Books & Music...

In our house when I was growing up, The Cosby Show was must-see TV on Thursday nights before NBC's marketing execs ever dreamed up that tag line. It's where I learned such great life-long lessons like how to hold a proper funeral for a goldfish or how to mop ("shovel, turn, splat"). It's also where I learned a la Cliff Huxtable (played by the Cos himself) that if you're not good at fixing things, don't try--and call someone who is. Cliff always made a bigger mess of things.

However, over the years I've also learned that said handymen can be expensive--and that there are a few things even I can do. Despite all I know about fixing things could fit into one of Bob Villa's arm hair follicles, I managed to fix our bathroom ventilation a few months ago much to my loving wife's surprise.

When it comes to the living an eco-friendly lifestyle, there are a few things we can all easily fix or at least investigate to see if something even needs fixing ... like our toilets and faucets.

In Stu Campbell's classic The Home Water Supply (classic mostly because it even pre-dates The Cosby Show), he explains a few ways you can check to make sure you're not losing water at home:

"Leaks in a faucet can amount to a loss of twenty gallons a day. A runny toilet can lose 200 gallons a day! A dye tablet, free for the asking at health agencies nearly anywhere in California, can be dropped in a toilet tank to demonstrate, almost immediately, if there’s a leak. Over time the dye will detect even the slightest wasteful seep. Food coloring will do the same job. So will turning off the water supply line to the toilet tank and watching the water level inside for several hours.

"People in metered water systems have a quick and easy way to check for leaks. Make sure everything in the house is turned off, so the system theoretically is using no water. If the meter still shows some water input, water has to be leaking somewhere. In an individual water system, finding leaks becomes a more painful trial-and-error search."