Astrology – The Many Shades of Green

What are the Environmental Costs of 99 Red Balloons? Charlotte Ghiorse founder of House of Choclet joins us to discuss the hazards of releasing balloons into the atmosphere. We also talk about how California is working to reduce textile waste, plus astrology and more…

99 Red Balloons by the group Nena is our featured song on this week’s podcast. Did you know that the song is a protest song which touches on the cold war?

Ninety-nine red balloons, foating in the summer sky

Panic bells, it’s red alert

There’s something here from somewhere else

The war machine springs to life, opens up one eager eye

Focusing it on the sky, where ninety-nine red balloons go by

Ninety-nine Decision Street, ninety-nine ministers meet

To worry, worry, super scurry, call the troops out in a hurry

This is what we’ve waited for, this is it, boys, this is war

The president is on the line, as ninety-nine red balloons go by

While we love balloons, if we see 99 red balloons in the sky, there could be trouble ahead for the environment. Balloons are fun and whimsical, but there is a problem which most people don’t think about or understand. While we delight at balloons rising into the sky, we don’t think about the fact that they don’t disappear when we let them go. They come back down, and when they do, they can be detrimental to many creatures. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) considers balloons a form of marine debris. NOAA has documented balloon debris affecting wildlife, waterways and even deep-ocean habitats. One of the most disturbing problems is what happens when animals encounter balloon debris. A sea turtle may mistake a deflated balloon for a jellyfish. A bird may pick up a piece of balloon or ribbon, and a marine mammal may ingest it.

Once inside an animal, balloon material can cause serious digestive problems, obstruction, injury, starvation and even death. The NOAA has documented the dangers of balloons and balloon ribbons to marine animals. While we see the beautiful moment when a balloon rises into the sky it is actually the beginning of a much longer environmental story. On this episode of The Many Shades of Green podcast Charlotte Ghiorse our resident eco-activist, artist, writer, comedian and super mom joins us. We focus on the environmental cost of balloons, how we can educate people about alternatives so that we can celebrate without turning a moment of joy into an environmental hazard. We talk about California’s proposal to become the first state to make fashion brands, manufacturers and retailers pick up the tab for textile waste, some good environmental stories, the floating single red heart balloon floating above Grand Central Station, astrology and more.

For more information go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com/

To help protect the environment visit and if you can, please donate to https://earthjustice.org and https://action.nrdc.org/ Help save a forest by going to https://www.preservebuttonhook.org/

Please make sure you are registered to vote! For more info go to https://civ.works/

To listen to past TMSOG shows go to: https://hudsonriverradio.com/ https://malcolmpresents.com and https://themanyshadesofgreen.com/

Follow The Many Shades of Green on FB, Threads and Instagram @tmshadesofgreen and on Blue Sky @tmshadesofgreen.bsky.social. Listen to TMSOG podcasts on all major podcast apps. #RaiseYourEco&SocialConsciousness.

A big shout out to Neil for all his engineering wizardry!

We Can’t Back Down & We Won’t Back Down, plus Maxine’s Birthday Astrology Chart Reading by Charlotte Ghiorse

I have Mars in Sagittarius, can I get rid of clutter? Why did I ask for a reading? Should I have a Tarot reading next?

On this episode of TMSOG we start off with the Tom Petty song I Won’t Back Down. The song was released in 1989 on Petty’s solo album Full Moon Fever. The artist told interviewers that people would come up to him all the time, or would write to him, sharing stories of how this song, with its plainspoken message of resilience and empowerment helped steer them through difficult times.

So we must stand our ground on many issues. When environmental and political challenges seem overwhelming, it helps to remember that we are not the first generation to face seemingly impossible obstacles. Environmental leaders have spent their lives reminding us that hope isn’t passive. Hope is something we put into action. The same holds true in the political arena. Activism is key on issues affecting the environment, social justice, democracy, being a responsible citizen and not backing down.

There are moments when standing up for what is right can feel exhausting. Many times people are told that their voice doesn’t matter and that change is impossible. You may be pressured to compromise but don’t give up, as the principle you are fighting for is more than worth your attention.. So, what does not backing down look like in everyday life? It means refusing to yield, quit, or surrender when you face pressure, fear, opposition, or hard times. It is about holding your ground for your personal values, goals, or rights instead of running away. Rosa Parks was arrested in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger, and her quiet steadfast defiance sparked the Montgomery bus boycott which was a defining moment in the American Civil Rights movement. John Lewis continually got into good trouble, but got his head cracked open when peacefully protesting for civil rights while walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma Alabama. In 2025 into 2026, the citizens of Minneapolis and other towns in Minnesota did not back down when ICE invaded their cities and harassed and shot immigrants and activists. E.Jean Carroll did not back down when she stood up to DJT and sued him for sexual assault and won. ABC recently decided to sue the FCC over First Amendment rights to keep their TV licenses. People are standing up to stop AI data centers from destroying land and polluting the air and water in the areas where they live and work. Millions of people did not back down and showed unity during the No Kings rallies.

