Living Simply So Others Can Simply Live with Ed Begley Jr.

What an honor to have Ed Begley Jr. on Consciously Clueless. An environmental inspiration for decades Ed has a wealth of knowledge to share on how to save our planet.  

Ed Begley, Jr. is a Hollywood icon with hundreds of film and television credits to his name.  The Golden Globe and seven-time Emmy nominee burst onto the national television scene in the series “St. Elsewhere” and currently can be seen in the film “Amsterdam” and the series “Young Sheldon” and “Better Call Saul”.  Ed is one of the most noted environmentalists of our time who is dedicated to multiple charities and initiatives to make our planet a better place.  

Instagram: @e_-begley_jr

Twitter: @edbegleyjr

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Support the show

Thanks for listening to another episode. Follow, review, and share to help Consciously Clueless grow!

Work with me: https://www.consciouslycarly.com/

Join the Consciously Clueless community on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/consciouslycarly

Connect on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/consciously.carly/

Connect on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/consciously.carly.blog

Connect on Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/carlyjean5/

Music by Matthew Baxley

Transcript

[00:00:00] Carly: Welcome back to another episode of Consciously Clueless. You're here because you want to learn about how to live a healthier life, how to live more sustainably, how to take your everyday actions and make them work for you and the planet. Sometimes it might feel like you've got this figured out, and other times you probably feel lost.

That's why I'm. Together we will learn how to live happier, healthier lives without the need to be perfect and always allowing space for a little cluelessness on this journey to living a more conscious life. Today on the podcast, I talk to Ed Begley Jr. A Hollywood icon with hundreds of film and television credits.

To his name, ed is one of the most noted environmentals of our time dedicated to making our planet a better place. Here we go. Are you ready to hear some good news stories? dive into the Healthy Seas podcast and meet the people doing all they can to help the seas and oceans thrive from above and below the wave.

Host Crystal De [00:01:00] Micelli talks to diverse fishers experts and more about what they're doing to protect our source of life and how you and I can help from wherever we are. Healthy Seas is a marine conservation organization whose mission is to tackle the ghost fishing phenomenon and turn this waste into an opportunity for more circular economy.

They do this through cleanups prevention education, working with partners who recycle and repurpose this material. This new show highlights their work and the work of their peers around the world. Go to forces for nature.com/healthy Seizes podcast to listen for feeling right now in this moment. Put you on the spot a little bit if it was a spectrum from Clueless to conscious.

[00:01:42] Ed Begley Jr.: Carly, thank you so much for having me on and your wonderful show. What a great theme for a show. I'm in a rare but slightly unsettled state cuz I got covid again on Friday. I, let me be clear. I tested positive for [00:02:00] Covid on Friday and I haven't really been sick since or before or since I feel fine.

Mm-hmm. , I have what I would call a minor sore throat, but I can, okay. I tested positive again this morning, but I'm fine. And so eventually that positive test will go away and I can mingle with my fellow man and woman again. Yes. That 

[00:02:22] Carly: is quite the feeling of I. Yes. So I, oh, sorry, ed. 

[00:02:31] Ed Begley Jr.: No, I'm fine. I'm feeling good is the point, but just slightly unsettled up cuz I'm, I'm supposed to work on Monday, something I test negative by Saturday and they won't be able to have me on set of course on Monday, and they'll have to work something.

Hopefully that won't cause him that problem. But again, all minor problems. There's people out there in the Ukraine and elsewhere with real problems, and I'm not one of them. 

[00:02:58] Carly: Yeah, always good to keep perspective, [00:03:00] but at the same time, real bummer to have your life held up by something like that. 

[00:03:05] Ed Begley Jr.: Yeah. How are you today, Carly?

Tell me how you're feeling. I'm 

[00:03:10] Carly: doing good. It is sunny. I'm in Northern Minnesota, so there's just tons of snow, so anytime there's sun, I will welcome it and feel it's warmth and feel. Some vitamin D.

[00:03:25] Ed Begley Jr.: Yeah, we're having the same thing. It's usually sunny most of the year, and it still will be statistically sunny most of this year. But we've had a lot of rain, as you probably heard here in California, and some snow at even lower elevations. . So today the sun is shining bright again and it's nice. After that much needed water we got, 

[00:03:46] Carly: yeah, it really does make a difference.

