Green Christmas… Ho ho ho!

Change the World Wednesday – 17th Dec

Yes, there is a CTWW today.

Don’t buy it, make it!

Do something extraordinary, totally outside your box.

An example, ham, a traditional seasonal meat (yes, I know you veges and vegans won’t like this, but there are still a few normal people left).

Everybody who does, rushes out at this time of the year to buy the expensive traditional foods for Christmas and the New Year. Prices are bumped up because the shops know you’ll buy it.

Loevly ham

Well, DON’T!

Make it.

Oh, I can just hear you all now, “make ham, don’t be stupid, that’s too hard!”

I can assure you it’s not.

Ham can be made from almost any piece of pork, big or small. I’m not suggesting that you buy a whole 20lb leg of pork, maybe half if you have a big family gathering planned, maybe a smaller piece of loin. I have made it from inch thick pork chops before.

Basically, the fresh raw meat needs to be pickled in brine. A big piece, two or three days, smaller pieces a couple of hours. Washed, dried, and baked off in the oven or simply in 170ºF water until the inner temperature reaches 155ºF; if your pork piece is about 3lb it will take about 3 hours. You’ll need a meat thermometer to measure this. There is the option of smoking, but not evryone has a smoker.

You’ll need one of these

Many recipes call for a cure, to me that just complicates things, you don’t need a cure. Other recipes call for juniper berries and others, you don’t need them, use whole cloves and bay leaves.

Check this site out for some tips and a brine recipe. Remember forget the cure.

Maybe ham isn’t your thing, try something else a traditional Christmas cake, or a steamed fruit pudding. There are plenty of recipes on the net, you just have to look.

Part of the secret of this challenge is returning the spirit to Christmas, taking power back from the companies and commercial interests.

Have a Merry Christmas, and I’ll be back next week… maybe I’ll have a surprise.

Change the World Wednesday – 26th Nov

A sure sign that it’s Christmas… Small is taking a break until the New Year.

It’s been a quiet week, not a lot has happened.

We’ve had some rain since last CTWW, and are expecting more today, possibly a storm. The weather change over the weekend left me all stuffed up, but getting over that now.

Click the banner for full post

This week’s CTWW is not so much a CTWW as a plea for help by Small.

What would you like to see on Reduce Footprints in 2015?

Pop on over to see the rest on her blog and add some ideas.

Me, I don’t have much. I rather like her blog. I don’t follow product reviews, nor Special offers, not on any blog. Some of the recipes I like, even though they tend toward the vegan. Meet & Greet, I think that needs a facelift. I must admit since it was reduced to once a month, I have been rather lax about participating because I forget it.

However, I am going to throw out a challenge.

Once Thanksgiving is over people begin thinking about Christmas trees.

A slow Christmas death

The last thing the world needs is another dead tree.

Please don’t do it. Don’t kill another tree.

If you must use the imitation tree you saved from last year, but don’t buy another.

Think outside the box; in fact you can use the box, or just branches, or just your imagination.

If you don’t like this, search ‘alternative christmas tree’ on Google, there are plenty of ideas there.

But please don’t fall victim to commercial products, or become a serial Christmas tree killer.

Change the World Wednesday – 19th Nov

Is it too early for seasons’ greetings?

Christmas is just five weeks away. Somehow, I don’t seem that excited any more.

We finally had two days of rain, not torrential stuff, but it wet the ground and brought some new life to the praça.

The plants I donated to the botequim are doing nicely, better than they did alongside the house where they only got sun for half the day. They are all showing new growth.

My herbs are also doing well. The guava tree is full of fruit and I have harvested three lots of chillies. The passion fruit vines are growing prolifickly and I watch each day for signs of the first flowers

Click the banner for full post

With the silly season nearly upon us CTWW is seasonally appropriate.

Cheers!

If you are planning to entertain friends and family this season, and plan to serve “adult” beverages, do a little research and plan an Eco-friendly bar. Here are some things to consider:

• Wine is the most Eco-friendly alcoholic beverage. Choose organic varieties which don’t include preservatives. While boxed wine may not look classy, it is the most earth-friendly of wine packaging options. Glass bottles would be the next choice.
• If you’re serving beer, cans are better than bottles because they weigh less which gives them a lower carbon footprint.
• Opt for liquors and wine with natural cork instead of synthetic corks or metal tops.
• Avoid frosted bottles. Chemicals are used to create them.
• Look for beverages which are distilled locally and check that the company uses minimal energy and water to create their libations.
• Serve drinks in glass rather than plastic and use glass straws.
• Use cloth cocktail napkins instead of paper.
• Use local, organic fruits and herbs in mixed drinks. And don’t forget organic “munchies” to go along with the cocktails.
• Make ice in an ice tray rather than use the automatic ice maker in the refrigerator. You’ll use less energy.

The idea, this week, is to plan ahead to ensure that your home bar is “green”.

OR …

If you aren’t including alcohol in your celebrations, make plans to “green” any get-togethers you are hosting or attending. Consider local, organic foods and reusable serving pieces. If you are traveling to an event, share a ride with others. Use natural elements to decorate. Supply visitors with comfy slippers or socks so that they will feel comfortable to remove their shoes at the door.

