So where do I go from here?

The more I see how my "American way of life" is subsidized by other people's suffering, the more I am offended by the way things are. I know I can't change the world, I can't even change another person, but I can change me. I am not obligated to participate in causing another persons suffering though my actions...or purchases. Even if it is the accepted norm.

I ran across another blog quite by accident, about a week ago or so, which summarized exactly how I have been feeling for the last few months. I have reprinted one of the posts here, in it's entirety, because it's so well written and I didn't feel a small excerpt would have the same impact. I reprint it here with the authors permission. I have also given the link below in case you want to read the rest of his blog. Most of his blog is not about resource conservation, but it is some really good stuff about life and living compassionately. I recommend it as a must read. Be warned though, it is very powerful and quite an emotional read. Here is the excerpt I promised from Weblog "Spirit Poor".

------------------------

Think about the drink

I washed my hair by a mountain stream once. We were backpacking for an entire week and I stunk. So I took an impromptu bath, rinsed my hair in the stream, and watched the bubbles drift downriver.
Didn't give much thought to the hikers who would be collecting water from that same stream down below.
We live our lives with that same thoughtlessness. "I can live any way I darn well please. To hell with the rest of you."
We wouldn't say that out loud, or maybe even think it. But it's how we live.
It's what we do when we buy clothes made in third-world countries at the expense of someone else's near-slave labor.
It's what we do when we sip rich coffee grown and harvested by the sweat of people who will see almost no income for their efforts.
It's what we do when we buy products that can't be easily recycled. When we carry them home in plastic bags. When we toss away the glossy packaging and eventually the item itself with its non-degrading plastic and toxic chemicals.
It's what we do when we treat the waitress that way. Or the co-worker. Former friend. Husband. Wife. Child.
What's your trickle down? What are you dumping in the river for others to drink? What lives are impacted by your actions? Take a long, hard look downstream.

Spirit Poor: Think About the Drink

------------------------------

I am aware that sometimes my blog or comments probably sound like I have jumped up on a high horse and don't know how to get off. It's really not that way exactly. At least I hope not. I do have a bone dry sense of humor that is sometimes missed or misunderstood and that often gets me in trouble. I also tend to rant about things that are really just hitting me square between the eyes and I would like to change in myself. I am truly a novice when it comes to using resources correctly so I give myself challenges and put my thoughts out there in cyberspace so I have a higher standard to live up to. But in the end, I do believe I have still missed the mark a bit.

So back to my original question, "Where do I go from here?"

I have reasonably determined that if I stay mindful of what is leaving me in the form of trash, garbage, refuse, water, wasted food, hydrocarbons, methane?, recyclables--and anything else I might have forgotten in the list-- then I will be making headway. However, having given this careful thought, I don't think it is enough to just think about my waste stream. I also must think about where what I acquire comes from.

As I look around my house I find things that most likely were made by another man's poorly compensated sweat in a third world country. There are other things too that used an extreme amount of resources to produce or probably created a great amount of pollution in their manufacture. When I buy these goods, do I not perpetuate suffering or extreme pollution and also share in the blame?

There is a hidden price for cheap goods that someone else pays instead of me. I can only live cheaply because the cost to produce my goods is kept low by cheating someone else out of the right to pursue happiness. Is that fair? I have the right to pursue happiness but those in "developing" countries don't? That's arrogant and piggish and I don't want to be that way.

I plan on being more mindful of what I purchase. I am with No Impact Man on buying used but that is not always possible so here are some points I am going to consider on every new purchase. I am sure I will revisit this list later and add to it, but this is the list for now.

1. In which country was this product made?
2. Were the persons that manufactured or assembled it paid a decent wage, and did they work decent hours? Is there a chance they were kept locked in their place of employment for long hours with no breaks? Were they forbidden to use the restroom for long periods? Is it Fair Trade?
3. How far did this product have to travel to reach me? How much oil was consumed in it's manufacture and shipment?
4. What air /water /soil pollution occurred when this product was made?
5. How many tons of resources did it actually take to manufacture any metals in the product?
6. Did anyone die to extract the resources necessary to manufacture the product?
7. How much plastic is in the product? If there is plastic, is it recyclable or will it end up in the landfill?
8. Is the packaging excessive? Can the packaging be recycled or will it just end up in the landfill?
9. How long will this product last? Can it be renewed or repaired? Is it manufactured specifically to be disposable?
10. Do I really NEED it, or do I just WANT it?
11. Does my use of this product create any additional pollution?
12. When I am through with this product will it be difficult or impossible to dispose of?
13. How long will it take for this product to decompose? Will it ever decompose?
14. Will this product harm me, or those around me?
15. Can this product be purchased from a local manufacturer instead of an importer?

Whoa, that's a big list, you might be saying. Well, it should be. I would call it mindful consumption rather than impulsive and it is what I should be practicing. If it takes me a few days or hours to determine if I should buy something...that's good! Stores are set up for impulse purchases. If I must run myself through a checklist before I purchase, I will be less prone to buy on impulse. And I do love to buy on impulse. It makes me downright giddy. Until I leave the store. Then it just makes me less rich.

Peace.

Eating Local

Here is an excellent video that clearly spells out the need to eat local. Following the video is a link to find a CSA in your area. This link has every CSA and farmers market which belongs to "Local Harvest" but there may be other small CSA's or markets in your area as well that are not members. Your community may have a CSA organization that has a list of more.

LOCAL HARVEST

Eating locally for me is one of the biggest challenges I face and is is going to require a major shift in the way my life is organized. That is coming soon. I was once a member of a CSA but they only delivered produce in the summer and I wasn't fully satisfied with the produce they provided. Very little variety and not as fresh as I would have expected. But when I get settled in my new place I may give this a try again. Suggestions are always welcome.

The Big Question

This is a good video I ran across. It tends to be a little overly simplistic but it does get the gray matter turning just a bit.

clipped from www.youtube.com

Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness

Today I split from my normal dialogue, and occasional diatribe, on sustainability, consumerism, pollution and the like because August is officially "Happiness Happens" month. So be happy, it's the law...well sort of.

The constitution promises you 1) life---well if you woke up this morning and you are still breathing you got that one nailed, 2)liberty--uh that one is under attack a little and we just won't go there right now, and 3) the pursuit of happiness---hey, it's the pursuit you're promised, not happiness so, get over it.

Anyway, if you live in one of the states shown below, then back in 1999 your governor declared August officially "Happiness Happens" month. So if you live in one of these states you must be happy. It has been officially decreed. The rest of the states couldn't decide if they were happy or not and you citizens of those states will just have to do the best you can. Maybe go see a good movie or something. We'll think happy thoughts about you from time to time and hold out hope for you next year.

Oh, I should also mention that the governor of Texas was happy back in 1999 but I am not sure whether he is happy right now or not. He didn't take my phone call so I wasn't able to find out.

Happy States and the responsible Governor

Alabama - Don Seigelman
Connecticut - John G. Rowland
Idaho - Dirk Kempthorne
Indiana - Frank O'Bannon
Iowa - Tom Vilsack
Maryland - Parris N. Glendening
Massachusetts - Areo Paul Cellucci
Nebraska - Mike Johanns
Nevada - Kenny C. Guinn
New Hampshire - Jeanne Shaheen
New Jersey - Christine T. Whitman
North Carolina - James B. Hunt, Jr.
Oregon - John A. Kitzhaber
Rhode Island - Lincoln Almond
Texas - George W. Bush
Vermont - Howard Dean, M.D.
Washington - Gary Locke
West Virginia - Cecil H. Underwood
Wisconsin - Tommy G. Thompson

Well, I guess I have to tie this into the theme of my blog somehow so, here goes. Here is your project for the month to achieve more sustainable happiness. (Phew, got the tie in accomplished.)

1. Smile at at least ten people you don't know and give them a genuine warm hello this month.

2. Clean out at least one messy closet, cupboard or drawer and give the stuff you don't NEED away. Notice I said NEED not WANT. Meditate on the difference if you must. It has been a hard lesson for me to learn too and I understand completely.

3. Pledge to give away at least twenty one-dollar bills to persons less fortunate than yourself this month. They're all around if you pay attention and a dollar or so means a lot to them. Don't be judgmental, just give it freely and without strings. If you really want to be happy, give them a five.

4. Forgive someone that does not deserve forgiveness. Trust me, that really makes you happy inside.

5. And lastly, do something fun and quit working so hard. When you die, your in box will still be full. Then what are you going to do? Don't worry, be happy.

