Friday, May 30, 2008

BOOK REVIEW: Living Like Ed!



You will forgive me if I gush on Ed Begley. He is one of those awesome celebrities that people are more interested in his lifestyle than his work. In my fantasy world He is my neighbor. The kind of neighbor that is interesting, that you like having over for a steak at a barbecue. Or what ever it is that vegans eat at barbecues. Besides the beans.
This book is probably best listed as a “green reference book” for us all to use in living a greener life.
This book was easy for me to read since I am one of Ed Begley’s biggest fans. But this book helped me grow a better appreciation for Rachelle Carson-Begley. It must be hard for her having to live with Ed- she automatically has to adapt to his lifestyle. And his solar ovens. And his rain barrels. His lifestyle is basically- as he puts it isn’t so “much activist as it is he is simply cheap. And as he put’s it Living green is easy- just start out collecting the low hanging fruit. Start with the simple changes. And I like that throughout the book he has little tags in it like “Clean the refrigerator Coils- COST: Free!” Another impressive thing about Begley is that he does most of these things by himself- no spoiled son of an Academy Award winning actor here! He washes his own solar panels, grows his own food.
Ed also gets into is how to recycle everything- it is all recyclable, even if something has to be “free-cycled”. Easy changes. An interesting thing Ed does in this book is small section throughout the book called Ed’s Green Friends that are written by folks that Ed deals with or has dealt with in the past promoting environmentally friendly products and/or services. Some of these are long and some of these are way too short. But All in all makes for good reading. Really interesting is Ed's take on alternative power- He has had his own Solar Panels for years. And he talks on how accessible it is. At the end of the book are worksheets that basically you can use to chart your own progress.
In short, this book is an extension of “The Living with Ed” TV Show; and most of the information is old to us who have followed this greener lifestyle for any amount of time but it is mostly up to date; a lot of the same information, but it is still interesting reading. But I may be biased, being one of his biggest fans!

1 comment:

Green Bean said...

I love Ed. He is one of the few folks in Hollywood who seems to practice what he preaches and he is so accessible. Thanks for the book rec.