviest users of electricity in our area then I could only imagine that most of my clients did not know this either.  Add the fact I did not know these water districts sent water meter readings to the various sanitary districts so they could tax us accordingly and I knew I had found a new passion — Green Plumbing. 

I am now embarked on the attempt to educate the folks I do business with about the positive aspects of green plumbing – even if it’s just one service call at a time.  With 6 guys workin’ in the field, visiting an average of 2 or 3 homes a day, that’s 12 to 18 customers every single day, or 90 a week, or … well, you can do the math.  To be brief, I saw that finally I could be of real service to ‘ol Gaia rather than simply give lip service.  That feels good, that’s what I want to do now that I’m not involved with the day to day running of my biz, and that has become my new passion … and without passion life’s relegated to bein’ simply a bit of a bore. 

Best,

Ed