<p>Does anyone plan to participate in Earth Hour? The photos from Sydney and other points east were really cool. I plan to do it, and hope to see some stars come into view.</p>
<p>Anyone else planning to join in?</p>
<p>[Earth</a> Hour US](<a href=“http://www.earthhourus.org%5DEarth”>http://www.earthhourus.org)</p>
<p>Yes, but I’m cheating. I’ll turn off everything but my router and unplug my laptop and use it for an hour.</p>
<p>I thought it was last night…so I sat in the dark for naught.</p>
<p>oh dear! Hope it was a nice experience anyway. Dark is not all bad.</p>
<p>You could do it tonight as well and have double the effect… :D</p>
<p>We’ll be having dinner with friends at their house so we’ll have to wait and see if they’re up for it.</p>
<p>Hope so–we did it last year (at home with the kids) and it was wonderful. Lit a fire, worked on a jigsaw puzzle by candlelight, took a walk in the dusk. The teenagers didn’t want to stop after the hour was over.</p>
<p>No- I’d rather be less wasteful on a regular basis than make a symbolic effort once a year. I remember back in the early 1970’s when we would turn off the water while brushing our teeth in the dorms to save water- in a Great Lakes state. Senator Gaylord Nelson, of Wisconsin, started Earth Day type things back when I was in HS. All of this conservation stuff is ancient history for me- it needs reviving. I gave up many of my efforts when I realized they were such a small drop in the ocean when no one else was bothering.</p>
<p>I feel your frustration wis75, but I am enough of an optimist to enjoy doing things just for their own sake, and possibly enjoy the side benefits of seeing the sky darken a bit. I didn’t even know about this last year, but since I seldom see any complete constellations here I plan to go outside and see if any old familiar friends from my childhood can suddenly be seen. It’s sad, but my kids have rarely seen the stars that I grew up with. Maybe a side benefit of this small effort will be that people remember the days when stars were visible in the sky. I know that’s not the point of the exercise, but it’s the part I most look forward to.</p>
<p>And yes…I do my best at conserving, recycling and respecting our planet. I am imperfect, but I try.</p>
<p>The street lights will still be on with their reflected glow from today’s clouds. We see stars on clear nights where the trees don’t interfere.</p>
<p>Yep, we did it. We turned off as much as we could, lit candles and talked about sustainability, etc. Bonus, since the computers and t.v. were off already, everyone went to bed early!</p>
<p>Lights are off. Computer and TV are on. Substantial compliance.</p>
<p>psh, no. the game’s on.</p>
<p>or was.</p>
<p>it’s over now</p>
<p>We did, with ten extremely noisy Twister-playing 11-year-old girls at our house. We lit some candles and left the tv on so they could continue watching the Kids’ Choice Awards on Nickelodeon. Why did I assume the darkness would calm them down a bit? Just brought the last few home, thank goodness…</p>
<p>We always keep minimal lights on and stagger down dark halls holding onto the walls. With a full moon, the skylights act as nightlights.</p>
<p>We did last year and this year again. Husband and I played cribbage by candle light, while our 14 year old daughter showered by candle light. Then she came out and we played UNO until time for the 10:00 news and minimal lights came back on.</p>
<p>I love this. Not just the environmental aspect, but this really opens up an hour for families to spend time together, that they almost certainly would not have otherwise.</p>
<p>TOTUS (TelePrompTer of the United States) posted this from Camp David on his Twittter account tonight:</p>
<p>*“Huh. Michelle is lighting all these candles up here at Camp David. Kind of creeping me out. Maybe it’s the Barry White in background.” *</p>
<p>We didn’t exactly participate. Our children’s HS was in the state BBall finals at that exact time, and we wanted to watch/listen to the webcast and radio. (No cable for us)
We did turn the lights off in the rooms we were not in and didn’t turn the outside lights on until later. We live in the country(it’s already pretty dark at night) so those outside lights provide a sense of security. </p>
<p>We’ve been aiming to reduce our total March electric bill by 10% compared to last March just by being more aware of usage. Lights, tvs, computer monitors, etc. have been off when not in use. I’m anxious to get the electric bill to see how we did this month. I would love to start changing some light bulbs to compact fluorescents, but I am not a fan of the light color. </p>
<p>BTW–the Bball team won state-yeah for them!</p>
<p>We did it…except for when DH turned on the bathroom light because he had to go.</p>
<p>Didn’t do it, but nothing against those that did. I try to focus on doing things that will actually save energy, turning the lights off for an hour isn’t one of them. </p>
<p>Recently replacing almost all the lights in the house with CFLs has an much much bigger impact on our overall electricity usage. However, if turning the lights off for an hour encourages people to make bigger changes then it can only be a good thing.</p>