I don’t think that I will ever run out of ideas for this blog. Plastic is everywhere and every piece of it is crying out for ME to think of a viable alternative. (Ok, so those are the kind of sentences that I write when I am actually short on ideas. My readers don’t usually get to see them and they languish in my virtual pile of unpublished drafts.)
I feel like I have covered all the most basic ways to reduce plastic consumption. There is only so much to be said about using cloth shopping bags and avoiding plastic beverage containers and food packaging. Blogging about those positive actions was like picking the low fruit. I thought I had run out of those kind of ideas. It may be more a case of me making quick decisions that reduce my plastic consumption and forgetting to blog about them. I am going to start blogging more about the little things.
My daughter has a cold and she desperately needed some tissues while we out and about. I had a choice between buying a handy plastic package of tissues or a cardboard box. I bought the box. Actually I bought two because I am fairly confident that I will catch the cold. Everybody seems to have a cold and the empty plastic from all the tissues that everyone else are using is one of the most common types of litter. I can picture this plastic litter clogging up storm drains when it rains, forcing pedestrians to walk through puddles and making their colds worse so that they use even more tissues and drop even more little plastic packages on the sidewalk. I’m looking forward to spring.
PS: Handkerchiefs are an even better choice for the environment. My father handed the handkerchief habit down to me, but alas my kids think it is a gross concept (ironically, they seem to be ok with using sleeves).
February 12th, 2009 at 3:37 pm
Hey Martin, thanks for the link! As you can see from my hankie post, people are really passionate about hankies– either pro or con. (Team Tiny Choices has actually deduced that folks are passionate about discussing bodily fluids in general, which is great fun). I’m a recent convert to the hankie camp and I’ll tell you, I’ll never go back. Your kids may think it’s gross but so does my mom, and she’s much older than them– so I don’t even think it’s necessarily only a generational issue as much as an exposure issue– you saw your dad using them so you understand the concept. Maybe by the time your kids are your age, they’ll get it too. Here’s hoping!
Jenn