I forget until it's been a few days of clouds and then it just feels so rejuvenating. So I've heard in a few interviews that you've done in the past, people ask about where has your inspiration [00:04:00] for being so environmentally minded come from? And I know you've talked about your dad a lot. 

[00:04:05] Ed Begley Jr.: My dad was a big influence.

He was. He never really used the word environmentalist, but he was one in away because we turned off the lights and turned off the water and save string and saved tinfoil and you know, just were very careful with everything. He was a son of Irish immigrants. He had, you know, lived through the great depressions.

So I got a lot of that from him. But the, that was the positive influence was my dad. The negative was equally compelling, cuz I grew up in smoggy LA and lived with that smog for two decades and it would just sre your lungs, it just hurt. Forget about running around as a kid to just sit on a bench and breathe the.

You know, you'd be, oh my, I can't. Wow. You couldn't quite catch your breath and it hurt to breathe. So that will get anybody motivated, get most people motivated, I'll say, and I think 

[00:04:54] Carly: just as fascinating is not only where did this inspiration come from, but to stay [00:05:00] motivated to work at something for decades.

Where do you find this ability to keep going? Where does that hope come?

[00:05:10] Ed Begley Jr.: It comes from the people that are doing extraordinary things. I'm basically a cheap scape that likes to ride my bike and take the bus and you know, I'm being a little bit unkind perhaps, but still there are people out there, Jane Goodall and Shiva and Bude gal and these people, Dolores Huerta, they're doing important things.

You know, as regards the environment, Rachel Carson, who really suffered and paid a great price for their care for the farm workers and for the environment and other important things like that. Care for the chimpanzees in James Case, Cason, Putte with the orangutans. I've done a little bit and I do get encouragement though from their work and also from.

Where we have made some progress. We have four times the cards in la, four times since 1970 [00:06:00] and millions more people, the smog is not the same. It's not worse from 1970, it's better. So we still have a ways to go. You did not hear today, ed Begley said the smog is fixed in la. It's not end of interview. Near these fulfillment.

Right, right. Pack up your tent to declare success and go home. Not so. People that live near the fulfillment centers nowadays, people live near the freeway interchanges. People live near the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles are still breathing very dirty air. We have to get them some relief and I continue to work towards that, but we've proven that it can work.

All the stuff we hope would work. Carly did work, you know, right? Cleaner cars, catalytic converters on cars, cleaner power plants, you know, all this stuff big and small that we. Stop using Perlo ethylene, no for dry cleaning, all that stuff. We tried it. It worked, and so we've proven that we can do it.

Banning CFCs worked. You know, the ozone hole is not the problem that it was in the [00:07:00] past. So we can do this. We just have to set about doing it and save what's left. There's a lot now that unfortunately has been lost. There's a lot of pollution in the pipeline. No matter what we do, there'll be continued loss, but let's save what remains.

Whatever we can. . 

[00:07:16] Carly: I love that message. And I heard you say this before too, and when I first became really genuinely interested in the environment and making a difference in Dove in, I had this naive sense that it was just my individual actions would cure everything. And not that I don't think those are important, but I am learning more and more about these, you know, these community level, this global level.

Political level and what can we do on a legislation level, like what things work on that level of change. 

[00:07:49] Ed Begley Jr.: I'm so glad you brought that up. I sometimes forget to mention that, and that's so important. My personal action has been satisfying to me and I feel like I've accomplished a lot. That's just one [00:08:00] third of what needs to be.

You know, and the important big ticket item, that is to say personal action, very important, good legislation. The clean air actors. How come we got to clean up the air in la? All that personal action helped, but the Clean Air Act gave us the cule, the weapon to enforce and clean up the power plants and the cars and everything, and also corporate responsibility and all three interti, if you're.

As a consumer wanting to buy more green stuff, the manufacturers are gonna make it. If there's good legislation, they'll be more inclined to do it. It'll make it easier for people to do the personal action. All these three columns upon which all clean air or clean water has been built, you know, were like the Cuyahoga River caught fire in 1969.

