Having had a minute to think about it, I wonder if some of the perceived smugness isn't what a friend of mine calls "Michael Pollan Syndrome"? The idea that everyone lives an upper-middle class lifestyle in a part of the country with year-round local produce, public transport and curbside recycling?
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Posted 1 year ago #
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@lucy - thank you for the info! I will try that out and hope that at least some of the garbage mail gets taken care of. I hate the waste!
Posted 1 year ago # -
@irishbell....i bought my irish linen napkins on ebay, and we just use them as napkins.
i vote for using your mum's linen! linen is such a utility object....it is produced with no other purpose in mind, than to be used.
if it is beautiful linen, then i think it should be used and enjoyed....rather than stashed away in a drawer for all eternity.
and if some of it gets stained or torn, well that is what happens in life sometimes.Posted 1 year ago # -
@lucy1965...i love the idea of "michael pollan syndrome".
it's true, we can all get a bit bogged down in our own viewpoint at times.
i know i do.
that is why i value travel so highly.
there is no better way (for me) to get a sharp jolt of other people's reality than to see it and experience it up close.Posted 1 year ago # -
I was at Costco yesterday (a big warehouse-type store) and I kept thinking about the no-waste family as I walked past the over-packaged groceries and supplies.
Is it worth saving money on razor blades if they come in a big, non-recyclable plastic package? At my local store they are slightly more expensive per blade, but come in a small cardboard box, and I can buy four at a time instead of 16.
At Costco I had to buy two lotion bottles at time (I only need one right now) and they were attached together with plastic wrap (non-recyclable) and had a large paperboard tag (recyclable, but totally unnecessary). Not only did I get extra packaging, but now I have to store the extra bottle until I need it.
I'm nowhere near ready to have a zero-waste home, but that article and blog are making me think about the waste that comes into my home.Posted 1 year ago # -
I have sat down a few times and done Catalog Choice for that week's crop of junkmail. It's tedious, partly because you can't just do it by address - so if (for example) a catalog is sending us FOUR copies, one to me, one to my middle name, one to my mom at this address, and one to "occupant" or "Rosa Family", I have to enter them each individually.+++++
Posted 1 year ago # -
stlmom, you ask: Is it worth saving money on razor blades if they come in a big, non-recyclable plastic package?
my thoughts, such as they are:
when we can buy big bunches of plastic stuff cheaply, we aren't really paying the full price for those items.
the cost on the environment to create and ship those items, then to deal with the inevitable waste, is just outsourced to the planet.
we don't pay the true cost of all that at the checkout at all.
and that is why most people really cannot grasp what is going on.
it is because they personally aren't being hit with the real price of things, right there at the checkout.
if the price of a plastic bucket included the cost of it's eventual recycling and it's toll on the environment, you bet people would buy a metal bucket and treasure it all their lives, instead!Posted 1 year ago # -
Bandicoot, you are so right. There are costs that we don't see on the price tag. I think I'm a little frustrated because I thought I was doing pretty well, environmentally. I use energy-efficient bulbs, I mostly use rags instead of paper towels, and I usually remember to bring my reusable bags to the grocery store. But reading about that zero-waste home made me realize that I'm still at least half-filling the big garbage can each week, and we nearly fill the big recycling bin as well.
I think clutter and waste often go together, so I'm going to try and work on both at the same time.Posted 1 year ago # -
Bandicoot, I've been thinking along the lines of what you mentioned: "if the price of a plastic bucket included the cost of it's eventual recycling and it's toll on the environment, you bet people would buy a metal bucket and treasure it all their lives, instead!"
Watching a tv commercial for a high end, all the bells and whistles car the other night, I started to ponder.
What if, instead of the beautiful and flashy background of open skies and wild country in the ad, there were mountains of raw rock, to show how much metal needs to be mined to make one car? And a barrel of crude oil, to show how much petroleum is used to make the plastic components/paint/upholstery? And maybe it could be shot on mountainside covered with tailings from the mines, or in front of a pond that's bright yellow from heavy metal run off?
Ahh, reality tv! It will never happen.Posted 1 year ago # -
STLMom, i'm with you - clutter and waste go together, and getting rid of the clutter makes it easier to reduce waste.
That said...there's no such thing as zero waste, in this world. I did an internship on a communal farm, and even there they had a dump pit. It wasn't very big, but there are products of this modern world - polyester clothing, once it's too worn to wear, doesn't make good rags - that come into your life willy-nilly, and are never really going to go "away".
Posted 1 year ago # -
i don't believe there is any such thing as zero waste either.
unless one is living in a cave, wearing animal skins, picking wild berries for food, then there is going to be waste.
one can set it up so that one doesn't personally see the waste leaving one's own home....but it is going to be there somewhere.
we all leave a footprint, it's part of the human gig.
we can minimise it enormously...but we cannot eliminate it.
so, i snort a bit at the idea of zero-waste.Posted 1 year ago # -
@STL Mom -- good point re: buying bulk vs. buying small quantities. However, another thing to remember is that just because something isn't wrapped in plastic on a shelf at your local store doesn't mean it was never wrapped that way to begin with. Lots of items come to stores in large shrink-wrapped pallets, but that packaging is obviously removed when shelves are stocked.
I'm not saying this to discourage buying small quantities rather than buying bulk, just saying waste reduction at the consumer level isn't the whole story. Like bandicoot, I'm skeptical of the idea of zero waste.
Posted 1 year ago #
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