7 simple products that cut your energy usage

Saving is a loaded word. It usually involves sacrifice of time, money, or style.

But if you can save without giving up any of these, then saving becomes an agreeable activity.

Yahoo! has published an agreeable list of 7 simple products that save energy -- hence money -- but don't require you to alter your lifestyle in any major way. Not even for the indoor clothes drying racks (#2), which you might think would look odd in your laundry room. You'll get used to them in no time.

The 7 products are:

1. Power strip, which you can turn off so your devices don't consume vampire energy
2. Indoor clothes drying rack, to give your dryer a rest from guzzling all that power
3. Efficient showerheads and faucets, which drench you just as much and as fast as conventional ones
4. Compact fluorescent light bulbs, which will serve you well if you buy and use them as recommended by the Environmental Defense Fund
5. Programmable thermostat, so you can turn the heat on before you wake up in the morning
6. Water heater blanket, because without it, you're just heating your utility closet
7. Sealant for those tiny leaks around the house, because just like you don't want to heat the utility closet, you don't want to heat the outdoors.