That doesn't happen anymore because of those three things. It was a clean water act. The air is better in la Clean Air Act, and corporations started to do things better, make cleaner cars, make cleaner power plants. They're all related, and you can't just focus on just legislation or just corporate responsibility or just personal action, all [00:09:00] three together, or you're not gonna get anything done.

[00:09:03] Carly: It's almost relieving when you realize that, because when I thought it was all on me, if I did anything wrong, I felt like I'd failed the planet and that wasn't sustainable. Remember, I had that feeling myself. I, I cried the first time I got a plastic straw after deciding I was an environmentalist and was like, that's not sustainable for long-term activism.

[00:09:26] Ed Begley Jr.: I, myself was, I labored under the delusion for years that all this plastic emotion was gonna be recycled. I knew there was some residents four, five, and six that were really hard to recycle and what have you, but no one through three man, we're taking care of that. Never really thinking. As you mentioned the straw, what number is on the straw?

There's no number in the straw. There's no room for it. Where you can't, it's not possible. Where does it go? It's just this, another piece of plastic that goes into the ocean gets caught in a, you know, a turtle's nose, for God's sake. [00:10:00] All this single use plastic is terrible. Yeah. And we thought it was all gonna be taken care of with recycling.

And that's not the case. A very low amount of. The single use plastic is actually recycled. It's a fairly low number we now learned and so we've gotta do a lot better. The best thing you know when you've got a tub that's overflowing and what have you, you wanna get mops, you wanna clean it up and get buckets and all that stuff, but the first thing you wanna do is turn off the tap.

If the tub is overflowing, turn off the water so it stops overflowing, and then you can get your, your bucket and your mops and what have you. And that's what we gotta do with single use plastic. Stop it all. Stuff like this, I suppose. This is a good use of plastic in glasses, fine. Something like that makes sense.

It's gonna be, you know, somewhat permanent, at least last a decade or something like it, for god's sake. Right. But just to get a cup of coffee or to get a straw, get a drink, there's no reason it has to be in a throwaway kind of a thing. It just, it's insane. So [00:11:00]

[00:11:00] Carly: there's been so many advancements that you've mentioned a few.

you've seen in your lifetime. Are there things that you can't believe we don't have yet, or that you can't believe haven't happened yet? Like maybe technology or legislation?

[00:11:18] Ed Begley Jr.: Yeah, I'm really surprised that there's not a greater push in places like Los Angeles, Phoenix, Tucson, all these places in the Southwest and everywhere, really, where they don't. Have a better program to capture rainwater, but certainly in Southern California, the desert communities, why are we capturing all the rainwater you conceivably could get?

You know, just goes into that concrete channel known as the LA River and goes out to the sea, and you could use that. We can meet at least half of our water needs in the LA and stop stealing it from the Colorado River and stop stealing it from Northern California. You know, and you know, we, we could do that.

We could save [00:12:00] a lot here at my house. As you might have heard, you know, I've got a 10,000 gallon rainwater tank and I've got a gray water system and everything that doesn't go in the graywater system to irrigate the trees or into the rainwater tank goes where it should go also, which is to percolate down into the soil a recharge aquifer.

So none of that is going, none of my going out in the street and winding up in that concrete channel. And that's something that's very possible and of the greatest urgency, cuz. Water is becoming every day, every week, every month, every year. A bigger problem in many parts of the country, and I live in one.

Why do you think 

[00:12:40] Carly: stuff like that doesn't exist yet? Is it money?

[00:12:45] Ed Begley Jr.: It's money and people are resistant to change. , you know, people and corporations and individuals are resistant to change. I know somebody said to me, Hey, I know you've always learned your lines this way. As an actor, you're gonna do, but now you gotta [00:13:00] buy a little tape recorder. You're gotta do with a tape recorder and you've gotta double up.

Had some new procedure for me, learning my line, that's not the way I've done it my whole life. I don't wanna, I don't like that. I've heard people do that in the tape recorder, but I would need to run it with my daughter and she helps me learn. No, you can't do that anymore. You gotta get a little tape. You.