Despite pushback and reductions in funding, scientists and engineers are still working on ways to improve life in areas of medicine, and we recently learned that there could be a cure for certain cancers using the mRNA messenger vaccine, which would indeed be a miracle. We need millions of voices to rise up and not back down. I believe that the good people out number the bad, and we must take to the streets daily. We must vote in the midterm elections in numbers never seen before. We must call and write elected officials and tell them what’s on our minds. We must make sure people are registered to vote. We must be proactive to conserve the land and be good stewards of the Earth. But most of all, we need to listen to each other, be kind to each other and respect each other. On this week’s podcast we discuss the need to stand up and not back down, and we talk about environmental innovations, my birthday astrology chart and more with friend of the podcast, Charlotte Ghiorse, who is our resident eco activist, artist, writer, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of ChoCLet. For more info go to: https://www.houseofchoclet.com/ and Sexy Astrology on Facebook. Also check out Bad Music for Bad People ACT 1 and ACT 2

ACT 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pYwoj01lfA&t=923s

To help defend democracy please donate if you can to help lawyers defend our constitution by going to: https://www.aclu.org/ https:/ /www.brennancenter.org/ https://libertyjusticecenter.org/

To help protect the environment visit and please donate to https://earthjustice.org and https://action.nrdc.org/ Help save a forest by going to https://www.preservebuttonhook.org/ Also check out https://civ.works/

To listen to past TMSOG shows go to: https://hudsonriverradio.com/https://malcolmpresents.com and https://themanyshadesofgreen.com/

A big shout out to Neil for all his engineering wizardry!

Heat Domes in Virgo, Smoke Gets in Our Eyes, Let Us Not Eat Lettuce, July Astrology and more with Charlotte Ghiorse, Founder of House of ChoCLeT

We start off the episode with the tune Heat Wave which is a 1933 jazz standard written by Irving Berlin. The song uses scorching summer weather as a playful metaphor for intense, passionate desire. I am not sure if today’s heat domes bring out the same passion, and while heat waves are not new to summer months, heat has become more extreme, and so perhaps a new song needs to be written titled What’s It All About-Heat Domes. Because of its show-stopping, rhythmic nature, Heat Wave has been covered by numerous icons, including Ethel Waters (who debuted it), Ella Fitzgerald, and Marilyn Monroe in the film There’s No Business Like Show Business.

This summer, millions of people across the United States, Europe and globally are experiencing something that has become increasingly familiar: relentless, dangerous heat. Cities are breaking temperature records. Emergency rooms are seeing increases in heat-related illnesses. Energy systems are being pushed to their limits, as people turn to air conditioning for relief. Are these extreme heat events the new normal, and how much are they connected to climate change? Climate change exacerbates droughts and warms the atmosphere, both of which intensify heat waves and heat domes. The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) warns that while high-pressure heat domes are a natural atmospheric phenomena, fossil fuel-driven climate change is supercharging them. Warmer oceans and atmospheres trap heat more effectively, making these systems more stagnant, prolonged, and intense, directly amplifying extreme summer temperatures across North America. Warming temperatures can also lead to forest fires, which leads to dangerous smoke in the air. Climate Scientists note that a fundamentally warmed planet means heat domes trap much more heat and humidity, which would be virtually impossible without decades of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions.

Heat domes are dangerous for humans and animals. Not only can they create record-high temperatures during the day, but they also warm temperatures during the night. Children, the elderly and people with underlying health conditions are most affected by the heat. Heat domes are not just a weather story. They are a reminder that the climate we live in today is changing, and extreme heat is becoming one of the defining challenges of our era. The science is clear: a warmer atmosphere increases the likelihood of more intense and prolonged heat events. The choices we make in our communities, our energy systems, and our policies will influence how much hotter the planet becomes and how prepared we are to face it.

