Occasionally, the subject of just what the hell I’ve been doing with myself lately comes up, and in an ideal world I’d have some sort of clear response. You know, something snappy; quick and informative, but lacking in condescension or buzzwordery.
“It’s going to be the Uber of eco-friendly green building remodels, but without the dishonest claims about not being a taxi service and tendency to block traffic while picking up passengers”
Unfortunately, I generally give some sort of disjointed report, replete with equivocations and corrections, which usually ends with me mumbling about ‘eco-friendly’… and I pretty much hate using that sort of vague, jargony dreck. Although I must admit that those sorts of words (see also: ‘green’ and ‘environmentally responsible’) are efficient in conveying a lot of context, they are also ill-defined and mean different things to different people. Also, they tend to leave a vague whiff of patchouli upon the user.
“Um, it’s like an environmentally responsible remodel… super efficient building… we’re going to try for a net zero-energy type of thing. Oh yeah, and rainwater harvest… it’s eco-friendly!”
Either that or as I’m rambling off my little spiel, I can see the light of interest and understanding dying in the eyes of my audience, in spite of being an accurate description (or possibly because of it).
“I extracted some cash from San Francisco’s batshit real estate market and am now doing a chainsaw retrofit on a mid-century rancher in Santa Rosa. We’re going for net-zero ready in the passive house style, but don’t plan on going fully off the grid”
I really oughta work on that…
Anyway, please feel free to leave any comments, suggestions and/or bitter recriminations in the comments section. I promise to read and consider them carefully before deleting them.
Buttermilk skies over the Ranch
the gimpy dog ranch 
perhaps some time to ideate your quick wins may parachute some leverage?
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Hal, this is really a solid learning for me. I’m going to disrupt my thought process and pivot into a more collaborative action plan.
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