People are resistant to change. It may not be better, but I hate change myself. But when you come up against a thing like climate change, when I came up the, with the real problems with the smog, when I was only 20 years old, I went, I'm gonna do something. This is crazy. You know, I'm gonna do what I can. And some people, sadly, are still so resistant to.

they're in denial about climate change. You know, they really don't think it's happening. They think it's a hoax, and that's been the most brutal weapon, one of the most brutal weapons we have today to just call everything a hoax. Yes. Climate change is a hoax, and I have intelligent people who've called me up or email me and asked questions.

Many of them friends of mine, I heard this is all [00:14:00] bullshit because of blah, blah, blah. I said, no, that's not true at all, and here's how you can verify what I'm saying is true. There's a thing out years ago. There's more pollution from a Toyota Prius than there's from a Hummer. They had a whole crazy thing where the batteries were made here and shipped there, and some of that was true when they first made the car.

There was all this shipping to get the technology right and what have you. Right? But they like assigned all the pollution from a nickel plant in Sudbury, Ontario, and Canada. To just making the batteries. It's also used to make stainless steel for most of the country, you know, and all this stuff. Mm-hmm.

and that plant was cleaned up 15 ye 20 years ago, so they just did all the kinda look right. Wow. The nickel from the nickel metal H batteries. Before they were lithium ion people just. They, it's as Al Gore rightly suggests it's an inconvenient truth. That really is inconvenient to believe this is true.

It'd be so much easier to just drive around on SUVs, knees. And keep the heat the [00:15:00] way we want it in the winter and the air conditioning on this summer, it'd be pretty groovy. But that's not the case. That's not the way it is. Right? We have to do something. Our legislators have to do something and the corporations have to do something.

And I'm talking about now for our survival. It's about our survival at this point. And 

[00:15:16] Carly: I wonder if you've been outspoken, you have been passionate about this since you were. In LA in your twenties, and you also have this unique position of being in Hollywood, and that juxtaposition seems really interesting to me.

What has it been like to be an environmental activist in that world? It's 

[00:15:36] Ed Begley Jr.: a great way to communicate things to people. If you have some sort of notoriety in sports and medicine and as a legislator, as an actor, as a singer, but with it comes responsibility. You don't want to just cry. Fire in a crowded theater.

Of course, you don't wanna right alarm people, so they do nothing. But if you're about to go on and do your song and dance in front of an audience, huh? And that fire marshal taps you on the [00:16:00] shoulder, ed, we have to act, evacuate slowly and calmly, row by row. But there's a fire smoldering in the basement, so uh, do anything right now.

But don't do it any entertainment. Just please go out. Would you then just do your song and dance? Of course not. The fire marshal told you there's a fire in the basement. You've gotta carefully, you don't wanna freak people out, but you have to get the movie in an orderly fashion, you know? Right to the exits.

And that's where we're at. The Fire Marshal is a union of Concerned Scientists. Michael Mann, James Hansen from nasa. Na, nasa. All these people have come to us over the, in 1987, James Hanson testified before Congress, you know, about the climate change and what it was gonna mean to us. and we chose to ignore the fire marshal.

So it's my responsibility to share that stuff, to make sure I get good information. I don't wanna just go out there and say, we're all gonna die tomorrow. And there's lasers stuff, you know, so they're trying to kill us. You know, you don't, you wanna have [00:17:00] your facts, right? Right. And then if you have the microphone, you know, here, let me tell you about this.

And, and that's responsibility and you must, uh, take it. , have you ever see, 

[00:17:14] Carly: felt any pushback or felt isolated for having this strong activist mind in that world in Hollywood? 

[00:17:25] Ed Begley Jr.: There was a story recently, a reporter asked me that same question and since she asked me about some of the times when, um, there was, uh, fear was harder to get work and that.

That happened in the nineties to me. But let me be clear, as I tried to be with this reporter, even though I, it was a factor that people were, uh, telling me they thought I was gonna take them to TASS or driving an SUV or to do something, they just were a little concerned about hiring me. I don't need anybody to throw any benefits for me.