So on this episode of TMSOG we talk about heat domes and how a warming climate is making extreme heat events more intense, longer-lasting, and more dangerous. We discuss the cyclospora parasite which is affecting what fruits and vegetables we can eat, plus a story about artist Victor “Marka27″ Quiñonez, who was banned from exhibiting his work called I.C.E. Scream,” at University of North Texas. In addition, we cover positive eco news about a young lady, Rebecca Young in Glasgow, Scotland, who invented a solar blanket that fits in a backpack to help keep homeless people warm in colder weather. We hit on these topics as well as July astrology and more with our resident artist, activist, astrologist, comedian, writer, and marvelous mom, Charlotte Ghiorse, Founder of House of ChoCLeT. For more info go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com/ and check out Charlotte’s new show “Bad Music for Bad People” at the Nocturnal Cafe in Ithaca, NY July 19, 20, 23, 26,27 and August 1st.

Go to https://civ.works/defend for more info about civic action, voting and more.

To listen to past TMSOG shows go to: https://hudsonriverradio.com/https://malcolmpresents.com and https://themanyshadesofgreen.com/

A big shout out to Neil for all his engineering wizardry!

The Bees, The Octopus and The Plastic Eating Mushrooms with Charlotte Ghiorse Founder of House of ChoCLet

The Opening Song for this episode is Flight of the Bumble Bee.

“Flight of the Bumblebee” is an orchestral interlude composed by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov in 1899 for his opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan. Its musical meaning is to depict the erratic, frantic flight of a bumblebee, serving as magical background music for a prince transformed into an insect. While intended to be a minor background transition in the opera, the song’s vivid, frantic imagery caused it to take on a life of its own.

It became famously used as the theme for the 1930s radio and television show The Green Hornet. It has many musical challenges because of its immense speed and technical difficulty, it is frequently arranged for solo instruments and serves as a virtuosic showpiece for musicians wanting to display their dexterity and skill.

Bees are among the most important pollinators on Earth!

While honeybees often get the spotlight, thousands of native bee species quietly perform essential pollination services every day. One Spring day in 2022, a Cornell University entomology technician Rachel Fordyce, who regularly walked through East Lawn Cemetery in Ithaca New York, noticed bees everywhere and became quite curious. She collected several specimens and brought them back to the lab for identification. Hidden underground, beneath the gravestones and grassy pathways of the cemetery, scientists have uncovered an estimated 5.5 million bees—one of the largest known aggregations of ground-nesting bees ever documented anywhere in the world. What seemed like a routine observation soon turned into a major scientific discovery. It made national headlines, and many people imagined a gigantic underground hive, but that is not what is actually occurring. (Cornell Chronicle)

The bees at the cemetery are solitary mining bees. Each female builds her own nest in the soil. Unlike honeybees, they do not live in large colonies with queens and workers. Instead, millions of individual bees have chosen the same favorable habitat for nesting. This discovery reminds us that nature often thrives in the places we least expect it to. What is underground is often not noticed by us humans. There are massive mycelium (fungi) networks underground in forests which breakdown environmental toxins and can absorb radioactive waste. Nature is remarkable, and scientific discoveries teach us about conservation, biodiversity, and the hidden wonders beneath our feet.

On this episode of TMSOG podcast we delve into the bees of Ithaca, mushrooms that eat plastic, plus we will talk about the amazing Octopus, as well as politics, astrology and other eco and social issues with our resident eco activist, artist, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of ChoCLet, Charlotte Ghiorse. Go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com/ for more information.

To help defend democracy please donate if you can to help lawyers defend our constitution by going to: https://www.aclu.org/ https://www.brennancenter.org/https://libertyjusticecenter.org/ and https://civ.works/defend

To listen to past TMSOG shows go to: https://hudsonriverradio.com/https://malcolmpresents.com and https://themanyshadesofgreen.com/

A big shout out to Neil for all his engineering wizardry!

TMSOG Goes Bananas! Plus Food Waste, Banana Bacon Challenge and ‘Greenhushing’ with Charlotte Ghiorse

We start off the podcast with the song Yes, We Have No Bananas, covered by Louis Prima, which was recorded and released in 1949 on Mercury Records. The Song was originally published in 1923 and was written by Frank Silver and Irving Cohn. Frank Silver would stop on his way to a gig at a fruit stand owned by a Greek gentleman, who began every sentence with ‘Yes’. The jingle of his idiom haunted Silver and his friend Cohn. The man at the fruit stand who said “Yes! We Have No Bananas” and inspired the song, never gave a reason as to why he had no bananas, as he probably did not know why bananas were in short supply. But there was in fact a worldwide decline in the banana crop caused by Panama disease, which develops from a fungus that lives in the soil. So, I can see why the fruit vendor did not have bananas to sell, and yes, Yes, We Have No Bananas had an interesting back story.

