Yikes. This is not why I left my ring on the bathroom shelf this morning:

It’s over. Now, what will you do with that ring? What did you do with your wedding ring or engagement ring once you finally broke up for good? Share you story with our readers. E-mail your story, in 100 words or less, to living@tennessean.com. Please put ‘ring’ in the subject line, and include your name, hometown and daytime phone number.

Maybe Ms. Lopez did not want her class ring back after all.

Well, more accurately, the bulbs are on the way out Down Under. After meeting with mayoral candidate David Briley, who is advocating for a greener city government, yesterday, I think this might be a noble goal to add to Nashville’s future to-do list:

While some US cities like Raleigh are already planning steps to cut back on energy wastes by converting to more efficient lighting systems, it looks like the entire continent of Australia could be following suit. Claiming to be the “world’s first” national government to phase out incandescent light bulbs in favor of the more “fuel-efficient, compact fluorescent bulb,” environment minister Malcolm Turnbull is hoping to “cut Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions by four million metric tonnes a year by 2015.” Citing the “climate changes” the world is facing as a “global challenge,” Turnbell also urged other nations to follow suit in making a difference, but didn’t exactly open up his personal wallet to stock our households with those uber-pricey bulbs. Interestingly, some environmentalists feel that the bulk of greenhouse gas emissions come from government and business-related activities, which should presumably take priority over swapping out a country’s light bulbs.

I also found it interesting that the article makes the point about governments needing to lower their greenhouse gas emissions because Briley, as Kleinheider pointed out yesterday, make the point that governments are often behind the private sector these days when it comes to environmentally friendly practices. (By the way, there are much cheaper options for green bulbs out there than the $65 LED versions Engagdet mentions above.)

Is this a bad time to mention that I left my wedding ring on a shelf in my bathroom this morning? It’s been bugging me because I can feel it “missing,” but now I’m especially interested in returning it to my finger ASAP after reading this amazing CNN story:

A college ring lost more than 20 years ago by a former undercover officer for the CIA has been found in an underwater cave off the coast of Africa. Steve Ruic, a writer on staff at Notre Dame College [in Ohio], received an e-mail about two weeks ago from a professional diver from Germany. Wilfried Thiesen wrote that he had found a class ring bearing the college’s name while diving off Mauritius.

The ring was engraved with the year ‘76. The ring was missing the thin portion on the underside that ordinarily carries its owner’s name. Ruic publicized the discovery in both an e-mail to college staff and a newsletter to alumni, but no one came forward to claim it. Then, while interviewing a member of the class of 1976 for an unrelated alumni magazine story, Ruic asked Dr. Maryellen Amato Stratmann if she’d ever been to Mauritius.

“I couldn’t believe it,” Ruic said. “She said, ‘No, but Clare Cavoli Lopez has.”‘

Sure enough, it turned out to be Ms. Lopez’ long-lost ring. I experienced a more believable, less astounding version of this story while I was in college. I discovered while home here in Nashville one summer that my missing high school ring had been found in a softball glove at my church gym. I’d borrowed a glove from someone the summer after I graduated in 1991 and left the ring inside accidentally. Nearly four years later, the ring turned up. I can’t claim that any strangers tracked me down, and the ring barely crossed Davidson County, much less an ocean, but I was still pretty amazed to find it.

When it comes to my wedding ring, I’m likely to be in sight of my bathroom shelf a little sooner than my next (and first) trip to Mauritius, but I’ll still be heading straight there after work. Gulp. [Image: AP via CNN.com]