One last thought. I have been thinking a lot lately about "time pollution". We are all in such a hurry now that our concept of time has been polluted. As a result we are no longer cordial to one another. Society tells us we are expected to go fast. Fast food, fast cars, instant soup, quickie car washes, minute rice, express lanes... (Have you noticed I like lists?) Anyway we get mad at our

"Oh, look at the time, gotta run, I have another blog to attend to. Sorry, we'll do lunch someday. Ciao"

Walk a little!

Here is a link to determine how walkable your neighborhood is. I gave it a test and plugged in my current address and came up with a score of 51. I am moving to a location which is much more walkable and came up with a score of 43. So, accuracy may not be perfect. However, I did look up Bill Gates and he has a score of 5, so there!

No, in reality this works pretty well and uses Google Maps. If anything it will identify walkable landmarks in your neighborhood or provide at lest a few minutes entertainment in the middle of your day. So, give at a try.

Walk Score - How walkable is your house?

Powered by ScribeFire.

Pardon me, I have gas

I come across an article recently  in the Oregonian reporting that the Federal Government uses 7 million, let me repeat that,  7 million gallons of fuel EVERY SINGLE DAY.  Just to fill up one B-52 bomber costs us, the taxpayer, over $100,000.  The tank on this baby holds 48,000 gallons and lasts for about one normal flight.  I did a quick calculation and that is nearly the amount of petroleum I will use in my car in a lifetime.    

When an F-16 fighter jet takes off, it spews $300.00 worth of fuel out the back end in the first one minute of flight.  An army Abrams tank gets just one mile per gallon at a cost to the government (ummm...that's really  us paying this) of about $2.00 per gallon.  Plus, there are ships in the water, transport trucks all over the world, generators, helicopters, other types of aircraft, well I guess there is a pretty big list.   All in all, the government spends 7.1 BILLION dollars on fuel every year. That is a lot of fuel. 

I work hard at reducing my mileage and fuel consumption.  I'm even moving so my car can stay parked most of the time. I have already cut my fuel bill in half and by September I should have that cut in half again.   I hope someday to have it to nearly zero.

I  have committed myself to not being blatantly political in this blog so I am not going to call on people to write their elected representatives asking that the federal government conserve fuel.  However, when I read this article I realized there is a very good reason the government has not been promoting  we all conserve fuel.    It would make them look like a hypocrite. 

I have no intent to go back to my wasteful ways just  because they waste and it "wouldn't make a difference anyhow."  It will make a difference.  It may be smaller than taking one B-52 or F-16 out of the sky but it will make a difference and I will realize an instant reward in my pocketbook as well.    And with gas headed who knows where that is a good incentive to me. Keep an eye on the ticker down there to the left if you want to keep up on the price of gas.  If you commit yourself to using very little of the stuff, it is no longer an aggravation...it's just a number.

The World Clock

Yesterday I added a really cool feature called "The World Clock". Using official sources such as the CIA Factbook, census bureau, and the like it keeps a tally of pretty much everything. Births, deaths, oil produced, cars produced, how people died, species extinct, the list goes on. The clock can be found at the bottom of this page.

The clock has a few radio buttons on top that allow you to change the readout to year, month, week, day, or now. If you click "now" everything starts counting up from the moment you clicked.

Spend a little time playing around with it. Watching the numbers tick by can really give you a lot of insight on the health of our world. Just one thought I had is the fact that terror inundates our news but if you watch watch the death ticker on the bottom of the clock, it is cardiovascular disease that is the real terror since it is nearly totally preventable with a proper diet. But that is a subject for a different blog entirely.

p.s. I have also cleaned up my act a little on this blog and added labels to my posts. They are over there to your left and down just a little. That should make it easier if you want to come back and search for buried treasure...or perhaps toilet paper.

Fake Plastic Fish: Plastic is made from oil. You knew that, right?

I have no official post today but the report Fake Plastic Fish has is so compelling I simply want to share the link. If you have a spare fifteen minutes right now pop on over to her blog and take a look. Be sure to watch the video.

Fake Plastic Fish: Plastic is made from oil. You knew that, right?

Ways to conserve

Packing up for a move has been a little hectic so I haven't really had much time for the usual reading and research I do. I am a bit polyphasic and a compulsive reader so this has been a bit of a withdrawal week for me. Lacking proper research time I thought I would just list seven of my own personal ideas on ways to conserve. You may want to adopt a few yourself.

1. Energy Conservation--There are many ways to conserve energy. One of the best is to move into a single level home. Stairs consume a great deal of energy and can be quite a drain on the system. Another is to buy an all in one multi-function remote control. I know I expend a great deal of energy every day just looking for the right remote especially when it slips into the crack of my lazy boy. What with a VCR, DVD, TV, CD and HD system finding the right remote can be very confusing and energy expending. And those multi-functions are about the size of a laptop so losing them is much more difficult. Having a spouse who loves to cook and clean can also help you save a lot of energy too.

2. Water Conservation--There are several solutions but the best option is just to skip the water and drink beer. Microbrew is the way to go. I've heard the big brewery stuff is pretty watered down and that kind of defeats the whole water conservation thing, don't you think.

3. Buy Less Stuff--This is an easy one. Shoplifting. If you do this right you would never have to buy anything ever again. It is difficult with big screen TV's but just take along your teenage son with the large pants.

4. Gas conservation--Eat less beans.

5. Fuel conservation--You could carpool or take the bus but then you have to put up with strangers. It is a known fact that drafting; driving so close to the vehicle in front you eliminate the wind drag; saves a ton of fuel. Your best option is to follow something large like a city bus. You need to be about six inches off the bus bumper for maximum effect. It may take longer to get where you are going since you have to pull to the curb quite often but at least you can listen to Pink Floyd "The Wall" on your own car stereo instead of having to use earphones on the bus. In your car you can crank up the volume and share your music with the rest of the world. Then you don't look quite as silly bobbing your head to the music when everyone can hear your one-hundred and twenty decibels of sound. One note though, if you already tailgate this may not be as effective.

6. Use less plastic--Just pay cash.

7. Use less paper--Well okay I had to at least do a little research on this one. I am compulsive after all. Here is just a few rather unique ways of using less paper from around the world as listed on www.toiletpaperworld.com .

*Hayballs, Scraper/gompf stick kept in container by the privy in the Middle Ages

*Discarded sheep's wool in the Viking Age, England

*Frayed end of an old anchor cable was used by sailing crews from Spain and Portugal *Medieval Europe- Straw, hay, grass, gompf stick

*Corn cobs, mussel shell, leaves and sand- United States
*Water and your left hand, India

*Coconut shells in early Hawaii

*Lace was used by French Royalty

*Public Restrooms in Ancient Rome- A sponge soaked in salt water, on the end of a stick

*The Wealthy in Ancient Rome-Wool and Rosewater

*French Royalty-lace, hemp

*Hemp & wool were used by the elite citizens of the world

*Defecating in the river was very common internationally

*Bidet, France

*Snow and Tundra Moss were used by early Eskimos

Thanks for listening. One can't always be serious. Have a happy weekend!

Am I just a fuddy-duddy?

As I post my blog and comment on other blogs like No Impact Man, some have stated that perhaps I and many others like me are just against progress and should lighten up a little. They are entitled to their opinion but I think they are wrong.

For one thing I am far from being a fuddy-duddy I guess I just have a different definition of progress now. I've perhaps seen the light at the end of the tunnel and it is a freight train headed straight for me and I have nowhere to go. It is a little scary what is happening to the world we live in.

Some seem to feel we must continue our inexorable march toward a better freedom through chemicals and technology. Trust me, I was in that camp with you at one point too. I understand. I wanted the best and the latest. I used things up and then just threw them away without a thought. Out of sight, out of mind, not my problem anymore. But we have been betrayed. It is rapidly becoming the problem of all of us. You can only sweep stuff under the rug so long before the rug begins to become lumpy. We clean our houses but pollute the rest of our world. If you just throw your garbage over the fence into your neighbors yard have you truly cleaned up? But this is how we all live. It's just that our neighbor happens to be a third world country with lax e-laws.

I am a child of the fifties. I remember the world that existed then. The world we have now is not better than the one I knew then. Even though we have so many conveniences. There were no PC's, no laptops, no cell phones, no palm pilots, no...oh, another list. Sorry.

I have no quarrel with those that say technology has improved our output and productivity. It has. But that is part of the problem. We can now produce goods so fast, so cheap and so easily they have lost any value. We now have huge piles of waste as the technologically fragile machines we produce wear out quickly. How many cell phones have you gone through? I've been through a bunch. Ever seen a farm using an old Massey-Ferguson built in the forties? That stuff was built to last and money was made on parts, not new machines. Imagine that...parts!