We are almost halfway through 2026 and bananas are in the news making headlines for transforming agricultural waste into eco-friendly products, including biodegradable plastic alternatives, sustainable fashion textiles, and renewable energy. Researchers and companies are converting banana peel extracts and fibrous stems (pseudostems) into durable materials, aiming to replace petro-chemical plastics and reduce agricultural waste. Food waste is a growing problem. Food systems are responsible for one-third of all human-caused greenhouse gas emissions. Within that, food loss and waste alone account for an estimated 8-10% of global emissions which is roughly equal to the carbon footprint of the entire tourism industry. Agricultural and corporate food waste has a ripple effect within the populace. According to a recent article in earth.org, food waste from restaurants and business accounts for 28% of all the food wasted globally. Businesses that implement innovative solutions to reduce food waste can make a profit no ‘greenhushing’ needed. Companies can redirect excess food to communities that need it, which will save money and reduce their methane emissions simultaneously. Individuals also have to rethink their perception of food and change their habits. Eating smaller portions, composting scraps from veggies, fruits and bones and using leftovers can also make a difference. We are a throw away society, and as food gets over produced, it often winds up in land fills polluting the land, air and water. Educating the public about small changes in their habits can lead to both businesses and consumers monitoring their waste more closely, driving a more comprehensive and impactful change. In a world where food insecurity remains a daily reality for millions, the disposal of perfectly edible food is a profound moral failure. Consumer education and awareness about the food system and food waste is encouraged and necessary to reduce waste.

On this episode of TMSOG podcast we discuss how bananas can be used to reduce food waste and pollution. We chat with our resident eco activist, artist, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of Chochlet, Charlotte Ghiorse about Banana Bacon, ‘greenhushing’, Astrology and God’s Love We Deliver, a NYC non-profit that provides nutritious meals to people living with severe illnesses (https://www.glwd.org/). For more info about Charlotte, House of Choclet and Sexy Astrology go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com and Sexy Astrology on Facebook. It might be time to start a Banana Bacon Challenge!

For more information on civic action go to https://civ.works/ To help defend democracy please donate if you can to help lawyers defend our constitution by going to https://www.aclu.org/ https://www.brennancenter.org/

To help protect the environment visit and please donate to https://earthjustice.org Help save a forest by going to https://www.preservebuttonhook.org/

To listen to past TMSOG shows go to: https://hudsonriverradio.com/ https://malcolmpresents.com and https://themanyshadesofgreen.com/ Follow The Many Shades of Green on FB, Threads and Instagram @tmshadesofgreen and on Blue Sky @tmshadesofgreen.bsky.social. Listen to TMSOG podcasts on all major podcast apps.#RaiseYourEco&SocialConsciousness.

A Special shout out to Neil Richter for all of his help and engineering wizardry in getting TMSOG up and running each week.

Will AI Inherit the Earth? With Charlotte Ghiorse

The opening song is this weeks podcast is “The Geeks Will Inherit the Earth” by I Fight Dragons. The song is an anthem celebrating the triumph of outcasts, intelligence, and passion over popularity. It asserts that those who are ignored for being “different” are destined to inherit the world and succeed later in life. The common phrase “the geeks shall inherit the earth,” reflects a cultural shift where intellectual and technological skills are valued over social conformity. The song highlights that the social hierarchies of early years are temporary, and the people ridiculed for being “nerds” or “geeks” often become the leaders and innovators of the real world. The question now is, will AI created by geeks inherit the earth?

