The Greenopia website is a great guide for everything green. The website recently released its greenest states rankings and Washington state came out on top. The staff at Greenopia assessed several factors in creating this list: air quality, water quality, recycling rate, green businesses, state legislature, LEED buildings, per capita emissions, per capita energy consumption,…
The Greenopia website is a great guide for everything green. The website recently released its greenest states rankings and Washington state came out on top. The staff at Greenopia assessed several factors in creating this list: air quality, water quality, recycling rate, green businesses, state legislature, LEED buildings, per capita emissions, per capita energy consumption, per capita water consumption, and renewable energy usage.
According to Greenopia, “Washington has a large number of green businesses and LEED buildings (ones that are both registered and certified), even when you scale them to its population.” The staff does say that Washington would benefit from renewable energy diversification, though.
Washington earned Greenopia’s top ranking of four leaves. Although Washington came out on top, several other states earned a four-leaf ranking including Vermont, New York, Oregon, California, Nevada, Maine, and Colorado. I can honestly say that none of these surprised me—I fully expected to see this states at or near the top of a greenest states ranking list.
A few top 20 rankings did surprise me including South Dakota and my home state, Arizona. Arizona earned the number 13 spot on the list and a three-leaf ranking thanks to the number of green businesses and LEED buildings in the state. The Greenopia rankings do point out that Arizona should be doing far better in the renewable energy arena considering our vast solar and geothermal resources.
South Dakota also earned three green leaves and came in as the 14th greenest state in the nation. As would be expected, LEED buildings and green businesses are lacking in the state however the great air quality and renewable energy consumption helped boost the state’s overall ranking.
While some states surprised me for making it into the top 20, I wasn’t very surprised by the states at the bottom of the list. Ten states received no leaves with Louisiana coming in as the 50th greenest state in the nation. The only thing the state seems to have going for it is that they have an average amount of green businesses when scaled for population. There are only a handful of LEED certified or registered buildings in the state, the state government hasn’t done much to support green industry growth in the state, and air and water quality in the state is below average.
Reddit user Girlfriendhatesmefor’s three-year-old pitbull, Otis, had recently become overprotective of his wife. So he asked the online community if they knew what might be wrong with the dog.
“A week or two ago, my wife got some sort of stomach bug,” the Reddit user wrote under the subreddit /r/dogs. “She was really nauseous and ill for about a week. Otis is very in tune with her emotions (we once got in a fight and she was upset, I swear he was staring daggers at me lol) and during this time didn’t even want to leave her to go on walks. We thought it was adorable!”
His wife soon felt better, butthe dog’s behavior didn’t change.
Girlfriendhatesmefor began to fear that Otis’ behavior may be an early sign of an aggression issue or an indication that the dog was hurt or sick.
So he threw a question out to fellow Reddit users: “Has anyone else’s dog suddenly developed attachment/aggression issues? Any and all advice appreciated, even if it’s that we’re being paranoid!”
The most popular response to his thread was by ZZBC.
Any chance your wife is pregnant?
ZZBC | Reddit
The potential news hit Girlfriendhatesmefor like a ton of bricks. A few days later, Girlfriendhatesmefor posted an update and ZZBC was right!
“The wifey is pregnant!” the father-to-be wrote. “Otis is still being overprotective but it all makes sense now! Thanks for all the advice and kind words! Sorry for the delayed reply, I didn’t check back until just now!”
Redditors responded with similar experiences.
Anecdotal I know but I swear my dog knew I was pregnant before I was. He was super clingy (more than normal) and was always resting his head on my belly.
realityisworse | Reddit
So why do dogs get overprotective when someone is pregnant?
Jeff Werber, PhD, president and chief veterinarian of the Century Veterinary Group in Los Angeles, told Health.com that “dogs can also smell the hormonal changes going on in a woman’s body at that time.” He added the dog may “not understand that this new scent of your skin and breath is caused by a developing baby, but they will know that something is different with you—which might cause them to be more curious or attentive.”
The big lesson here is to listen to your pets and to ask questions when their behavior abruptly changes. They may be trying to tell you something, and the news may be life-changing.
Throughout history, women have stood up and fought to break down barriers imposed on them from stereotypes and societal expectations. The trailblazers in these photos made history and redefined what a woman could be. In doing so, they paved the way for future generations to stand up and continue to fight for equality.
While conspiracy theories are not limited to any topic, there is one type of event that seems particularly likely to spark them: mass shootings, typically defined as attacks in which a shooter kills at least four other people.
When one person kills many others in a single incident, particularly when it seems random, people naturally seek out answers for why the tragedy happened. After all, if a mass shooting is random, anyone can be a target.
