The rake's progress

Now that fall is here, and the leaves are scattered on the ground, many of us worry about how to tidy them up. Well, Home Depot has a simple, yet sexy solution... the good old rake! (Thanks to Treehugger.com for pointing out the link.)

Not only does this rake look good - you'll look good using it! And the exercise you get from raking your leaves will help you stay in tip-top form. In fact, why not get a few rakes and turn it into a family activity. My daughter just loves raking the leaves - an attitude I'm heartily encouraging!

I'm glad to see Home Depot finally putting some effort into selling low-carbon solutions to yard work. They certainly have big-enough displays of the noisy, gas-guzzling kind at their stores.

And don't think you'll save any time using a leaf-blower. According to this story, a grandmother in her late 50s "cleaned the areas using rakes or brooms faster than any of the battery powered blowers and almost as fast as the gas powered leaf blowers and she did a better job in cleaning up the areas".

I just wish I could send a copy of the Home Depot EcoOptions magazine to a fellow I saw a few weeks ago. Not only was he using a leaf-blower (ick!), but he left it unattended, running, and belching blue-grey smoke out in front of his house. Don't let this happen to you! The moral of the tale is: "For idling hearts and hands and minds the Devil finds a work to do." (Apologies to Igor Stravinsky.)

(An interesting aside - apparently, "it’s a little-known fact that the number of human calories expended world-wide in raking leaves each year roughly equals π times the number of arboreal calories required to make the leaves throughout the preceding year." Believe it - or don't!)