One can bet that Artificial Intelligence was developed by the nerds and geeks of the world, but how did it get started? People like Alan Turing, who first asked whether machines could think, laid the philosophical groundwork. Later, researchers like Geoffrey Hinton, Yann LeCun, and Yoshua Bengio pushed forward neural networks—the technology behind modern AI. These weren’t celebrities. They were researchers, often working in labs, driven by curiosity more than profit. Yes, these brilliant scientist are considered the geeks who started the research into Artificial intelligence. AI seems to be everywhere and it is one of the most transformative forces shaping our world today. It is in our phones, our computers, our schools, our workplaces, social media and is part of our daily lives. So what does it really mean for society? Artificial intelligence/AI refers to machines designed to perform tasks that typically require human intelligence—things like learning, reasoning, problem-solving, and in some cases, even creativity. Recommendation algorithms decide what you watch, how your GPS apps predict traffic, and how chatbots answer questions in seconds. As computing power exploded and data became abundant, the ideas of the creators of AI, the “geeks” created something that worked very well. What started as niche research turned into the backbone of trillion-dollar industries. While many of the “geeks” of the past are no longer at the center of AI, it is now in the hands of the most powerful companies in the world, which are being led by major tech organizations, venture capital firms, and governments. There are pros and cons to AI, and one of the cons is that AI Data Centers are sucking electricity and water from the communities where these centers are located. Data centers are renowned for their intensive energy consumption and many are facing challenges sourcing reliable electricity supplies for campuses that need to be up and running 24/7. With grids already under pressure from electrification strategies, the industry must deal with many projects which include plans to build their own power generators and fund connections to the grid. Communities are opposing the building of these centers and some have been successful in stopping them. On this episode of TMSOG we talk with our resident artist, comedian, writer, astrologist and super mom Charlotte Ghiorse. We touch on Artificial Intelligence and the problem with AI Data Centers, as well as the innovative inventions which have come out of NASA and the space program (hail Apollo and Artemis ll), as well as what’s being done to clean up plastic pollution, good things about banana trunks and of course, astrology. For more info about Charlotte, House of Choclet and Sexy Astrology go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com

To help protect the environment visit and please donate to https://earthjustice.org Help save a forest by going to https://www.preservebuttonhook.org/

A Special shout out to Neil Richter for all of his help and engineering wizardry in getting TMSOG up and running each week.

Are We Living In A Cartoon?

South Park Theme Song (Opens the program)

I’m goin’ down to South Park, gonna have myself a time.

Friendly faces everywhere, humble folks without temptation.

Goin’ down to South Park, gonna leave my woes behind.

Ample parking day or night, people spouting: “Howdy, neighbor!”

Headin’ on up to South Park gonna see if I can’t unwind.

Has any series ever had a more fitting theme song than “South Park”? The “South Park Theme” by funk metal group Primus, later reworked by projects led by Les Claypool, is a twanging, frenetic jingle that quite deliberately fails to convince the viewer that its monotone lyrics about the titular small town’s idyllic nature hit their mark. It’s a perfect way to set the stage for the absurdities that invariably follow. The whole thing was carefully planned out and arranged, but as “South Park” co-creator Matt Stone said back in 2010, “the whole thing took just one incredibly lucky cold call to pull off. “

So the question is, are we living in a cartoon?

In a cartoon, characters exaggerate everything: emotions, reactions, conflicts. Sometimes I feel that we are living in an episode of South Park which just keeps rotating day in and day out, sort of like the plot in the movie Groundhog Day. If you’ve ever watched South Park, you know the formula. Something ridiculous happens in the news. The characters react in completely over-the-top ways. Everyone argues, chaos spreads, hypocrisy gets exposed, and by the end of the episode you’re laughing… but also slightly uncomfortable because the satire feels a little too real. The creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, built their reputation on one simple idea: take the most outrageous thing happening in society and push it just a little further until the absurdity becomes obvious. At its core, animation is a form of storytelling, and stories are an essential part of the human experience. From the earliest days of human history, people have used stories to make sense of the world around them, pass on knowledge and wisdom, and connect with others.

Animation takes this storytelling to a new level, using visuals and sound to create a rich and immersive experience that can transport us to new places and introduce us to new characters.

In a cartoon, a character falls off a cliff and pops back up unharmed, in real life, when systems break, people get hurt. In the current moment in the United States, sometimes reality seems to be moving faster than the satire. It feels like we are living in an alternate universe and we are being governed by what resembles a reality show. Even if politics feels like a cartoon, the consequences are very real. Policies affect healthcare, schools, immigration, climate policy, and civil rights. Trust in elections are declining, environmental protections are being dismantled and economic inequality is widening. We are now at war with Iran, and we have not received a credible explanation as to why. Every day there is chaos and people are suffering and are stressed. Prices for oil, gas, food, rent and more are rising daily, and we the people are not being heard. When will the madness end? It’s no wonder that Americans are moving to Europe and other places globally, but we need to stay and we must continue to fight, protest, and bring our collective will together to fix this mess. Actions speak louder than words, and we need to take action, so in the words of Bob Marley, “Get up stand up, stand Up For Your Rights!“

On this episode of TMSOG podcast, Charlotte Ghiorse joins me as we delve into the question: are we living in a cartoon? Charlotte is our resident eco activist, artist, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of Choclet. We talk about the environmentally conscious ten your old fashion designer Max Alexander, and what he is doing to reduce fashion waste. We also touch on politics, astrology, eco and social issues and more. For more info about Charlotte, House of Choclet and Sexy Astrology go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com

To help protect the environment visit and please donate to https://earthjustice.org Help save a forest by going to https://www.preservebuttonhook.org/

A Special shout out to Neil Richter for all of his help and engineering wizardry in getting TMSOG up and running each week.