Technology has also reduced a good percentage of the workforce to button pushing slaves. Well, actually forget about the workforce part, I guess I check myself out at the store now. Swipe, swipe, swipe, slide, push, whir, receipt prints "Have a nice day and thank you for shopping at Wal-E-World. Come again soon and help us keep up our bottom line. It's the patriotic thing to do. Made in China." Then we whisk our treasures out the door, which rapidly fade and become new waste.

Is this really the world we want? I don't. I read the book "Better Off" recently about a couple that goes to live with the Amish to learn their simple ways. Great book, there is a link for it over to the left. I must tell you though that is not really my goal, to hitch up a horse to my buggy and ride into town. I do admire their simplicity and simplicity is what it is all about but I don't really need to go back to the stone age to be simple or live like the Amish. All I really need to do is be aware of my own waste stream and be aware how I consume.

The easiest way to become aware of your waste stream is to end the one can system in your house. I have about ten receptacles for garbage now. Paper, recyclable plastic containers, cans, aseptic containers, batteries, plastic bags and film, e-waste, electronic media (tapes, CD's etc.) cardboard, green waste (vege scraps) and then everything else goes in a can that goes to the landfill. My original idea behind this was just to recycle. However it also had the effect of making me realize what I do to produce waste. I can now attack each one of these individually and find solutions to produce less waste, the goal being, no waste at all. It is a challenge but a good challenge can be fun.

Is that being a retroist fuddy-duddy? Call me what you want. To me it is just being responsible and that is something I can be proud of. Reduce, reuse, recycle. In that order.

Move it!

I woke up early this morning so I have had a bit of a chance to work on a few things. One of them being this blog. I have moved some of the links to a new heading called "Blog Honor Roll" . These are, in my opinion, some of the better blogs out there regarding sustainability. If you only have a chance to look at one right now I highly recommend you peruse "Fake Plastic Fish". Plastic is something I have begun to hate. Not just because we live in such a plastic society, I have seen the damage it does to wildlife and the eyesore it leaves on our roads.

About a month ago I went to the Oregon coast to do some hiking on the Oregon Coastal Trail. The trailhead was not properly marked on the highway and I never found it. I ended up walking 22 miles on the highway. It wasn't the nature experience I had anticipated. By the way I should mention that I did take the bus to the trail. Anyhow, having walked 22 miles of public highway it was quite alarming the amount of crap that lay all over the shoulder of the road. And it wasn't just on the shoulder. It was even blown into the trees and shrubs. Quite ugly. For a visual example of what plastic bags are doing to our environment AND OUR WILDLIFE visit the Photo Gallery at Reusable Bags. com Here is a direct link to the gallery (CLICK HERE)

Another thing that hit me recently, since I am packing, is that I have a lot of crap. Well, I am weeding it out and getting rid of a bunch of stuff. Another thing I am finding too is that I have a huge volume of waste paper that I am hauling to the recycle bins. I think this is going to be one of my projects for self. To reduce my paper consumption drastically. I really haven't paid attention to where this stuff comes from.

Well, that is about all the time I have today to write. Have a great day all.

$100.00 per barrel oil is coming!

In my hiatus while I pack and move I thought I would throw on a few interesting articles. This one is about the impending jump in the price of a barrel of oil. It is my feeling that the article is correct but may be a little premature. The price of oil is somewhat politically driven, so my feeling is the price will jump dramatically only after November 2008. In the meantime the price we see at the pump will be kept lower than it normally would be. This will be an interesting thing to watch. Remember, the price of nearly everything you buy is affected by the price of oil. I have put a little ticker over to the left side of the blog and near the bottom that shows the current price of gas. You can type in your two-digit state or just watch it tick through all fifty.

On a personal note, I found a place to move that is on the bus lines and walking distance from the grocery we frequent as well as the library. The light rail too is just five minutes away. Very convenient location. This will allow me to park my car except for the most urgent of trips. I hope to reduce my driving to less than one tank per month or less. This would be about one-fifth the fuel I used to consume. I'm getting there.

The house has very little room for a garden (schucks) but I see this move as one more step toward my goal of being off the grid and self sufficient. It is a rental and will afford me the time to find the right piece of property to build least footprint and put in a garden and most likely a greenhouse.

Well, here is the link to that article.

Bloomberg.com: Worldwide

Powered by ScribeFire.

I'm still here!

Here is a good article to read in the meantime while I get my life put back together.

Half of US food goes to waste

Powered by ScribeFire.

I'm still here!

For those visiting my blog please accept my welcome and feel free to poke around a bit. I have been getting a little behind on posts because I am in the middle of packing and looking for a new place to live. That has eaten up a lot of my time. I have a few draft posts I am working on and I hope to have them up in the next few days and get back to daily posts soon but until then please just read through some of my older posts or sit back and watch a film or two. Again, welcome.

Part 2: Teenage affluenza is spreading fast. Can we do

Part 2 of the teenage Affluenza program. Watch Part 1 first, then come back here.

Teenage affluenza is spreading fast.

Teenage Affluenza is a horrible disease that is spreading throughout the world. This report is from Australia but is just as true here in the US.

It's only fair--and it's free

Today is a rather short post because I am in the middle of packing to move. Actually I wasn't even going to do a post today but I was given a Fair Trade Manual just this morning to distribute to anyone I choose. I have put this up on one of my servers and it is free for the taking.

The booklet is 24 pages long and is in a PDF format. So, when you click the link it will open in your Adobe Reader. If you want to keep it for reading later, simply save a copy.

Here is the link: FAIR TRADE MANUAL

New Stuff

I added a new link today, over there to the left for "Little Blog in the Woods". This is written by a guy that calls himself "greenpa" and seems like a great blog. I must say that if anyone is doing this right it is him. Per his blog he has been thirty years off the grid. I love it. That is my goal. Just not sure how to get there yet.

I have also started a new group of the same name "Least Footprint". The link is also over there to the left. This is intended as a forum to exchange ideas or just to comment back and forth freely. The group will be moderated, by me, and that is just to keep the spammers out. If you post something I don't like or agree with (providing it is family friendly) it still goes through. I have another group I moderate and attempted to keep it free and open but got tons of spammers that way. It did no good to kick them off. They just changed their identity and kept on spamming with the same cheap software ads or dating services.

I should mention that there is no need to become a member of the group to participate. There are a few sections that are open to members only but feel free to drop by and comment even if you don't become a member.

National Memorial for the Mountains

Mountaintop Removal Movie from iLoveMountains.org

Video Log 2 - U.S. and Canada stall on eWaste export limits

Manufactured Landscapes

Why, mommy, why?

Some feel that the world is doomed and there is no reason to try and live differently. Others believe we can do whatever we want and the earth will just take care of itself-it always has and it always will. I agree with both sides.

Perhaps it sounds as if I am at odds with myself but really I am not. I do believe the earth is rather doomed because, in order to save it, the global population will have to end it's headlong rush to disaster. The odds of that happening are nearly zilch. But on the other hand, as I have said before, nature has a way of taking care of these things. It's called natural disaster, famine, disease, resource shortages...I probably don't need to go on.

There is no doubt in my mind that as we pull at the earth's resources and go against nature, more than at any time in history, we are going to run out of resources and upset completely the natural balance...eventually. I don't know if that will be in my lifetime or not.

We have manipulated our crops to hybrid them and made them ultimately unstable and non-resistant to mutated diseases. One only need to look back in history to know that crops often fail on a massive scale. We have weakened the human immune system through overuse of antibiotics and by trying to protect ourselves have just made some fairly tame bugs into superbugs that can't be killed. We are pumping the aquifers dry at an alarming rate to grow grain for cattle and now cars. What do we do when they have run out? It is practically an endless list of no-no's we are perpetrating as a species on the earth. We consume resources simply to consume. No finger pointing here. Go back a few days in my blog you'll see that I am a guilty man.

It is only a matter of time before there will be wars over water, oil, minerals and the like as the limited resources become scarce. As the aquifers dry up there will be less food and more famine. The green places will desertify and become less habitable. This will bring about great shifts in the population and wars between nations and people will again result. Diseases will appear that will wipe out huge numbers of people in the form of plagues. Again, I could go on with quite a list but the point is, there is nothing I can personally do to stop it on a global scale.

However, every day on the freeway there are accidents. It is inevitable that people will get hurt and die. Can I stop it? No. I have no control over how people drive. Many people get in their cars and tune out the fact that there are living, breathing people surrounding them. They just want to get where they are going...as fast as they can get there...and disobey the rules of safety. And so...we have lots of accidents on the freeways.

