Going green.

So I finally decided to buy into this whole “green” thing. Yes I know I’m a late adapter. First I began with recycling (only, of course, after my trash service provided me with a receptacle and offered to pick it up each week). Then I decided the next logical step was to replace every light bulb in my entire house with these neat “energy saving” light bulbs. So, feeling rather proud of myself for reducing my carbon footprint I headed off to Lowe’s.

Let me begin by saying holy crap these things are expensive. But I was determined to do my part to save the world so I decided to ignore the glaring price tag and continue with my mission…only maybe I’d start with just the downstairs first. So, list in hand I began gathering my merchandise. I needed 17 indoor floods and 28 regular light bulbs. Sheesh!!! I packed my cart full and headed to the cashier. I winced as she hit the total button and a whopping $180.34 popped up. I grudgingly handed her my credit card as I tried to rationalize almost $200 in light bulbs. I guess it’s a small price to pay for saving the earth but man oh man.

As I headed out of the store I decided to call my sister to vent about how much I personally am contributing to the higher cause. As I ranted and raved about the price of the bulbs I packed them into my car, shut the liftgate and returned my cart. Now I’m not one you would call “handy” and I certainly don’t always make the “correct” choices at Lowe’s so I decided to run by my hubby’s work to make sure I had purchased the right bulbs.

He rolled his eyes at me as I explained to him he needed to double-check to make sure I had gotten the correct bulbs but he went out to the car nonetheless while I decided to grab a soda. He returned about 5 minutes later holding a Lowe’s bag that was FULL of broken lightbulbs.

“Were these like this when you bought them?!” He asked.

“Of course not! I wouldn’t buy $200 worth of broken bulbs!!!!” I retorted.

“Then what do you suppose happened?” He asked.

I was totally confused as I began replaying the last 30 minutes frame by frame in my head. Everything seemed in place until I got to the point when I was angrily talking to my sister about how expensive the light bulbs were and was trying to close the liftgate on my car. I was passionately engaged in my argument that this “going green thing” seemed to be just a conspiracy to get me to pay triple the price for stupid light bulbs. At this point I remembered the liftgate wouldn’t close and adding to my frustration I had to bang it about 5 or 6 times before the damned thing would finally latch….

And thus, I ended up with a $200 bag of shattered energy saving bulbs.

-Ashford