Longtermism, Monks Walk for Peace, plus Astrology with Charlotte Ghiorse, Founder of House of Choclet

We start off The Many Shades of Green podcast with IMAGINE by John Lennon, which was written in 1971 as a utopian anthem calling for world peace. It asks listeners to envision a society free from the divisions of nationalism and material possessions. Co-written with Yoko Ono, the song promotes unity, secular humanism, and living in the moment. It acts as a hopeful, anti-establishment, and anti-war plea for a brotherhood of man.

The Buddhist Monks are living the themes of Imagine, as their walk for peace finally reached its destination after walking 2300 miles from Texas to Washington DC. Many of the people lining the various routes had been following the monks for months on social media, hooked by their seemingly simple message about blocking out the noise of a messy world and finding tranquillity. People from all races, colors, creeds, diverse religions and even those in the law enforcement who were keeping them secure felt a calling for peace and mindfulness. The Monks were helping us get through these most difficult times, times that I never imagined I would see in my lifetime. We live in an age of urgency, chaos, breaking news, breaking systems and breaking nerves. We have to believe in a better future even though we cannot predict or know what that future will bring. Which is why we need both longtermism and optimism. We can question what is happening now, but what will matter decades and centuries from now? Longtermism asks us to value the long-term future, not just the next election or quarterly profit, but the generations that will live 50, 100, even 500 years from now. Philosophers associated with this idea argue that future people will have real moral worth, be more empathetic, and live a happier more content life. The choices we make now could have enormous ethical weight. There are real indications that longterm thinking in environmental policy is urgently needed.

The 2025 policies of the current the EPA rolled back many environmental regulations, exempting hundreds of plants from pollution limits — a decision with immediate effects and long-term consequences for air quality and public health. Just this week on February 12, 2026, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the Trump administration officially announced the revocation of the 2009 “endangerment finding,” a landmark decision that declared greenhouse gases a threat to human health and welfare. This action, described by Trump as “the single largest deregulatory action in American history,” removes the legal foundation for most federal regulations targeting greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles, power plants, and oil and gas facilities. The political decisions show how short-term interests can collide with long-term climate and health outcomes, and why we must work on future-focused policy matters more than ever. In terms of AI, experts have estimated substantial risks around misaligned AI, including the possibility of systems that could profoundly disrupt or threaten human autonomy if not governed carefully. We need to push for policies that ensure AI development benefits humanity, and that is does not undermine it. We need to move forward, be active, keep optimism in our sight and work to make sure that we will be good ancestors to the Seventh Generation to come. So on this episode of TMSOG podcast we discuss longtermism, the increasing popularity of second hand and reusable clothes, furniture, tech items and more. We also touch Astrology, and other eco and social issues with our resident eco activist, artist, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of Choclet, Charlotte Ghiorse. https://www.houseofchoclet.com/

To help protect the environment visit and please donate to https://earthjustice.org Help save a forest by going to https://www.preservebuttonhook.org/

A Special shout out to Neil Richter for all of his help and engineering wizardry in getting TMSOG up and running each week.

Hail Sweden’s Second Hand Mall, plus good environmental news about the Amazon Rainforest, and some Astrology with Charlotte Ghiorse, Founder of House of Choclet

I’m wearing second-hand hats
Second-hand clothes
That’s why the call me Second Hand Rose
Even our piano in the parlor
Father bought for ten cents on the dollar
Second-hand pearls
I’m wearing second-hand curls
I never get a single thing that’s new

