You’ve heard the green mantra: REduce, REuse, REcycle. Implement all of those actions in the order listed and our landfills will get RElief. I’d always assumed that medical items follow a different set of rules; modern medical practices dictate use once, eliminate the possibility of infection.
There’s an exception to every rule, and it turns out that some kinds of medical items can and should be reused. Those crutches you used for three weeks? Someone else your height can use them. Canes, wheelchairs, walkers, hospital beds, etc. are all candidates for recycling. A non-profit company called Home Cares in San Rafael, CA collects and redistributes medical equipment for free to people in need. They accept surplus medical equipment from both individuals and heath-care agencies. Their efforts keep reusable medical equipment out of the landfill while helping people with heath issues.
For more information about Home Cares, read the newspaper article here:
http://www.marinij.com/lifestyles/ci_8292384
To contact Home Cares, call 415.388-8198
The Lesson of Kitty Litter
BUY IN BULK. I’ve seen that suggestion so many times in lists of how to live a green lifestyle. I just didn’t “get it” until recently. I tried (unsuccessfully) to imagine how buying large packages at the big box stores would reduce packaging waste. The only waste reduction I could think of is fewer lids to throw away. The problem isn’t that the suggestion is faulty; I had to adjust my thinking.
Here’s how the suggestion ought to be phrased:
Buy Products Using Refillable Containers
Now THAT is something I can understand.
Six years ago we adopted a kitten. Our local animal shelter is very protective of its charges, and instructs adoptive families to keep pink-nosed kitties indoors lest they develop skin cancer. So we promised to do so, not fully understanding that our kitten would grow into a cat who had no intention of being housebound. But during her period of incarceration, we tried several brands of kitty litter. We settled on the Petco brand because it works, smell-wise. The stores have big tubs of kitty litter and funnels, so if you bring in your container you can fill it up for a discount. I don’t know the relative “green” merits of different brands of kitty litter, but Petco’s bin makes sense from a reduced packaging waste perspective.
Recently I wanted to get some nuts and discovered that they’re cheapest at the local health food store (go figure!). They’re in bins; just scoop ’em into the provided bags. OR, as the sign suggests, bring in your own containers (which the store will weigh while still empty). They sell nuts, flour, rice, oatmeal, cereal, dried fruits, pancake mix, cookies…all sorts of things that one would ordinarily purchase in a disposable package.
Ah ha! Now I understand the exhortation of “BUY IN BULK”. It just took some kitty litter and nuts to figure it out.
The Prius has been on the market in the United States for about 8 years now. It wasn’t until this year that I saw someone smoking while driving a Prius — not just one person — but three different people!
WHAT?? Isn’t that kinda like ripping the seatbelts out of a Volvo? After all, isn’t the point of owning a Prius, a PZEV (partial zero emissions vehicle), to reduce air pollution as well as gas consumption?
On reflection, I realize that we’re all doing what we can in our own way to help the environment. Though these people create polluting cigarette smoke, perhaps they more than offset it by driving a vehicle with low tailpipe emissions. It’s probably most realistic to expect people to gradually adopt “green” habits. A hybrid vehicle on the way to a green lifestyle is a perfect metaphor — it’s about the journey.
Our grapevines produce amazingly delicious sweet table grapes. The thing is I can only eat so many grapes in a day, especially when other fruits are simultaneously at their peak of productivity. So we tried a few “alternative” ways to consume them.
We tried grape juice first, but it looked icky and nobody drank it. Then we tried jam, which was delicious, but it used up only a few of the grapes. This year, I tried raisins and from now on, that’s what I’ll do with the extra grapes.
It’s really easy to make homemade raisins and as my son said, “They taste like they’re supposed to.” High praise from a teen! Commercial grape growers put grapes on insecticide-permeated white paper between rows of vines and let the sun do its thing. I decided to “green-ify” their method. I put the grapes on white freezer paper and covered them with cheesecloth to keep the insects away. Both the freezer paper and cheesecloth are reusable. My only challenge was finding a suitable place for drying.
It turns out the roof is the ideal spot for grape drying — lots of sun, and away from foraging animals. Our dog loves both grapes and raisins, but they’re not good for him. The chickens adore grapes, but we don’t want to give them an unlimited supply. Sorry, animals, we like ’em too!
Just about everyone I know is becoming more aware of the journey our food takes before it reaches our plates, and the disadvantages associated that travel: loss of flavor, loss of nutrition, excess consumption of gas.
Here’s how to tell if your food has traveled too far:
10. When your food looks tired from jet lag.
9. When your food has undergone so much reconstructive surgery you no longer recognize what it originally was.
8. When your food is wearing pesticide that’s no longer fashionable in your area.
7. When your food is sealed tighter than Fort Knox.
6. When your food shows up wearing flip-flops and it’s snowing outside.
5. When your food has a food entourage that can’t possibly all have been from the same neighborhood.
4. When your food has a maxed out gas credit card.
3. When your food went to the food-additive tanning booth to look attractive for you.
2. When your food knows more answers than you do in the geography section of Trivial Pursuit.
1. When your food’s passport has been stamped more times than yours.
For those of us who don’t live and shop in San Francisco we’re still offered plastic bags when we shop. Let me correct that. Often the checker doesn’t offer a bag — s/he presumes to put my merchandise in a bag without even asking. Then I have to make a big fuss about taking the merchandise out of the bag I didn’t want in the first place.
My plastic bag aversion is obvious if I manage to show up at the checkstand with my reusable bag, but I don’t always remember to bring it. Sometimes I choose not to bring it because I’m not going to buy a lot of items anyway.
If I can carry it to the counter in my arms, I can carry it away from the store the same way! Please, if you’re like me and forget to bring (or choose not to bring) a reusable bag when you go shopping, don’t accept the plastic bag.
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