I can change me. If I obey the rules of the road, drive defensively, act courteous and limit the number of miles I drive I limit my exposure to harm. Perhaps even save a life. But most of all I help to solve the problem in my own very small way. Do I change the fact that people die on the freeway? No! People are still going to die but my actions still make a difference, even if it is in a very small way. And that is why I try to act responsibly now in what I consume. I can make a difference to me, I can be pleased that I have acted responsibly. Even if it is in just one very small way for me and my neighbors on this big blue marble.

Banana, nana fofana

I made a comment about fair trade bananas a couple of days ago in my blog to to which someone responded "I was not aware of the banana farmer/worker experience". I wasn't aware either until a couple years ago when I saw a video of a banana worker holding a huge hand of bananas while another worker sprayed insecticide, dousing both the bananas and the worker. It was reported that this man ended up sterile from being doused with so many chemicals and had other ailments as well. I tried to locate that video on Youtube but was unable. I was certain it would have ended up there. I plan to keep looking for it. Undoubtedly it is floating out there on the web somewhere.

I wanted to give some of the facts about bananas that many people aren't aware. The facts may surprise you.

Fact 1: Bananas are the worlds most popular fruit. Banana are so popular sales amount to ten BILLION dollars per year. Yes that is a lot of bananas. They are the fourth most important crop after rice, wheat and maize and some civilizations still live primarily on bananas. 96% of Americans buy bananas at least weekly.

Fact 2: Bananas do not grow on trees and are really the fruit of the worlds largest herb...the Musa Sapientum. They contain more digestible complex carbohydrates than any other fruit. They are fat free. (Note: freeze bananas and then whip them into delicious smoothies in the blender.) Bananas are very low in allergen potential and make perfect baby food.

Fact 3: In Ecuador, where a great deal of bananas are grown, workers receive about a dollar per day in pay.

Fact 4: If you are a banana farmer, you are paid as little as one and a half cents for every pound of bananas you grow. Often that is less than it costs to produce the bananas.

Fact 5: Bananas are the most profitable item in the grocery store and account for 2% of the profits. Ever wonder why there are huge tables of them. Sometimes even two or three.

Fact 6: Chiquita, Dole and Del Monte control 65% of the worlds banana market. They are now beginning to offer Fair Trade bananas but it is still a very small part of their market. Chiquita and Dole alone control 50% of the worlds bananas. Only 14% of the bananas raised are actually exported. The rest are eaten locally.

Fact 7: Dangerous pesticides are applied to bananas forty times by airplane during the growing cycle. Ninety percent of this insecticide does not reach the bananas but instead drifts through the air onto the workers and nearby residents. The insecticide of choice is usually Paraquat or DBCP, which are highly toxic to humans. Growers wrap the bananas in plastic and cushion and these wrappers are then removed by hand exposing workers again to the insecticide at close range when harvesting.

Fact 8: Workers often develop severe neurological disorders such as muscle pains, nausea, dizziness, organ damage (eyes,liver and lungs, male sterility) from insecticide and fungicide poisoning.

Fair Trade

Fair Trade coffee has been on the market for years. Fair Trade bananas not quite as long. What fair trade does is add a layer of monitoring to the process to improve the quality of life for the growers and workers and puts limits on the pesticides used. It guarantees fair prices, fair wages, and safe working conditions. Personally, I go one step further and pay the ninety-nine cents per pound and buy the Fair Trade organic. Then I know I am not taking advantage of the disadvantaged and I am not exposing workers to dangerous chemicals on my behalf. The difference in cost is usually about forty cents per pound.

For more information just Google or Yahoo fair trade bananas. Here is an excerpt from one report by Human Rights Watch that gives just one small example of the banana travesty.

"Human Rights Watch interviewed forty-five children who had worked or were working on banana plantations in Ecuador. Forty-one of them began in the banana sector between the ages of eight and thirteen, most starting at ages ten or eleven. They described workdays of twelve hours on average and hazardous conditions that violated their human rights, including dangerous tasks detrimental to their physical and psychological well-being. The children reported being exposed to pesticides, using sharp tools, hauling heavy loads of bananas from the fields to the packing plants, lacking potable water and restroom facilities, and experiencing sexual harassment. Children told Human Rights Watch that they handled insecticide-treated plastics used in the fields to cover and protect bananas, directly applied fungicides to bananas being prepared for shipment in packing plants, and continued working while fungicides were sprayed from planes flying overhead. Sometimes the children were provided protective equipment; most often, they were not. These children enumerated the various adverse health effects that they had suffered shortly after pesticide exposure, including headaches, fever, dizziness, red eyes, stomachaches, nausea, vomiting, trembling and shaking, itching, burning nostrils, fatigue, and aching bones. Children also described working with sharp tools, such as knives, machetes, and short curved blades, and three pre-adolescent girls, aged twelve, twelve, and eleven, described the sexual harassment they allegedly had experienced at the hands of the administrator of two packing plants where they worked. In addition, four boys explained that they attached harnesses to themselves, hooked themselves to pulleys on cables from which banana stalks were hung, and used this pulley system to drag approximately twenty banana-laden stalks, weighing between fifty and one hundred pounds each, over one mile from the fields to the packing plants five or six times a day. Two of these boys stated that, on occasion, the iron pulleys came loose and fell on their heads, making them bleed."

Source: Human Rights Watch Report on Bananas

We have become deliberately oblivious people in our country. It is assumed that if the product is on the shelf it must be OK and certainly it was produced by kind loving people. It simply isn't true. We live in a world that finds money more important than people. What is a human life when a dollar is to be earned. I abstain from waxing religious or biblical in my blogs but the best source I can find for the motivation behind this is in the Bible in 1 Ti. 6:10. which reads in part "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil." So true.

Rubbish, just plain rubbish!

As I devote a small part of each day to understanding my own waste problem I find I am actually learning a great deal. If you have been following "No Impact Man's" blog-- which I highly recommend you do-- you are aware of his rants, and a few of my own too in the comments, about e-waste. Yesterday I put a few videos on my blog about e-waste- they are all very short- and collectively they give a good concise picture of the problems e-waste is causing our planet. It is very serious problem. e-waste is a particularly noxious form of garbage since it contains many dangerous pollutants. Many of the pollutants are in a form that is difficult to extract and so they end up buried and pollute the ground and waters.

However I don't really want to continue with e-waste today. I am sure I will come back and revisit it soon since I have a whole drawer full of e-waste I don't know what to do with yet. I'm working on it just like I am working on disposal of my garage full of chemicals I need to get rid of too. That's a topic for another day.

Today I want to take about vegetable waste. Apple cores, potato peels, unusable lettuce leaves, tea bags. Stuff like that. Believe it or not vegetable waste accounts for 29% of the stuff that heads off to the landfills. An additional 46% that gets hauled away for burial is actually materials that can be recycled but just got tossed in the trash can. Only 25% of the stuff that goes to the landfills actually needs to go there. We, as a nation have along way to go. (Source: Office of Sustainable Development, City of Portland)

Vegetable waste is a particular bugaboo because it creates methane gas and methane, a greenhouse gas, is 23 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. Hot stuff...yikes!

Landfills, it turns out, are the largest source of methane in the United States but properly composted vegetable matter does not emit methane. Instead, it becomes a useful product for growing more food or even flowers. (Source: Office of Sustainable Development, City of Portland)

e-Waste may be a deadly problem with no easy solution but the vegetable waste problem is remedied by two very simple solutions. Both cost surprisingly little and can actually be personally fulfilling.

COMPOST BINS

The first solution is a compost bin. In my area these compost bins are sold by Metro for just $35.00. The first year they were offered they were only available for one day and there was a line that stretched for about an hour. To use them you open the lid, throw in the stuff and gave it a stir from time to time. Eventually it all turns into nutrient rich compost and you just shovel it out of the bottom.

If you wan to begin composting here is a link for easy instructions on how to do it.

Composting Instructions

A compost bin can also be built for very little as well from wire mesh, old fencing, wooden pallets, cement blocks. Just about anything.

WORM BINS

The second easy solution is to use a worm bin. For those that are handy, there is a link below showing plans for building your own worm bin. Some gardening stores sell these already made as well. Just look for a store that sells worms.

Here's the link courtesy of Spokane Regional Solid Waste System:

Worm Composting Bin

These work great outside but if you live in an apartment, as I do, here is a web source for purchasing indoor worm bins:

Indoor Worm Bins

I recently found a neighbor that has three compost bins and am now delivering my own vegetable waste to her weekly. My kitchen trash can is no longer seeing a lot of business. Previously I was dumping it about once a week, now I can probably go about once a month or more. I plan on weighing it each month (hope I remember) to act as an incentive to continue toward my goal of zero waste. I'll post my results here (if I remember).