I'm fine. I got through that period. My bills are [00:18:00] very low here with my solar house, and I grow a lot of my own food. I'm. You know, complaining to anybody, I would do it again in a minute. Right? But it was a thing where I, my name was never, I don't think on a list in a drawer somewhere, people that are blackballed in Hollywood.

I don't think it was ever as official as that. I just gave people the creeps cuz I thought I was gonna be mad at them for getting out of a limo at a fundraiser or something. So I th that happened according to my agents and managers. Back in the nineties, but it didn't last that long and I got through it.

I could go, I could work in television, I could go to Canada or Australia and do a movie. But I, I did work, you know, in Hollywood movies in the nineties. I did, uh, weeks work on Batman forever. Joel Schumacher gave me a nice job, and, uh, Bon Howard gave me six weeks in a movie called Greedy. Other than that, didn't do movies.

I freak people out. I think they were af afraid of it, or maybe they thought it was a hoax back then. I'm not sure what, but it was a [00:19:00] problem. But one easily weathered by me. My, as I said, my bills are low, so I don't have to worry much about, you know, working a certain amount. 

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Do you, do you think Ang in the last few decades 

[00:21:06] Ed Begley Jr.: It has, it has. By time, the nineties were over, new Millennium, realize that things were beginning to occur and now we can see They certainly are. You have. Wildfire after another. There's always been wildfires, of course, but there's worse. Wildfires are more frequent.

There's always been tornadoes, but there are more tornadoes now and stronger. So it's not really just global warming, it's global weirding. You have these incredible coal snaps and people say, like James in Hoff, there's a snowball in the house of Representative or in the Senate Chamber, I should say Saint See.

This is your climate change for global, a snowball across the Senate floor. I believe . Forgetting that if you got a refrigerator that you get, that you're trying to make cold inside, what is the, what happens to the [00:22:00] back of the refrigerator? It gets hot. You know, it's, it's all between one part of the globe being hotter, one part being cold, colder.

You know, there's agul and many other, the jet stream, many other winds and, and oaks that affect all that. . It could be, you know, Washington, DC where you throw the through the snowball, but that means it's warm somewhere else, you know? Right. There's a system and what he's talking about is weather. We're not talking about weather, we're talking about climate.

There're different things. The other one is a weather report, either the lo local or national where there's storms coming through and rain and, and dry periods. But climate is a different matter and the ocean is warming and the planet is warming. And at some point it's, we could become very problematic for not just us, but many other plant animal species.

And we're there, we're basically, it's starting to happen now in a very bad way. The 

[00:22:54] Carly: my guess I. Psychoanalyze. So my guess of that period of the nineties, I [00:23:00] wonder if people get nervous because that means they have to examine their own habits too. It's easier to to push them way because then they didn't have to think about it.

If you were someone who confronted them or they thought that you might be about the climate, we kind of versus that might make us have to deal sometimes.

[00:23:19] Ed Begley Jr.: Carly, I did it myself, but I really said it and I meant it back in the nineties when people would talk about, it's all. Climate change is baloney. I was pulling for them. I was kind of hoping Rush Limbaugh was right. Mm-hmm. , and I'm dead serious. Mm-hmm. , I'm about this. It's not about I was right. You were wrong.

How wonderful is that? I wanted to be wrong, but it turns out we were not wrong in talking about that. Right. You know, it was a real thing that has gotten further along, even quicker than we thought it was going to Greenland. You know, more and more ice is melting all the time. Antarctica. You know, we have problems with loss of ice in many, you know, glacier National [00:24:00] Park and the United States of America.

There's not a lot of glacier left there. I've been there myself, you know, receding for a while. So it's, it is simple, man, and we have to do something now to save what remains. So, one 

[00:24:16] Carly: way to lessen your impact is to think about your diet and are you vegan or vegetarian? 

[00:24:24] Ed Begley Jr.: I'm, I became a, I was a vegetarian in 1970.

I stopped eating meat. I haven't eaten it since, became a vegan in 92. Now, cuz of my age in certain medical things, I'm, I guess I'm mostly vegan or I guess you, I'm a vegan . I mostly vegan and, uh, shoot me now. It's, you know, uh, I up and I occasionally I stray. , but I'm mm-hmm. beef for chicken or anything like that, or lamb or veal or, I haven't had that since 1970.