The aforementioned lyrics are from the song Second Hand Rose as performed by Barbara Streisand. The song is apropos to the topic we discuss in this week’s TMSOG podcast, which is about the need to reduce waste by recycling, reusing clothes and other items.
I used to shop with my mom, QOFE Ruthie at second hand and antique stores in Brooklyn and NYC, especially Greenwich Village. I loved wandering around checking out cool hats, clothes, costume jewelry, dishes from England and sometimes vinyl records, 33s, 45s, and 78s mostly from the 40s,50s and early 60’s. People would sometimes look down upon those of us who shopped at stores with gently used items, but secondhand stores are no longer a stigma. We can make smarter choices, take action on the climate and show creative expression. People are selling and buying secondhand for so many reasons. Many folks want to save money, reduce waste, avoid fast fashion, find unique, one-of-a-kind pieces and make extra income from selling items they no longer use. Resale apps like Depop, Vinted, ThredUp, Poshmark, and eBay have made it easy. But Sweden took the idea even further — and turned secondhand into an actual mall experience. In Eskilstuna, Sweden, there’s something called ReTuna Återbruksgalleria, often known as the world’s first secondhand mall. It’s a full shopping mall where everything sold is reused, repaired, upcycled, or secondhand. We are a throw away society, so maybe it’s time to consider selling old clothes, and swapping them for other items, donating them, and to reimagine what you can do with older items to reduce waste. It is highly possible that somewhere out there, someone else might need exactly what you no longer use. So this week we discuss the second hand mall in Sweden, a Swedish billionaire who is helping to save the Amazon Rainforest, Octlantis where Octopuses thrive, plus Astrology, and other eco and social issues with our resident eco activist, artist, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of Choclet, Charlotte Ghiorse- https://www.houseofchoclet.com/

To help protect the environment visit and please donate to https://earthjustice.org Help save a forest by going to https://www.preservebuttonhook.org/

A Special shout out to Neil Richter for all of his help and engineering wizardry in getting TMSOG up and running each week.

The Environmental Cost of War, Wave Browser, December Astrology and more with Charlotte Ghiorse

The opening song of this episode is Some People Sleep, by The Tokens, which was written by my Token Bro, Mitch Margo. The last line of the lyric, sung in three part harmony is “some people sleep to the sound of the falling bombs… and some people don’t sleep at all.” The tune was written during the Vietnam War, and Mitch wrote it to bring out his opposition, but in beautiful way with music. War is horrific, and mankind continues to wage wars through the centuries, with little end in sight. People lose their lives fighting each other, and innocent lives perish as collateral damage. There is also another area of collateral damage, which seems to fall under the radar, and that is the destruction of the land where conflicts occur. When we think of war, we think of human loss, destruction, migration, trauma. But with every bomb that drops and every military convoy that rolls through a landscape, nature absorbs a blow too. War doesn’t just change borders. It reshapes ecosystems.

There is an environmental impact of war which includes air, water, and soil pollution, habitat destruction, and a significant contribution to greenhouse gas emissions. Conflicts lead to deforestation, biodiversity loss, and long-lasting contamination from chemical weapons, landmines, and military waste. Warfare also causes long-term damage to ecosystems and natural resources, affecting everything from food security to the availability of clean water.

According to the Conflict and Environment Observatory in an article dated May 5, 2025, the environmental impact of wars begins long before they start. Building and sustaining military forces consumes vast quantities of resources which includes metals or rare earth elements and critical minerals, water or hydrocarbons. Control over militarily relevant critical minerals is becoming an increasingly important strategic consideration for militaries, as evidenced by policies towards Ukraine and the DRC. The CO2 emissions of the largest militaries are greater than many of the world’s countries combined. It is estimated that militaries are responsible for 5.5% of all greenhouse gas emissions globally, however military emissions reporting to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change is poor and not all of the information gets out. So, war, what is it good for, absolutely nothing! Charlotte Ghiorse is on this episode of TMSOG. Charlotte is our resident eco activist, artist, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of Chochlet. We talk about the environmental effects of war, as well as some eco-innovations (Wave Browser), plus an homage to a cat that lived to be 38, fake vs real Christmas trees, some Astrology, and other things. For more info about Charlotte go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com/ and https://www.houseofchoclet.com/sexy-astrologyflkx9h8uma0

To help defend democracy please donate if you can to help lawyers defend our constitution by going to https://www.aclu.org/ https://www.brennancenter.org/ https://www.democracydocket.com/ and if you want to take more effective civic action visit https://civ.works/ To help protect the environment visit and please donate to https://earthjustice.org Help save a forest by going to https://www.preservebuttonhook.org/

To listen to past TMSOG shows go to: https://hudsonriverradio.com/ and https://malcolmpresents.com Follow The Many Shades of Green on FB, Threads and Instagram @tmshadesofgreen and on Blue Sky @tmshadesofgreen.bsky.social. Listen to TMSOG podcasts on all major podcast apps.#RaiseYourEco&SocialConsciousness.

A Special shout out to Neil Richter for all of his help and engineering wizardry in getting TMSOG up and running each week.

Save the Planet: Eat Less Meat, Boring Tunnels, COP30 and Astrology with Charlotte Ghiorse

The tune Mother Nature’s Son is about a deep, simple connection to nature, written by Paul McCartney with inspiration from his childhood love for the countryside and a lecture by the Maharishi.

