Satireday on Eco-Crap

Monday Moaning

Why must we do it?

Why must we continually threaten the planet?

Almost everything man does in the wake of 20th century technology has a price, and that price is the destruction of our planet.

When are we finally going to wake up?

The answer is simple, NEVER!

At least not until it’s too damned late and we are the last species living on a non-productive dirt ball.

The rich have this insatiable need to get richer and to hell with the consequences; the governments have this insatiable need to conquer and dominate and to hell with the consequences.

Yesterday I read an article in The Guardian that says that “M&S, Co-op and Sainsbury’s say chickens will be fed on GM soya

As three more supermarkets drop their bans, the industry is accused of caving in to cartels and GM food giants”

The RSPB says the number of birds affected by the spill has now reached 4,000 – image: BBC News

Today I read in an article in BBC News that “Shipping chemical ‘unsafe for birds'” and it is legal under maritime law to discharge the chemical into the sea.

It is the chemical polyisobutene (PIB) that has been responsible for the sticky deaths of 4,000 seabirds on the shores of Britain.

PIB is chemical is used as a lubricant in ships’ engines, but not only, it is also used in chewing gum, cosmetics, adhesives and sealants.

We are going from bad to worse.

With the latest decision by major supermarkets you won’t be able to buy a GM Free chicken in Britain, unless you buy from a free range farmer.

If PIB is killing seabirds, what’s it doing to the fish we eat?

PIB is considered low risk and non-toxic, but the same source says limited information. In other words… We don’t really know!

Is it killing them, or simply contaminating them so they enter our food chain?

During the week also I read about ‘Super Wheat’ 15% greater yield, resistant to fungus, will be available within two years. Has this been tested for suitability for human consumption, will it ever be until it is foisted on us all in our daily bread as guinea pigs?

AH, who cares?

Change the World Wednesday – 3rd April

Running a bit late this morning. Big tropical rainstorm last night lots of rain, lots of lightning and lots of wind. The net went down. for a couple of hours. But that is normal for the Third World, you get used to it.

Last week’s CTWW was about your water footprint.

Boy did I get a surprise.

1848

Initially, I thought it was ho-hum, at least I did until I saw reports of 100+ and 400+.

Then I went, oh dear!

I wasn’t doing so well. My big culprit was food, or more specifically meat.

In Small’s last week’s CTWW gave these figures:

• Beef 1 kg = 15,500 lt of water
• Pork = 4,800 lt
• Chicken = 3,900 lt

Now while that isn’t an end all definitive list, it did show me that the amount of beef that I consume (Oh, I do love a BBQ) was where I unwittingly used most of my ‘hidden’ water.

After much gnashing of teeth I thought about what I could do.

The result is that I have imposed on myself two beefless weeks each month. Monday – Sunday, the first full and third weeks  of each month.

I am now in the middle of my first week.

Last night at the supermarket, I bought no beef, only chicken for three days, pork for one day and fish for two days (I already have fish in the fridge for one day). I have bacon to make a bacon & egg pie and ham for snacks.

By doing this I have roughly halved my beef intake.

Even Lixo P. Cat has joined the the effort.

Not by choice, I might add.

He is having chicken as his meat supplement instead of mincemeat (ground beef for our American cousins), and fish ‘flavoured’ dry cat food that probably doesn’t have any actual fish in it as much as his meat ‘flavoured’ doesn’t not have any actual meat in it.

My Lixo is a ‘green’ cat.

When I unpack from the supermarket, Lixo is a great helper. He carefully inspects each item as it goes into either the cupboard or fridge.

Last night as the last item was hidden from his feline eyes. He looked up at me quizzically and ‘meowed’, and I could just read his mind… “Where’s the beef?”

Onward!

Click for the full post

This week’s CTWW.

This week, apply the three R’s (Reduce, Reuse and Recycle) to CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray Discs, etc.

Once again, it’s rather a large challenge to hop across to Reduce Footprints to read the rest, just click on the banner and you’ll be transported from Kansas…

I am already green here. I haven’t bought a CD for music in years, I download from the net. The same with films, although I do have one or two currently. I have in the past given DVDs to neighbours when I am done with them, so they have been recycled.

I wouldn’t use a CD as a coaster, because coasters need to be absorbent or you drip condensation all down your front.

But I can imagine that they could be used decoratively as dangly things in the wind, like chimeless wind chimes.

As for disposal, Brazil is just not up with this type of specialised recycling and if they were added to the ‘plastics’ would no doubt be discarded at the recycling plant. Anyway, in our area we don’t have selective recycling for anything.

You do see this in ‘posh’ areas, but Zona Oeste (West Zone) is not ‘posh’ enough

Our recycling is more like this…

Catadores roaming the streets looking for stuff to sell on

That’s about it for this week, on with my beefless week… Chicken for lunch!