And that was a 

[00:24:54] Carly: decision directly related to its impact on the climate and on the planet. [00:25:00]

[00:25:01] Ed Begley Jr.: And it was that, it was a compassion issue too. I saw the conditions in the slaughterhouse. I wanna do it for the climate, I wanna do it for, Animals and I wanna do it for myself. You know, it's, I believe it's gonna make me healthier if I stopped eating so much steak and so much spare rib and so much all that I was eating.

And, uh, I changed iron and I felt better. And I'm sure a animal, a lot of animals did too, cuz I wasn't consuming them in horrible conditions. Yeah. That. 

[00:25:31] Carly: Something I've talked about on this podcast a lot is that I really did go into veganism as looking at it for a diet, for health reasons, for selfish reasons, and then it was all the other dominoes fell as I learned, but it really just was, I think I'll feel better.

Right. And then it was Oh wow. And also, and 

[00:25:54] Ed Begley Jr.: Right. It's a good way to. Vegan dishes, and they're [00:26:00] loved by vegans and meat eaters alike. And the crowd pleasers, I occasionally entertain, and not everybody comes to my house for a party, is, uh, a vegan. So complained about the food, quite the contrary. They love it and they can't believe my cream of potato leak soup has no cream and no chicken stock and no beef stock and no nothing like that.

And it's, it's tasty. And when you think about. What do you do with this steak if you want it to be tasting? You put a lot of plant matter on it, plants on it, pepper, and you put a put on this kind of plants on it. Yeah. You same with the burger. You know you want lots of tomato and onion and relish and pickles.

Yeah. That's my favorite 

[00:26:40] Carly: party trick is serving people food they enjoy and telling them after that it's vegan . 

[00:26:47] Ed Begley Jr.: Right. I've done that quite a few times myself. , I heard 

[00:26:51] Carly: you say something in an interview that I really appreciated that when you started getting into, okay, what can I do to help this [00:27:00] climate crisis?

You didn't have the money to invest in solar panels or things like that. And when I was first looking into sustainability, it did feel like I maybe didn't have the capital or the investment power that I wanted. But you talked about all the things you could start with. Could you talk a little bit for people who are like,

Yeah, I wanna help, but I can't do all this expensive, big stuff.

[00:27:27] Ed Begley Jr.: Yeah. I people regularly who say, I can't afford a fancy electric car like you drive today, or the solar panels like you have in your roof. I go, I totally understand. Cause neither can I when I started. Right. It's an interesting li list of things that you can't afford to do, the things you can't do. That's an interesting list.

Hold onto that. Put that aside for a second. Now let's make up another. List of things that you can do. Can you buy an energy efficient light bulb? Can you buy an energy saving thermostat? Can you ride your bike of weather and fitness permit? Can it take public transportation if it's [00:28:00] available near you?

Home gardening, home composting, everything. I just become a vegan. All those things I just mentioned, they're all good for the environment. And what else are they? They're super cheap. They're gonna save you money, right? They're gonna put money in your pocket. There's another green at stake here. Not just the green of the environment, but the green of cash.

And you're gonna have more of it if you do those simple things. And then if you save money doing those things, and I promise you, you will, you can move up to a medium ticket item, buy a little solar oven, get a rain barrel if you have a play that put a rain barrel under the downspout, collect your rainwater, and pretty soon you're gonna afford to put solar on your roof.

You know, if you, uh, lucky enough though, you have a place, a good site for that, a good sun on your roof and you own your house, or he got a, a lamb into it. Because nowadays you don't even have to buy it like I did back in the late eighties. You don't have to buy solar. You can lease it for no money down.

Yeah. So you can, you wind up paying like 70, yeah. [00:29:00] $70 a month for the sole lease. But you save a hundred dollars a month on your bill, so you're putting 30 bucks a month in your pocket. You can point the solar so you spend any money on it like that idiot begley, you know, . I got it. I just signed a contract and so, uh, you know, today they're a lot cheaper.