Paul is a vegetarian and is very outspoken on the affect that raising meat and eating meat is having on the planet. He adopted the lifestyle for compassionate and ethical reasons and worked on the Best Free Monday campaign. Paul and his late wife Linda McCartney stopped eating meat in 1975 after watching lambs play outside their farm while they were eating lamb chops, which appeared to be quite the conundrum indeed. After that experience, Paul said that he would never go back to eating meat.

Paul McCartney stated that serving meat at a climate conference is like “handing out cigarettes at a cancer-prevention conference”. He issued this statement in a letter to the UN Climate Change Conference (COP30) organizers, urging them to make the event’s menu entirely vegetarian to align it with its mission to combat the climate crisis. His letter, shared by PETA, highlighted the significant environmental impact of the meat industry. The food we consume has an impact on the climate, as what we grow, how we grow it, what chemicals and fertilizers enter the foods we eat, and the methane that is produced by cattle are all having a detrimental impact on the climate and our well being.

According to a recent Associated Press article, about 15 million deaths could be avoided each year and agricultural emissions could drop by 15% if people worldwide shift to healthier, predominantly plant-based diets, The EAT-Lancet Commmission brought together scientists worldwide to review the latest data on food’s role in human health, climate change, biodiversity and people’s working and living conditions. Their conclusion was that without substantial changes to the food system, the worst effects of climate change will be unavoidable, even if humans successfully switch to cleaner energy. “If we do not transition away from the unsustainable food path we’re on today, we will fail on the climate agenda. We will fail on the biodiversity agenda. We will fail on food security. We’ll fail on so many pathways,” said study co-author Johan Rockström, who leads the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. We are what we eat, and we need to start to consider how our food is grown. Meatless Monday is a good starting point for a more plant based diet. We must consider our own health as well as the health of Mother Earth. On this episode of TMSOG podcast, we delve into the effects of climate change on the food system and the need to reduce meat consumption. We also discuss COP30, Boring Tunnels in Nevada, some Astrology, and other issues with our resident eco activist, artist, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of Chochlet, Charlotte Ghiorse. For more info about Charlotte go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com/

A Special shout out to Neil Richter for all of his help and engineering wizardry in getting TMSOG up and running each week.

Dancing Frogs and Musical Mushrooms with Charlotte Ghiorse

“I’ve lived 82 years on this earth, and this is the first time ever I’ve witnessed people delighting in the suffering of others so openly, so proudly, and even recording it for the world to see.” Mick Jagger

You Can’t Always Get What You Want (Jagger and Richards 1969)

And I went down to the demonstration

To get my fair share of abuse

Singing, “We’re gonna vent our frustration

If we don’t we’re gonna blow a fifty-amp fuse”

Sing it to me, honey

You can’t always get what you want

But if you try sometimes, well, you just might find

You get what you need

The Rolling Stones got it right, and the words and music of Keith Richards and Mick Jagger written back in 1969 reflect how I have been feeling of late. The state of things are, to say the least, quite depressing, but there are cracks in the wall that might eventually turn things around. I think people are energized and are fighting back. There are hundreds of No Kings rallies set for this coming Saturday 10.18.25 (go to nokings.org for more info), not only in the US, but worldwide, as people in foreign countries are supporting those in America who are peacefully protesting. We are at an inflection point, and it seems clear that things have to change, and a new scenario has to be put into place, because what we have now is not working. Yes, the Rolling Stones put it best, “you can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, well you just might find, you get what you need.” We need to take action and I am asking our listeners to be proactive, and to dump the tea into the harbor, as we are not a nation of Kings! On this week’s episode we delve into politics a bit and we talk about topics that affect us. Micro plastics are in our bodies and we have to reduce single use plastic. Behavioral + small interventions (boiling water, avoiding plastic packaging / utensils, using natural fiber clothing) are helpful, especially while larger systems scale up. We also touch on nuclear waste being dumped into the Hudson River, plus musical mushrooms, October Astrology and more. We delve into these subjects with our resident eco activist, artist, astrologer, comic, marvelous mom and founder of House of Chochlet, Charlotte Ghiorse. For more info about Charlotte go to https://www.houseofchoclet.com/

To help defend democracy please donate if you can to help lawyers defend our constitution by going to https://www.aclu.org/ https://www.brennancenter.org/ https://www.democracydocket.com/ and if you want to take more effective civic action visit https://civ.works/ If you want to help protect the environment please donate to https://earthjustice.org

A Special shout out to Neil Richter for all of his help and engineering wizardry in getting TMSOG up and running each week.