The place I live in is being converted to condos and our time here is very short. In other words, I have to buy it or move. It's not a bad apartment but condo? No, it is not a great condo. Anyway, once I get moved I am definitely starting a worm bin to compost my own stuff, (sorry Sally, I know you love my garbage). I'll post the results here once I get it going. Worms actually sound like fun and i understand you can even make pet food out of them. Oooo!

If you want to find someone to take your compost like I did just post a note on Craigslist or join a Yahoo or Google group for gardeners and see if you can find a taker. It only took me one day to find someone to take my garbage for compost. It was a simple solution to a very big problem and it cost me absolutely nothing.

e-waste from greenpeace

Save a Life E-waste Campaign Mixed Greens Emerson College

One minute PSA on e-waste

E-Waste-It's Our Problem

This is a great segment from a news program. Length 6:27.

GOOD Magazine: E-Waste

Excellent brief video on what happens to e-waste.

I am a guilty man

I have been taken in by the comments on "No Impact Man" blog and put a considerable amount of time in posting my own comments there rather than writing my blog. Since my blog has not really taken off yet I felt this was a better use of my time since I was communicating with more people. Below is a reprint of comments I left today on the No Impact site. I felt it came out well and decided today I would post it here as well.

___________________________________________

When Columbus sailed to our shores he found an unspoiled land full of a people that lived in harmony with it. There were no shopping malls, freeways, power lines or prisons. But these he felt were a "savage" people that must be "civilized" and they stood in the way of his pursuit of new resources for the king. So he claimed the land for the king with an intent to return and "civilize" it and capture its resources.

In 1492 Columbus also discovered Haiti. The native population when he arrived is estimated to have been at least one million and some estimates run as high as three million. In Columbus own words "I found very many islands filled with people without number, and all of them I have taken possession for their Highnesses...As soon as I arrived in the Indies, on the first Island which I found, I took some of the natives by force in order that they might learn and might give me information on whatever there is in these parts"

He hauled off much gold for the kingdom, and left a delegation to build a fort built from the remnants of the sunken Santa Maria with the intent to "control" the land. By 1596 there were only 125 individuals remaining of the native population. The rest died by sword, famine and disease.

We assume these stories are ancient history, and in the case of Columbus, who is purported to have "discovered America" we just bury it under the rug and declare a national holiday. We are now a modern civilized people who seek peace for the world...through technology. But our "civilization" is still in pursuit of conquest. We just mask it through wars of ideology which are really wars of conquest and annihilation. The goal of these wars...more comfort for the people of the kingdom through the assumption of more resources.

As I look around my office I see a router, a laser printer, a scanner, two speakers, an LCD monitor, a tungsten lamp, a telephone, a tape recorder, computer, a laptop computer, a TV, a VCR, a DVD, a stereo, a label maker...need I go on? These make life very convenient and, I guess, bring me some happiness; maybe just a little; but these did not spring from the earth as fruit of any plant. They were manufactured from oil and ores from all over the planet. Retrieved through force many times so I, as part of the "kingdom" can enjoy them.

To be fair, I acquired much of this stuff long before I began to wake up to the realities. Indeed, if it were not for my computer, I could not be participating in this forum. I am still rethinking the logic of that and am not sure where my future path will take me when these things wear out. Will I replace them? I really don't know.

I learned years ago that most diamonds sold had a price tag of blood attached to them. I vowed not to buy diamonds. When I learned about fair trade bananas I discovered that many workers died or became ill from being sprayed with pesticides and that the banana farmers did not receive adequate compensation from their bananas to even live. I now buy organic fair trade bananas. The more I learn, the less I want to buy.

We can march, we can protest, we can decry needless wars. Shoot we can even build websites and have public forums to sicken ourselves with the facts then legislate against that which disgusts us. But if the wars are fought and people die simply to bring more goods for our kingdom so we can sustain our convenient and comfortable lives are we not then really an accomplice if we buy?

I am a guilty man.

Talking Trash

In the morning you stumble out of bed, grab a banana off the table, spill a little cereal in the bowl, slice the banana into the cereal and then pour a little milk over the top. The banana peel gets dumped into the trash can, the empty cereal box and inside bag goes there too. As luck would have it the milk carton is also empty so you dump that in the trash as well. Time for the morning paper as you grab your bowl, wander to the table and, eyes not quite open, sit down.

Leaning back slightly you read the morning headline--"Sending trash across the state may be pricey". Oooo...sounds expensive. You read on scanning through the text. Ten million dollars EVERY YEAR--570,000 tons of garbage--burial in the desert, 137 miles away--70 diesel belching trucks every day--trucks traveling 274 miles round trip just to haul garbage. Could this really be?

Garbage, it seems, is better off in a dry climate. I assume it decays better. But 570,000 tons? That is 1,140,000,000 pounds of garbage yearly. Oh wait, let me make that easier. That is ONE BILLION, ONE-HUNDRED-FORTY MILLION pounds of garbage yearly or three-million-one hundred twenty-three thousand-two-hundred and eighty-seven pounds of garbage EVERY DAY. Holy Toledo, that's a lot of weight!

It all starts with us...err I mean me. We, I mean I, put the stuff in the can and dump it without a single thought. Well, actually I do give it a though now after reading "Garbage Land; On the Secret Trail of Trash" but most don't. Just drop it in the can...not my problem now. Every item we, I mean I, drop in the trash can uses petroleum. Not just in the manufacture but also in the disposal. Imagine if this option were not available and I had to start burying all the stuff I throw away in my backyard. For sure I might just get a little embarrassed. Not to mention the complaints from the neighbors. Not a good option.

We, as a society, have learned to avoid embarrassment by paying someone to take our trash away. It's a lucrative business for the trash company. we pay them millions of dollars every year to take our trash out and hide it in the desert. This way we don't even have to think about it. It is just nice little plastic bundles given up for burial without last rites or eulogy and then simply forgotten.

We ourselves can go from dust to dust but much of our garbage cannot. It goes from plastic to plastic and stays that way for centuries, possibly forever. Even paper, when layered and not exposed to the air, lasts for hundreds,or possibly thousands, of years. If this world lasts long enough we will have left enough trash behind to keep an archaeology team busy and snickering at our piggish folly for a very long time. Ummm..the current system is not sustainable so eventually we will have to figure out a different way. But don't worry that will probably be after we have all have been disposed of ourselves...hopefully with a little more reverence than the trash we left behind.

So what should we do with our trash? Well, the first thing to do is think about trash before it becomes trash. Don't buy as much. Refuse to buy things in containers that cannot be reused or recycled. AVOID PLASTIC. Buy bulk as much as possible. If your store does not have a bulk aisle then switch stores and tell the manager why you left. If there are no bulk stores in your neighborhood then start a co-op. Use reusable bags and containers rather than plastic bags as often as you can. Recycle everything you can...everything! About 80% of what we currently use in our household is recyclable and we sort and haul it away to the proper bins. Be conscious of reducing, reusing and recycling. Start a compost or worm bin. Quit buying so much stuff. I know, I know...its hard to do in our consumerist society.

I won't go into the details about my own trash here because I have covered that in previous blogs but I know I still have a long way to go. My goal is to be as close to zero garbage as possible. I have failed that goal in many regards simply because I haven't been conscious. If I keep my mind on garbage and put pressure on the manufacturers to think this way too I can personally help to make garbage less of an issue, financially and otherwise. I must say the numbers I quoted above came from my hometown paper and shocked me a bit. It actually left me feeling a little soiled because I know I am part of the problem. I even used to own a bunch of stock in Waste Management and rooted for all those tossing their trash because it made the company more profitable. Now I am working toward being a part of the solution by Reducing what I buy, Reusing what I can, and Recycling what I can't. It's a simple statement but agreeably it is very difficult to fully implement. But it makes you feel good when you deposit very little trash in the can or dumpster. Try it...you'll like it.

Vacation

Well, our vacation is finally here. And this year it is going to be much more relaxing and slower paced. And that is not just because I am getting old. I can still keep up with the young guys. I just don't want to anymore.

Our normal vacation usually begins with a long list of things to pack, followed by days of packing, repacking, adding and eliminating, then finally bundling it all up, putting it by the front door, rechecking to make sure we have everything, worry a little that we forgot something, and then on the day before leaving retire to bed late for the long travel day ahead.