[00:29:17] Carly: I love that. It's basically the idea of start where you are cuz it can be intimidating when you kind of dive heads into this issue and all of a sudden if, if those things are on your radar, it's overwhelming. It can feel like, well, the worldly on fire, what can I really do? So those, those kinds of starting where you are, I think can help with that.

Overwhelm and climate anxiety. Oh my gosh, look at this friend. 

[00:29:42] Ed Begley Jr.: This is my friend. My daughter Hayed and found this little angel at a tow yard. Her car, my daughter's car had been impounded and this little dog was there. We thought she was a black terrier. She was so covered in certain oil. Brought her home here.

My daughter brought her [00:30:00] home just to, to put her on, you know, the different bulletin boards of picture. So whoever owned her could find her and be reunited. There's no, she didn't have a chip or anything. No tag. So minutes that she met me, I must look like someone in her life. She just glommed onto me. She hasn't let me go since September 16th, my birthday.

This all happened on my birthday. Oh. So she wanted say hello? I thought I'd say hi to everybody. Funny what 

[00:30:24] Carly: sweetie. Hi, baby. 

[00:30:26] Ed Begley Jr.: She's, she's very happy here. I'm very happy. I imagine it's like 

[00:30:33] Carly: a, a bit of from her previous 

[00:30:35] Ed Begley Jr.: life. I think so. And I really, I'm just, I wish one could learn about a dog's past. I somehow would ever find out what happened to this dog or what the family, I have a feeling I

her the tow yard at the impound lot. So she loved my daughter right away, climbed onto her, but she went, moved aside. She made a beeline for me [00:31:00] and she hadn't let me go ever. I dunno what funny it's about, but I'm gonna just enjoy it. 

[00:31:05] Carly: Animals choose their people sometimes. They really do. Yeah, 

[00:31:09] Ed Begley Jr.: she did. 

[00:31:11] Carly: So I'm curious, what's your vision?

When you imagine a sustainable future that's possible, what is, what does that look like? What does a vision for a sustainable future look like? 

[00:31:24] Ed Begley Jr.: My vision for sustainable futures, that it's very inclusive. that it deals with a problem with environmental racism cuz all these worst incinerators and plating plants and, you know, chrome plating plants and all this dangerous stuff has this waste incinerators, you know, all of it, it's always in the poorest neighborhoods and so, mm-hmm.

we have to deal with that and make sure that people aren't, you know, we're cleaning things up here where I live in Studio City, then somewhere in another part of the south. Is being adversely affected in engraved [00:32:00] danger and health risk because of it. You know, it's wonderful. Recycled batteries, and we did, for years, there was an exide battery recycling plant, and I was always in favor of battery recycling.

But in this poor neighborhood, there was a tremendous amount of lead that escaped the environment and people were, their health was at great risk and they suffered great health. Health from. Recycling batteries. You know, you can't, you know, you wanna recycle and you wanna, you talk about you want electric cards, that's all good.

Now these were lead acid batteries. They're not like the lithium ion battery we, we have today. Those are, you know, lead dangerous and any of the other stuff you're talking about, right? But still, if you wanna do something good, you don't wanna have a, a very side effect occur. So to really, there's a real net environmental gain that you're doing things right and make sure that, uh, people in every part of.

Uh, treated fairly in your goal to make a sustainable future. It's a really, 

[00:32:56] Carly: really good reminder cuz I know I live in northern [00:33:00] Minnesota. I have so much privilege in the air, I breathe, the water I drink. I don't think about so many things that even other people in this country are thinking about. Uh, let 

[00:33:09] Ed Begley Jr.: the world, me too.

I'm, I'm very lucky, so I wanna use that good fortune to try to fix things in the every single part of the world. We can. I 

[00:33:20] Carly: couldn't agree more. And I know that you have a line of products, correct? You d you have a line of eco, is it cleaning products and home products? 

[00:33:34] Ed Begley Jr.: That's correct. Uh, you know, back in 19 70, 1 of the other things I did, I didn't mention, I stopped using.

you know, like AMS as a cleanser and Formula 4 0 9 as a cleaner, Windex and what have you. I just started using vinegar and water to clean my glass and I started using baking soda to clean the sink instead of comet. Mm-hmm. . And that was very cheap and it worked pretty good. But there's some stains that baking soda won't get up and some [00:34:00] other kinds of cleaning that vinegar won't exactly do.

