Green Options » delivery

Preparing Your Nest: Home Birth Necessities

Leslie Quigley — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 03:03:09 +0000

It’s not long before the birth of our baby makes his debut into the world. Preparing for a home birth can be overwhelming but for the most part it has really put things into perspective. For instance, having to get your home ready by doing all the cleaning and sorting and laundry seems to be the overwhelming aspect. Ordering the birth kit and receiving our water birth tub put things into perspective as I realize the birth our baby is not far off. After that, it’s mostly preparation in the home which seems to be a large task but if done at pace, isn’t so bad and well worth it.

Having the labor and birth items 6 weeks before you deliver is usually key. The cleaning and sorting part can wait till the last few weeks. If you’re anything like me though- it can’t wait. I feel so much better working on things here and there as the weeks go along. Rather than trying to scramble and get it all done in one day or week seems more nerve-racking to me than spacing it out. At this point, I’ve been able to get to all the nooks and crannies that I feel should get cleaned prior to delivering a baby in our home. Focusing on the bathroom and birthing room is a must.

UPS Drivers Using Bikes to Deliver Packages This Christmas. I Seen it Wit Me Own Two Eyes.

Nick Chambers — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:29:30 +0000

So I came home from work today and saw a woman riding a bike loaded to the gills with cardboard boxes on a heavy duty bike trailer. At first I thought it was just another one of the local crazies that rides their bikes from one side of the town to the other all day long, but I’d never seen her before, and if you’ve lived in my town for as many years as I have, you get to know who our crazies are.

I watched her ride her bike around my neighborhood (it’s a small neighborhood) with a bit of a detached interest as I unloaded things from my car. She stopped every now and then, picked a package out of her clown-car-stuffed trailer and dropped it off at various neighbors’ doors.

Labor Of Love: Scheduled Induction and An Epidural Love

Susie Kim — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 13:30:46 +0000

It’s probably going against the grain to be talking about pain medication in a natural parenting blog, and one of the few writers this week that would probably advocate non-natural childbirth; but I always knew that epidural was going to be my drug of choice when the time came to give birth. Two distinct memories of labor and birth came from my mother and childhood best friend. I was three weeks overdue, and by the the time my mother delivered me; I was over ten pounds. She would regale in the horror of the labor and how terrified she was of her next birth, my brother. My best friend had a child right out of high school. I remember her telling me how it was the worst pain she had ever been in her life. With those two very painful experiences; I decided that I would DEFINITELY get an epidural, no doubt about it. I would always joke, first sign of contraction, I am rushing myself to the hospital so they could stick a needle in my back. Of course, I never expected to be induced either.

I waited a long time to have a child. Although I am only couple months shy of thirty; I am the last of my siblings, who are of rightful childbirthing age, to have a baby. My brothers would often ask me, when I would settle down and be a mother. I had no interest in settling down. I loved traveling and loved my life as a single girl in the city. However that changed when I met my baby’s father. Things progressed pretty quickly for us, and not even a year after we became a couple; I was pregnant. I suffered through the hell of first trimester, the bliss of second, and the ridiculous weight gain of third. We started laughing one night because my feet were SO swollen, they looked like Fred Flinstones. Then there was the waiting game. Waiting patiently for my daughter to make her entrance into the world. Eight days past her due date, and still no sign of our daughter; an induction was scheduled. Although I had always planned for an epidural; the induction didn’t play into the equation. I tried everything from sex to chocolates to induce naturally. No avail, on April 1st at 7:30 in the morning; we arrived at Moses Taylor Hospital in Scranton, PA with my trusty pillow.

Delivery Transport Gets a Makeover

Amy Stodghill — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 16:40:00 +0000

Transporting goods from point A to point B is necessary for the flow of commerce but can be heavy on CO2 emissions. Now with a little help from route-planning software trucking companies and other large delivery services can use less fuel, reduce overall emissions, and save money.

UPS has modified their package-flow technology to determine more efficient routes for delivery vehicles called Roadnet Transportation Suite. The suite can eliminate idle-heavy routes such as those including several left-hand turns.

Roadnet uses an underlying map database that can penalise or disable lefthand turns in the route planning process. The system is well suited to the delivery business because drivers can run circular routes, ending up where they started.

Using this technique, Roadnet customers generate surprising savings on fuel and emissions. Collectively, Roadnet clients save an estimated 54.4m gallons of fuel a year and can cut about 85,000 trucks and cars out of their logistics systems.

This technology will also help reduce the number of empty trucks on the road. After goods have been delivered vehicles return empty to their point of origin. Knowing which trucks can take on additional cargo and in what direction they're heading could create opportunities for shipping and delivery partnerships, cutting down the need for overall vehicles and the fuel and emissions associated with them.

Pepsi and Anheuser-Busch are two companies with large delivery fleets that are trying out the software. Other companies that have already made efforts to reduce business-wide emissions include FedEx, which has introduced a number of electric or hybrid vehicles into their delivery fleets.

Via World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD); UPS