The morning we leave,in order to avoid the exorbitant parking fees at the airport, we usually drag all of our stuff to the corner and wait for a bus. The bus then takes us to the light rail, which takes us to the airport where we ride the escalator, walk down a super long corridor,find a check-in line, check the bags and then deliver them to a gruff TSA person who sizes up whether our bags should get the mini-nuke treatment or the full service. We then wander off to wait, have our socks sniffed and our carrion checked by the vultures at the security checkpoint and if we are lucky we won't have to strip to our altogether in the little booth while the dentist wannabe checks our cavities. (I've been lucky so far and have only had the mini-nuke treatment and never the full service.)

Once through security we relax a bit and would not even consider leaving back to the real world again. The airport people make this easy since the corridors are lined with shops and restaurants galore. They are all overpriced and lousy but hey, what else is there to do except watch a bunch of tired people. I think it is important to mention here that to have a proper vacation one must first suffer. This is the reason vacation sentences must be served a long way from home. The further the better.

Watching people at the airport gets boring fast because no one is really themselves. If you act normal at an airport you might draw the attention of someone important and then you would need to explain why you stopped looking at your carrion for a few seconds and answer questions about people you don't know. This is why we usually make the cursory wander through the magazine shop to pick up the latest copy of AdBusters and then settle into a seat at the gate and quietly wait, peering above the magazine from time to time and take sucks off our $2.99 bottle of water. When the plane arrives we watch all the people get off to see if they are still breathing or look particularly nauseous. I also try to check out the flight crew to see if they actually look old enough to fly, or conversely...are they over the hill and should I bone up on my CPR skills.

Anyhow, we always buy the cheap tickets so we end up watching everyone else get on before us. When we are finally able to shuffle down the jetway, we try to smile innocently at the flight attendant who is smiling back but really just wondering if we have any contraband shampoo or creme rinse in our carrion. We slide down the aisle to find our seats and hope this time we are not next to someone with flatulence or wearing cheap perfume. We fit ourselves into our seats, properly stow our knees under our chins and then triple check to make sure the tray table is in the upright position. We don't want problems with he flight attendant. We must rely on her for the next few hours for our food and drink. Then we watch the flight attendant give a five minute speech on the proper clicking of seat belts, how to breath through a tube should one side or the other of the plane disappear at 35,000 feet and the proper method of flotation on a seat cushion. I believe you are supposed to throw your arms over the top and look skyward. Have you ever heard of a person being rescued in a plane crash that was floating on their seat cushion in some lake somewhere? We feign attention to the speech but since it is a rerun, we just get out our neck pillows and brace ourselves firmly in the reading position for the long three hours of sitting perfectly still while holding out hope our legs don't thrombose before the plane touches down. I don't want some doc on vacation removing a clot from my leg with a ball point pen at 35,000 feet, do you? I didn't think so. This is fun!

After reaching our destination, the process works exactly in reverse with the exception that the TSA vultures no longer consider us dead meat and pretty much ignore us unless we running through the airport talking about how great the jihad convention was. Once we finally arrive at our room, we flip on the TV and fall asleep weary from the first long day of our vacation. Tomorrow we attack our vacation with all we have left.

I think I have pretty much had it with that type of vacation. This year we are vacationing much closer to home and using our own vehicle. No stress, just a leisurely drive east of the mountains where we can hide from the rain, do a little walking, ride a horse, raft a river,get some rest, read a few books and probably watch a few videos. Carbon footprint for this vacation, about 20 gallons of gas and the same amount of electricity we would use at home. Expenditure for the jet vacation. TONS of fuel. Literally! There is also rumor that jets flying in the upper atmosphere are having an egg beater effect and affecting weather patterns. Who knows what the outcome of that is.

Anyway, I won't be writing any posts over the next week or so, but I don't think too many people are reading my blog yet anyhow. As soon as I can figure out a good hook like "No Impact Man" who has given up toilet paper I should garner a lot more attention. Until then, I am happy just to write to myself and pretend.

Ecological Dieting

My wife and I have been in two major car crashes in our life, one from the front and one from the back and this has left us with many aches and pains we would not normally have. The first accident left both of us with some residual back troubles and the second accident hobbled me with a double compound leg fracture and fractured my wife's skull. I was in a cast and brace for about a year and then followed that up by five years of self therapy. She was fairly debilitated for a number of years. It was a long road back and an Andy Warhol moment as we made the front page of the paper. I could have forgone the fame.

When you experience this type of physical trauma you never really do get fully back to "normal". The reminders of the accidents exist in your tissues and heat and ice become very good friends since they help ease many of these discomforts. I have just a few visible scars left but I have quite a bit of unseen scar tissue in my back and leg. Also since one leg is just slightly shorter than the other it messes with my hips a bit and throws off my gait. My wifes injuries are mostly invisible but they cause her chronic pain every day. There is no therapy that fixes scar tissue. It is just a residual agony that must be dealt with. (Here is where you sigh and offer meaningful sympathies in our direction before resuming your normal life. But please, no cards unless they contain money.) I have mostly recovered from my injuries and I am still able to walk, hike, backpack and ride a bike so I have no real complaints. My wife is less fortunate in this regard but she does mostly OK despite having quite a bit of pain still.

Why do I ramble on here about our accidents you are probably asking by now? What does this have to do with ecological dieting? Well, I enjoy walking and right now I try to walk about six miles every day. I am fortunate to live next to a Nature Park that has miles of wooded trails since the air is filled with scents and the sound of birds, there are ponds, creeks, snakes and even poisonous newts and it makes for a great place to walk. Anyhow, as I was out walking yesterday and thinking about all this ecology stuff I suddenly realized that what we have now in America are a bunch of good intentioned people putting themselves on an unsustainable ecological diet. Just like America is getting fatter while at the same time dieting like crazy we are now looking for the Atkins South Beach Zone Deprivation diet for planet earth. We think if we just eliminate this, add that, then boom...the ecological impact will magically drift away, bluebirds will sing, and the earth will be forever saved. Wrong! Deprivation never works. The unaltered human psyche simply catalogs our deprivations and then nags at us until we finally give in and pig out to reward ourselves for our earlier deprivation. (Citation: Human Nature 101)

I was a teen in the 70's and watched the wholesale development of an earth movement sprout into something great. But then over the next few decades the same exact people lost the vision and turned into rampant consumers. For all the weirdness of the hippie movement there was a lot of good that came from the "back to the earth" movement side of it. Not all lost the dream, but it seems most did. Some of us are coming back to the dream. ( OK, I wasn't a real hippie, but I shared in the dream and loved Carole King.)

We can try to adapt our current lifestyle to one that is more green but really the only true answer is to seek contentment without over-indulgence. We need to find what things we actually need and what are the things we just want but don't really need. Keep the needs, whatever they are, and get rid of the wants. It is not the same for everyone. A lot of it has to do with where you live. For example, if you live in an apartment it is just not practical that you are going to be able to start a worm bin, have a solar shower and grow an organic garden. It is not practical or financially feasible for everyone to move to God's green acre and live off the land. However if this is what you really want; worms, solar heated water and organic gooseberries; then by all means find a new place to live and go for it. But simplicity and proper earth stewardship can take place nearly anywhere.

But back to my original topic about the accidents. When I start talking about reducing our consumption my wife often says,"I couldn't get through the day without my morning warm shower". Here, here, I completely understand what she is saying and agree with her. In the first accident we were rammed in the back at about 45 milers per hour by an old fart that should not have even been driving. He was on some sort of medication that put him in a different realm than his automobile was in. He rocketed us through the intersection from a dead stop and as a result we both suffered equivalent and substantial back injuries that left us in pain for quite a number of months. It also left both of us with some residual back troubles. Scar tissue is abiding. That warm shower in the morning sure helps work out the kinks that develop overnight. So when I start talking about limiting our consumption to a few measly gallons of water per day I must decide if that will really work for us. How else could we erase the stiffness without a shower and the occasional soak. Is that a want or is that a need? It's a good question. I am not fortunate enough to have a hot spring in my backyard so if I want hot water I have to produce it myself and that takes resources. Plus, if I abandoned my fridge as well, as some suggest I should do, I would no longer have a freezer compartment with its stack of ice packs. Then my and my wifes life would dissolve into pain. Truthfully, it probably wouldn't be totally debilitating but life would become a drag and the chronic pain caused by chronic inflammation due to scar tissue would begin to take over our minds. Probably make us depressed. That would definitely limit our capabilities and we would become less productive in other ways...such as starting a garden, avid recycling, walking or riding a bike.

When I examine human history, to the best of my availability, I do not discover that we were dropped here from somewhere else and are aliens upon the land. We live here too! We are allowed to leave a footprint. What it really comes down to is, how big of a footprint can I leave before I am no longer a man but a pig? (My apologies to all things porcine, it's just an analogy.)

