Viridorari is an environmentally focused blog. The mission of Viridorari is to help you incorporate healthier, "greener" habits into your life, to benefit you, the people around you, and the environment.

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Saturday, July 20, 2013

Weekly Green Challenge: Sign Petitions

I continued to repurpose this week! I found a use for one of my other candle jars, and I used a side of the second fan box to transform a clutter of pictures on my wall into an organized picture board. I plan on using the other side of the same box to make another picture board.

The candle jar became a cup for razors in my shower
The box
My cluttered wall of pictures from a trip to Quebec.
The finished product!

What did you repurpose/upcycle? Send me photos of your projects at viridorari@yahoo.com and I will feature them on the next Green Challenge post. Remember, Viridorari always wants to know about what you’re doing to be greener! Email me anytime with your accomplishments.


This week’s Green Challenge is pretty easy, I think: I want you to sign ten environmental petitions. Where can you find petitions dealing with the environment? I sign upwards of five petitions a day because I receive emails from several organizations that send me action alerts. If you get on the mailing list for 350.org, the Center for Biological Diversity, Care2Petition, Moveon.org, the Rainforest Action Network, and Defenders of Wildlife, among many others, they’ll send you Action Alerts, which are emails that notify you of an issue and ask you to sign a petition. After you sign, you’ll get an email thanking you, asking you if you would donate money and/or spread the word on social media. Donating money and promoting the petition on social networks is entirely optional, of course. However, they make it really easy to spread the word- they’ll send you pre-written Facebook and Twitter messages; all you have to do is copy and paste. Follow me on Twitter- I tweet links to petitions all the time! @viridorari
 
I’ve signed petitions on a broad range of environmental concerns, such as protesting the recent proposal to remove protections for endangered North American wolves, sending messages to government officials, including the President, asking to reject the Keystone XL Pipeline, demanding that Mexican officials give justice to an activist who was murdered while working to protect sea turtles, demanding that factories pay a price for CO2 emissions, asking for the labeling of genetically engineered foods, and much more.

Signing petitions is easy, it only takes a few minutes, and they really can make a difference. Often, the petition providers allow you to adjust or add to the message that you’re sending in order to make it more personalized and to allow you to speak your mind. How are leaders, politicians, and business owners supposed to know what we want if we don’t tell them? Petitions are a great way for us to join with hundreds, even thousands of others to make our leaders aware of the issues we care about.

So, get vocal! Sign up with a few of the organizations I mentioned, if you haven’t already, and add your name to at least ten environmental petitions this week. I’ll keep you updated on the petitions I sign this week- tell me about the petitions you signed either in the comments section of this post, or via email: viridorari@yahoo.com. If you want, I’ll mention your action on Viridorari!

Good luck, and have fun!

Animal of the Month Update
 
Gorillas are typically calm and peaceful creatures. Aggression usually only occurs when the alpha male is challenged by a sub male. When confronted, the dominant male responds by standing up, throwing stuff, pounding his chest, roaring, and charging aggressively.

Gorillas have twenty-five known vocalizations which are primarily used to locate each other. Screams and roars, which signal warnings, are most commonly emitted by the dominant male silverback.

 Picture courtesy of: http://wwf.panda.org/what_we_do/endangered_species/great_apes/gorillas/mountain_gorilla/  

Sources:
           http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_gorilla#Vocalization

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