So I thought one day I'd like to have a line of product. You know that were cleaned to every bit as good as Formula 4 0 9, a Windex or Comet, you know, but just didn't environment right. And so I found that I've got this great guy, Mark Cunningham, with Lab Clean. He had some great formulas he came to and asked me to help him promote these cleaning products.

And I've been working with him for a while. There's a great, uh, odor and stain remover for pets. We've got lots of different products that clean every part of your house and kitchen, and so. It's very important with our pets and our kids. Think about it for a second. Our dogs and cats are on the floor putting their paws in their mouth all the time.

You don't wanna have something dirty that they're putting in their mouth, something contaminated, I should say. Same with our babies. They're crawling around putting their toes and their fingers in their mouth. So you wanna have, you know, you wanna have a clean environment. Most people like me will be out there protesting a hazardous [00:35:00] waste, you know, in their neighborhood, a hazardous waste site.

but the worst hazard wayside is not near your home. It's in your home. It's under your sink. Get rid of that stuff and start. Start using this cleaner. We have some good products. The Begley's Earth responsible products. Just go to Amazon or any search engine, just go Begley cleaning and it'll come up. But there's other good ones out there too.

Seventh Generation has good one, good ones, ECOS. There's other companies out there doing it. It's not just about my products. They're fine. But try some green product today. They're all very, very good. I just mentioned a good and so is ours. And, uh, clean up your kitchen and clean up your home in a way that's not gonna harm yourself or your family.

I 

[00:35:43] Carly: think it's such an undervalued toxicity in our house. The, the detergent, the fabric softeners, the cleaners, the, the, that stuff is toxic. 

[00:35:58] Ed Begley Jr.: It is a lot of stuff [00:36:00] you just don't need. I mean, like what? He started to whole cottage industry based on the scourge of static clinging . You have to put a machine or something in your dryers know.

It's like nothing I laid awake, worrying about when I was in my twenties or whenever they started making those stupid sheets, you know, oh my God, what can we do about this national nightmare? You know? Yeah. I 

[00:36:22] Carly: mean, handed to the marketing team, right. 

[00:36:24] Ed Begley Jr.: their part, you know, as far as selling a product, but there's a lot of stuff we don't need.

You know, I think I can eliminate toxics and I'm not gonna worry about having a dandelion free lawn, you know, by using, you know, some toxic material. Uh, you know, I, without, you know, my bicycle, public transportation, even if I didn't have the electric car, you know, there's ways to get around, uh, doing it.

There's ways. Clean up the environment in, in different ways that save money and, you know, protect the many plant animal species that we need to keep the [00:37:00] web of life going here. Uh, done. And we, we need together. . 

[00:37:05] Carly: I really, really appreciate that message. I have to say one more thing I roll that people talk about with you often, but as soon as I got the email from your agent, I was like, ed Begley Jr.

The dad from Page Master. So I just wanted you to know that that movie was so important to me that you have done amazing things that I've also seen you in. But that's my first reference every time. 

[00:37:33] Ed Begley Jr.: Thank you. I love that movie. It's about reading, it's about libraries. It's about all kinds of good stuff.

So I'm very proud to be in that. So you made my day mentioning that, Carly. 

[00:37:43] Carly: Oh, thank you. I think I wore out the v h S of that movie actually. . 

[00:37:49] Ed Begley Jr.: That's great. That's wonderful. I'm glad to hear that. That's very good. 

[00:37:53] Carly: Is there anything else that you wanted to share with my listeners that I haven't given you space 

[00:37:58] Ed Begley Jr.: to?[00:38:00]

No, we've talked about the more important things you've brought. It can do this, you know, in ways that we can do it. I think we all need to live simply so that others can simply live. 

[00:38:11] Carly: Thank you, ed. This was really the most amazing experience. 

[00:38:15] Ed Begley Jr.: Likewise, Carly, thank you. Thank you. 

[00:38:20] Carly: Thanks for listening to another episode of Consciously Clueless.

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