I read other blogs by those who are trying to "reduce, reuse and recycle". I admire anyone that moves in this direction and support their decision. It's a tough change to make. I too was once a gluttonous consumer pig stocking my larders with things I really don't need and woke up one day to my folly. (OK, I still have a bit of folly in me but I'm getting better) But I also see people anguishing over how they are going to survive without things like hot water. Forget the anguish. If you need a little hot water, then by gum, use a little hot water. The idea is to move to a simpler life and not just go on a complex ecological diet.

Dieting doesn't work and never will. It doesn't matter if it is a food diet or an ecological diet. If becoming green means becoming guilt-ridden and enduring self-flogging hardship, it is not worth it and it will never work. You will just give up and go back to your old gluttonous consumerist ways. True change only comes from finding a new satisfaction and changing inside. Only when something has become truly unnecessary will it truly be gone from your life. So if you want to really be green, then the only way to get there is to learn to be simple. That might still mean some abrupt changes but they should be positive changes that make life simpler and more worth living and not things that bring about deprivation.

Several years ago I switched nearly cold tofu to eating a completely plant based diet. I did it for me. My concern at the time was not the planet or the animals, (although later I did incorporate these concerns in my decision), I did it because I was selfish. My father died at age sixty from a life of eating bad and I did not want that for myself. When I reached middle age and realized I was pushing two hundred pounds on my fairly small frame and saw my blood pressure begin the inevitable climb I started seeking answers. Over a period of about two years I went from being a junk food junkie to a very healthy whole grain, low fat plant based way of eating. I am happy with the food I eat, and I am completely satisfied and free of cravings for junk. But I made the change for me. It made my body healthier, meals are a snap to put together and I know I won't keel over and die in a Mexican restaurant with a mouthful of fatty food like my father did. Had I made this switch simply because I worried about the planet or the animals, but inside still desired the junk food or big juicy steak, my change would fail me and I would eventually go back to eating the old way. I've watched it happen over and over with people I know. We must first admit to ourselves that we are selfish creatures and then realize true change will only come from a true change of heart and desire for our own good...but never from self-sacrifice.

Whoa, this is getting heavy now. That's too deep for me. This is a blog not a philosophy class. OK, so here is the point I am really making without delving into religion. "Happy is he who does not condemn himself in that thing which he allows." That is what Paul the apostle wrote to the Romans when they questioned him about unclean things. If you want to save the animals and the planet, GREAT!, but you have to start with the man in the mirror and change you first. But not through deprivation. If you start with turning off the electricity, running a hose to the roof to collect hot water from the sun, fill your basement with worms to digest your garbage and then convert your one-acre yard to an organic garden you will most likely fail. If life is just a series of chores to save the world you will most likely lose heart. (You could try saving the cheerleafer first but I think that only works on TV.)

From my experience it has taken years to reach where I am now, consumer wise. I am probably not that far along compared to others but I am happy for the moment where I am. I have drastically reduced my driving, I recycle like crazy, I eat plant-based organic, I buy less junk and now I am working on eating locally. I also am trying to reduce my stuff. I have lots of junk and I am trying to end my attachments. Stuff lock I think it is called. That's a pretty full plate for now. I am concerned about the planet but, to be honest, I am more concerned about the stress my stuff brings me right now. I have a desire within me to move to a simpler life. One step at a time I am getting there. But I honestly think a warm shower and an occasional soak in a warm tub will be a part of that simple life. I'll let everyone else feel guilty for me and then won't give it a second thought.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

If you wander around long enough you can usually find a garbage can, probably one that is stuffed and overflowing, emblazoned with the slogan "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle". I think this slogan was developed in the 70"s and actually meant something back then. Now it is just a conscience buster. It is OK to load up the can as long as you read the slogan and promise next time to try and reuse something. But I really got to thinking about this slogan again. This really is the order we should think about things in.

Reduce--This is probably my biggest goal. I have cut back considerably but recently signed up for the Yahoo Group Riot for Austerity, 90% Emissions Reduction Project and apparently have a long way to go. I'm not sure what they propose is readily possible for a city or burb dweller. This group has the simple goal to reduce what we use by 90%. Here are the austere goals they have in mind to save the planet followed by my own comments.

Gasoline:

• 50 gallons per PERSON, per YEAR

It is my goal to "Divorce my Car" and move closer to where I shop. work etc. but right now that is an impossibility. When I am finally able to accomplish this, I will have met this goal. At least directly. Must not forget that every single thing we buy leaves a fuel footprint as well. We often think this stuff grows like mushrooms in the stores. No...it is trucked in.

Electricity:

• 1,100 kWh per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR

To be honest this one is a little difficult to figure out for the average Joe like me. I need to get out my bill and see what I am using now. Living in an apartment I also don't think they would take kindly to me punching a chimney through the wall and putting a wood stove in the corner. So...this may be unrealistic at the time. At least in the winter. However, we have stopped turning the heat on at every slight chill in the air and wear sweatshirts a lot more. We also have a good supply of blankets in the living area and use them quite often. Nothing like cozying up under the blankets too for a little book reading before bed. There are also other ways to stay warm but this is a family blog.

Heating and cooking energy:

• If your home uses propane or natural gas, 100 therms per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR
• If your home uses heating oil, 75 gallons per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR.
• If your home uses locally and sustainably harvested wood: Unlimited
• If your home uses unsustainably harvested wood, 5 cords per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR

Everything in my home is electric. Everything! Hey, it's the Northwest and we are proud of those fish kills we have labeled hydroelectric dams. Except all that power runs off to California now to run the AC instead of sticking closer to home. Which brings me to a good point. Why would anyone need AC here in the Northwest. We see what, two 100 degree days per year. Give me a break. Even if my apartment had it I wouldn't turn it on. But yet I see AC compressors all over the place. And AC uses a lot of energy. On the really hot days why not just turn on the fans and pretend it is a vacation in the desert for a couple of days. How did we all become such wimps?

Garbage:

• 0.45 pounds of garbage per PERSON, per DAY

Wow, I guess I will have to weigh my garbage now. We take about one bag a week to the dumpster and so I think we might be getting close to this one but I really have no idea. I buy all I can in bulk and we eat strictly plant-based so most of the stuff leaving in the trash can is biodegradable anyhow. I realize that is not necessarily good for the landfill and am looking for a place to take it for composting. I have no real backyard that is mine for a bin and my wife hates worms so an inside worm bin is currently out of the question. Rumor has it that the county is going to start a composting drop and when they do I will be first in line. We create a lot of compost and I really hate to see it go to waste. If we can find a place with a backyard then I will start a composting bin. Hopefully that will be soon.

I should mention that it is only because landfills are essentially buried and sealed off from the air that biodegradable waste is an issue. It is my understanding this actually converts the decay into a greenhouse gas. and if the dumps were open air then the stuff would just rot on its own and not be an issue. However the volume of garbage we piggish Americans produce every day is more than can be left in the open. We actually truck and barge the stuff around looking for a place to put it. Read "Garbage Land." It is a real eye opener.

Water:

• 10 gallons per PERSON, per DAY

I guess I will have to stop showering and flushing the toilet. How do I meet this rule in an apartment? I don't think it is possible. They suggest buckets of sawdust instead of using the toilet but what do I do with it then? Throw it out the back door? This is an impossible goal for an apartment dweller I think.

Consumer goods:

• $1,000 worth per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR.
• Used goods count only ten percent of their purchase price (so you could buy $10,000 of used stuff).
• Used goods that were donated to Goodwill or the church rummage sale, etc, can be bought in unlimited amounts (since might otherwise just end up in landfill).

OK, this is one that I may be able to manage easily since I am basically broke anyway. And I actually do love shopping at Goodwill type places. There are some real treasures to be had if you look. We live in a disposable nation and it is amazing what people give and throw away. I recently discovered that if you need furniture just wander around the dumpster areas of apartment complexes. People throw perfectly good stuff away every day when they move. Actually, I worked in an apartment complex years ago and some people would leave out the front door and never look back. Leaving behind literally everything. Clothes, furniture, shoes, refrigerators full of food. Amazing.

Food:

• No less than 70% of food purchases should be organic and be grown within 100 miles.
• No more than 25% of food purchases should be bulk, dry goods (flour, pasta, etc) from more than 100 miles away.
• No more than 5% of food purchases should be wet goods (meat, fruit, shampoo) from more than 100 miles away.

