Jubbling.com - Consume less. Reuse more.
Jubbling - Consume less. Reuse more.
I’m here to tell you about a little something called Obsessive Compulsive Jubbling (OCJ). What is it you ask? Well, OCJ is anytime someone takes Jubbling over the top. For example:
Jubbling: Buy a brush and groom your pets yourself instead of taking them to a professional groomer.
OCJ: Skip the brush and instead groom your cat with your tongue like in this scene from The Office.
Be sure to look for OCJ articles in the future. They will be popping up as soon as we find ‘em.
It’s called the Kokon Kennel and from the picture, the cat seems pretty happy in it. But what you can’t see in the image is the pissed off spouse of the person who just shelled out $350 for this well designed and yet extremely unnecessary cat bed with plant on top. I went to Pousse Créative’s* website hoping to find out that these structures were made from recycled diapers or to benefit orphanages but no luck. This is just a plant on an expensive pet bed that can easily be duplicated using a potted fern and a cardboard box. [Inhabitat]
*Pousse Créative is their actual company name and not one we made up.
San Antonio Express-News, Jerry Lara/AP
| Litter-Robot Gizmodo – “Without a doubt the worst part of owning a pet is having to clean up after it, and I’m not talking about food crumbs.” Jubbling – Without a doubt the best reason not to get a pet is if you have to shell out $340 on one of these Litter-Robots because you hate to clean up after your pets. Only upside of the Litter-Robot: it reminds us of the guy choosing to live in the egg-shaped house on the streets of Beijing. |
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| Automated Laser Chase Cat Toy Gizmodo – “Instead of having to manually direct a red dot around a room with your hand, this little pod does all the work for you, randomly moving it about at four different speeds.” Jubbling – If pointing a laser pointer around the room for your cat to play with requires too much effort, you probably shouldn’t get a cat. |
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| Canine Treadmill Gizmodo – “Unless you happen to have an exercise room with enough space for a treadmill of their own. This smaller version, designed specifically for canines…” Jubbling – So basically, if you haven’t purchased a full blown treadmill for your dog already, here’s a more compact $550 one that is smaller and designed specifically for your dog. |
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Two weeks ago, my daughter’s pet hamster Freddy past away and I wasn’t surprised to find hamster coffins available for people that want to send their former buddy off in style. Fortunately, we had an iPhone box and that did the trick nicely.
Pets give so much to their families, especially kids, and all they ask for in return is food, water, affection and a little of our time. Anything we do beyond that is our own consuming fault.
The Green Festival, or GreenFest, is a two day event that showcases products, ideas and solutions for consuming less and reusing more. And this year, they’re celebrating their 10th anniversary having welcomed 1 million attendees. Yes, green is prominent in their name but you don’t feel Jubwinked by attending because it’s all about the vendors. If you do decide to go, definitely bring your kids too. GreenFest is very kid friendly and includes a KidZone with crafts, games and featured speakers who’ll explain ways that kids can get involved. Here is their upcoming schedule:
| 2011 Green Festival Schedule | |
| San Francisco/SF Concourse | April 9-10 |
| Chicago/McCormick Place | May 14-15 |
| Seattle/Qwest Exhibition Center | May 20-21 |
| New York/Javits Building | Oct 1-2 |
| Los Angeles/LA Convention Center | Oct 29-30 |
| San Francisco/SF Concourse | Nov 12-13 |
Now Jubbling Festival, or JubFest, is still about 3 – 20 years off but I’m working on it. For now, it occurs in my house daily and consists of me walking around in a parka telling my kids to turn stuff off.
This weekend, my daughter Amanda and her friend Maggie decided to make cat toys again. This time, their toy making materials included twine, toilet paper wrapper, a little tape and a pencil to draw eyes. It’s hilarious to see the results because they not only spend time studying how their respective cats play but they also factor in what they know about how cats hunt in the wild and then meet up to develop the toys.
Using the numbers from the American Pet Products Association, we calculated that Americans spent roughly $2 billion on pet toys in 2010; $700 million on just cat toys. It feels good not to contribute to a number that large.
Something that you should know about Jubbling is that we try to avoid events with “green” in the name. Unlike Jubbling, green is such an overused term and often repels as many people as it attracts. But we’re always in need of new ideas so we headed over to Seattle to see what was going on. Thankfully, Green Festival Seattle was not an overly hyped marketing event and instead focused on local vendors and offered solutions in a more Jubbling vein. You still had companies like Nature’s Path, Tesla, and Verizon but they were easily outnumbered by small local companies like ecohaus, SolTerra and ReUsie.
For my trip to Green Fest, I brought with me a couple of experts in the area of Jubbling – my daughter Amanda and her friend Maggie. 
The main reason they came along is that they’re pretty savvy kids who are not afraid to ask the tough questions. The other reason was that I knew they would willingly snoop around the PETA booth and see if the woman in the “One pound of meat equals six months of showers” display was naked. (Unfortunately, I couldn’t get positive confirmation.)
Interesting Products
ecohaus’s Gray-Water Toilet – An older idea but still awesome. A sink mounted in the lid over the tank lets the water that normally goes down the drain fill the tank for the next flush. ecohaus is a reseller of innovative building products that are sustainably produced, designed to reduce and built to last. The gray-water toilet is one of many thoughtful products you can purchase from ecohaus. And yes, you can brush your teeth in the built-in sink while you’re taking care of business in the morning. True multitasking!
SolTerra Systems EcoRoofs – SolTerra is a local company retrofitting and/or building new living roofs onto homes and businesses. SolTerra’s “EcoRoofs” can support a garden, will insulate your home from extreme hot and cold weather and are expected to last up to 50+ years. They also mitigate the effects of runoff by filtering and retaining up to 69% of the rainfall.
SodaStream – A showstopper for the kids. SodaStream is a simple product that uses a compressed CO2 canister to carbonate normal tap water into sparkling water. Add a small shot of flavor and you’ve got your favorite soda. Flavors are all natural and include root beer, cola, diet cola and every other color of soda you can think of. SodaStream’s goal is to move the anti-bottled water debate to the possibly-recycled containers delivering soda that is loaded with preservatives. And the CO2 canisters can be exchanged and recharged and will supply enough carbonation to produce from 60 – 110 liters of flavored or straight soda water.
Green Fest was loaded with other great booths but I’ve got to reach out to the Vegans – pitching your cause and ideals is great but staring down the attendees is probably not the best way to attract a following. I guess the saying “Love animals. Hate humans” applies here because there was a lot of carnivore-profiling going on at that booth. Fortunately for them, they’re booth ended up being the most memorable for the kids. I’m not sure why but I think it had to do with one of their t-shirts.
Anyways, if a Green Fest comes to your town I would recommend attending. You’ll find a lot of good people and discover Jubbling ideas that are not all extreme and are usually local. Definitely bring your kids too. They’ll ask questions that you wouldn’t think of and in a pinch, they’ll nose around the PETA booth and let you know if the shower-taker is naked or not.
Blank us on ......