This is a goal we are moving toward. We buy about 95% organic now and are working on the "local" part. One of our goals this year is to buy as much as possible at the farmers market. That should solve the "within 100 miles" conundrum, at least in the growing season. When shopping at the grocery store I try to buy as much as possible from Washington and Oregon growers but winter usually gets a little lean in the local department. I am much more conscious of the ramifications of buying lettuce from Mexico now. That is a lot of fuel spent for my salad. Certainly we can grow enough lettuce locally to sustain us. Once I move I will start a garden and produce as much of what we eat as possible. I think we meet the 25% and 5% goal mentioned already.

Mind you now, we all must meet these goals, every single person on the planet, to stop our self-destruction. I assure you most in developed nations are not that motivated. I do fear though that nature is much stronger than any of us, and always seeks a balance to force sustainability. We have mickey moused around with nature so much, eventually it is going to strike back. And then, we will have no choice but to make these changes. Forget the Alamo. we should all remember the dust bowl of Oklahoma and the potato famine of Ireland instead.


Reuse-This is a difficult one. Most of the crap we have now is not made to be fixed. For example, I have a small appliances I use daily to grind flax etc. The only parts that are sturdy are the contact parts. The rest is cheap plastic and over time that plastic is cracking, simply from age and vibration. When it finally cracks all the way the motor will be out of line with the shaft and that will cause it to wear out. Can I fix it? Well, if there were a place to buy parts I guess I could. But, there is no place to buy parts. When I was a kid there were small appliance repair shops, but not anymore. Now we just throw it away and buy another cheap one. Even the computer that sits on my desk that I use for writing this blog is mostly disposable. Hard drive crashed? Buy another one. CD not working, buy another one. No one fixes these things and then puts them back in. You just pop down to CompUSA and buy it again. Convenient, yes but right? Not really.

Recycle-Ah, I love this one. I have become really good at recycling. I have stuff stacked all over which I run to the recycling places on a regular basis. Most of my garbage gets recycled. Any batteries I use get recycled. Anything I can recycle gets recycled. I have become very aware.

This fall I am planning on completing the Master Recycler" program. Why? Because this is the jumping off place into awareness. If you can make people aware of complete recycling you can get them thinking about reducing and reusing too. I'm not talking about the yellow curbside box recycling. That in some ways is a cop out. I mean thinking about everything that can be recycled. Batteries, compost, clothing, old electronics, etc. Things that are not necessarily picked up at the curb but can still be recycled with just a little effort. If you can keep it out of the landfill, then do! It is much easier than one thinks. It just takes a little practice and it becomes second nature. So much so that when my wife and I attended a Sustainability Fair and were handed a sample in a plastic bottle we could not bring ourselves to throw it away in the trash. And guess what? The Sustainability Fair had no recycle bins. We both found that very weird.

Well, I have really rambled on this time. Check out the 90% project. I'm not sure it is attainable for everyone living in the middle of the burbs but it has some worthwhile goals to strive for. The link is over there to your right.

Harping on Junk Mail

Ok, well I really hate to keep going on about the junk mail but I just got through sorting through the mail from the last few days and out of a stack about four inches high, I saved one piece of paper, a reimbursement check stub. That was it! The rest went in the recycle bin. Let's see, a major political party, to which I do not belong, was asking for money. Ummm... you said once you got a majority things would be different, they weren't. Send you money. I don't think so! A big cat rescue facility wrote to tell me about their new enclosure...and ask for money. There was a newspaper stuffed with coupons for places I'll never visit trying to get a bit of my money. A dragon wanted to take over my computer and talk with me while it typed. As long as I sent in just $99.00. Tried that once. The dragon was a lousy typist. I think I might have the disc in a drawer somewhere still. Someday maybe it will help scare some birds in the garden or something. Smithsonian wanted me to renew my subscription early. It's up in October. It stated it was an "urgent request" . My how time flies. Performance Bike, which really is a great store, sent me no less than three thick fliers this last week about their perpetual sale. They do have great prices but have not responded in any way to my request to turn off the paper and just send me e-mails. I don't shop there much anymore. There were a few phony magazines touting some get-rich-quick stocks, vending machines and real estate. Do these things really work? Do some people think these are real magazines and pore over them with breakfast then rush out to buy the recommended stock or flip a house? They smack of phony. Or am I just cynical? They certainly are glossy and expensive no less so they must work.

Well...I probably won't post much more on the junk mail thing. I have probably outdone it already.

This week my car is in the shop. I'm trying to pretend I miss it. I really don't. I think the last time I was thoroughly excited about driving was in high school. After that it just became part of life and lately I just hate driving. Is that part of getting old? No, probably not. I see enough old farts on the road that seem to love driving to the store and back while pretending they still see and hear fine. Anyway, my only transportation right now is an old mini-bus I bought off e-bay from a school district. It gets horrendous MPG but runs fine. I used it when I was remodeling a house because I got tired of hauling cement in my trunk and wondering if the shocks would burst. I've driven it 72 miles in the last four months so you can see it gets lots of use now. I think it gets lonely at the curb and seems to be growing a wonderful green patina around the edges. It is for sale. The first twelve hundred bucks drives it way. It's worth every penny if you need something big and spacious. It still has half the seats remaining.

Well, that is enough of a post for today. I see it is 10:00. That's when the mail comes. I wonder what is in it today. Goody.

Long Time

Well, it has indeed been a long time since I have posted. What a backslider I have become. Shame on me. First it was work then it was other excuses. None of them good. I sort of forgot about weighing my mail and all too. I do seem to be getting just as much as before though. Even though I have called tons of mailers and told them to turn it off. They don't turn it off even when you ask them. I think the system is on auto-pilot and is out of their control. I even posted my name and address with the Direct Mail Marketing Association and paid my few bucks to get off the list. Didn't help yet. I'm still hauling tubs of the stuff to the recycle. The odd thing is that a good percentage of the junk mail are pleas to "help save the earth, animals, air, water, trees, mountains, valleys, people.... Kind of defeating the purpose if you ask me. Why don't they get out in the streets and beg for money if they really want to save the earth. Or how about hauling people out to the woods en masse, and let them see what the beauty of nature is really like...then hit them up for the money to save it. I guess that would use a little fuel at first but it might get people to thinking more than a piece of junk mail printed with soy ink.

I am happy to report though that my automobile fuel bill is still declining rapidly and is now only about 2/3 of what it was before. My goal is to eventually only use flex and rental cars but the wife has not reached my level of fanaticism yet so... This month brings a small vacation though so it will go up a little, but we are staying close to home and not flying so the actual amount of fuel used will be considerably less than other vacations months when you eliminate the jet fuel we would have consumed. We are also committed to making this a relaxing vacation and not drive all over kingdom come to "have fun" like we normally do. I do love a road trip and usually log thousands of miles. Not this time. Only about 400 total for the whole trip, including side ventures. Even the rafting trip we have planned is via bus and the car will just stay parked. I have also mapped out some of the things we want to see and plan to group them together by locale. Most of all I am looking forward to the sun. Bring it on.

I have just started a wonderful book called "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" by Barbara Kingsolver. It is the true story of how they moved from the deserts of New Mexico with it's water that would kill goldfish to live as close to the land as they could. She talks about raising animals for food which does not fit my plant-based lifestyle but any move away from factory farming is a plus. Ultimately my desire is to do much the same without raising livestock. However living in Oregon I don't have to move far to accomplish it. Just need a little more space to put out some small raised gardens. Maybe a small glass enclosure or two for a winter garden.
Well, I hope to get back to posting every day. I haven't given up on my efforts. Have gotten a few dirty looks at the grocery store when I used my cloth produce bags, rather than the see-through plastic bags. Really, is it that much more work to open the bag and look inside? Oh well, I still plan to use them. It has really drastically reduced the amount of plastic I haul to the recycle.

I have been keeping close tabs on the "No Impact Man" project and Colin is now facing many of the grey conundrums that appear whenever you try to reduce your impact in this modern world. It is simply impossible to move to a no impact life in a mid town apartment. The biggest being refrigeration and, when winter returns, heat. Most likely if the temperature hits 100 degrees in August they will be driven from their air-conditionless walk up. We humans are a bit like lizards and need just the right temperature to survive. Other societies that live closer to nature do not insist on living in tight gypsum boxes and therefore don't need to worry about this. We as Americans have our codes and rules that drive us away from each other and into our cubicles. Wait, isn't that the first terror in nearly every sci-fi novel? The isolation?

Perhaps when the last drop of oil runs through the veins of our modern world we all finally all look at each other and look for the natural solutions rather than the technical. It is probably wise to learn now how to live without modernity and pass it on through the generations. Hmm...

If anybody is listening, I wish you well.

Scott