 

OR …

If you’ll be spending quiet time at home this season, plan to make the experience green. Use all the ideas above, on a smaller scale, to make your personal time fun and Eco-friendly.

Well, the purple bit doesn’t apply, that’s just plain silly. Imagine Christmas and New Year without a tipple ot two, takes all the fun out of it.

I’m not planning on anything extravagant, so I’ll do the blue bit with the green bits added.

Screw tops I leave on the shelf

Yes, wine will be included. Some orgnic wines are appearing here in Brazil, but they are invariably stoppered with synthetic corks or screw-tops, both of which I try to avoid, particularly the latter; I hate them. When I buy wine, it sometimes sits for years before I get to drink it, so cardboard is out; besides, I think that is so tacky. Boxed wine also has a plastic bladder, so I wonder at the environmental value of boxed wine.

I refuse beer in cans, mainly. With the exception of three options; Guinness, Murphy’s Stout (both imported as cans) and a São Paulo beer that is only available in cans. Beer cans are lined with BPA or BPS, and for that reason I avoid them.

Non-alcoholic drinks, soda, etc don’t feature in my celebrations, unless for the kids, that’s unavoidable. But I do make fresh fruit juice with no added sugar.

There are some beers here in Brazil that are made with GMO corn, I refuse to buy them as well.

Plastic, wouldn’t consider it.

Plastic cups… I continue in my crusade at the bar to get the regulars to return to glass. Even at work, I encourage my students to drink from glass rather than the disposable cups provided by my bossette.

At the botequim, if there is a spill, we use cloths to wipe up. Generally speaking serious drinkers don’t spill their drinks, but it does happen, and there is the condesation that drips of bottles and glasses, that also gets the cloth treatment.

Pestiscos (bar snacks, munchies), I prefer to make my own at home and take to the bar, which I share around of course; they are always welcomed. Organic they may not be, but they are better than the flour-based commercial ones.

I wouldn’t consider using an auto-ice maker, all my ice is made in ice trays. Domestic appliances like this I consider a waste of resources that panders to consumerism.

So within limits, I do adhere to green principles, even for the silly season; and beyond.

Not a CTWW Post – 25th Dec

Day off…

BBQ for ex and kids today.

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas.

I Boobed

Yesterday was Monday, need I say more?

The above is a hypothetical question, it doesn’t need an answer.

With PC problems, internet problems, best part of two days with almost no access I got confused and posted today’s post instead of Monday Moaning

😦

So today you get…

Not a CTWW Post – 18th Dec

This was me yesterday

OMG, now it’s Thursday.

I had so much on yesterday. Read Not a Damned Thing and you’ll see why.

I didn’t even get the dishes done! Oh, wait, that’s normal.

The plants only got watered because it rained overnight.

I got some blogging done, mostly minimal posts with a single, but pertinent, image. By the time it got to 11pm, I ran out of steam. I typed in the title, and stared at a blank screen for several distraught moments and decided the best place was bed; as I wasn’t in bed, I rectified the situation.

Do you ever have those days?

So, what does one do on a CTWW, that’s not a CTWW on a Wednesday,  but a Thursday?

Does it even qualify?

We are all gearing up for the Silly Season, heck it’s only a week away, and I haven’t been near a shop. I don’t intend to go near a shop until after New Year.

My thoughts are on how we can recycle for Christmas.

I saw this lovely image that represents recycling, so a quick plug for the site from which it was purloined.

If you are lucky enough to live near Buxton Market Place they may be doing the same thing as last year, check the link, and offering to accept your unwanted presents in return for something you want.

A Bit of History

Many people are under the impression that it was Coca Cola who turned Santa Claus red. Certainly from the 1930s Coca Cola has capitalised on a red Santa as it suits their corporate colours.

But Santa was based on Saint Nicholas of Myra, Turkey, who was a bishop in the 3rd century. The red and white comes from the colour of the bishop’s robes.

My Not a CTWW challenge this week, is to avoid any product that uses a commercialised form of Santa Claus. Now in today’s commercialised world that is a hard one.

Leave a comment tell me the about what you hate about the commercialisation of  Christmas, or the worst advertising you’ve seen.

Mine, here in Brazil, is a TV ad that implies, in fact brainwashes you into thinking that only Coca Cola can bring you happiness and joy. Every time I see that ad I want to puke.

Oh, and Christmas carols in shops and stores…

Don’t get me started.

 

A Green Christmas

“As we finish up the year 2011, I want to thank all of you for your educational posts over the past year.

I am so totally screwed up now and have little chance of recovery!I no longer open a bathroom door without using a paper towel, or have the waitress put lemon slices in my ice water without worrying about the bacteria on the lemon peel.I can’t use the remote in a hotel room because I don’t know what the last person was doing while flipping through the adult movie channels.

I can’t sit down on the hotel bedspread because I can only imagine what has happened on it since it was last washed, and maybe it has never been washed.

I have trouble shaking hands with someone who has been driving because the number one pastime while driving alone is picking one’s nose.

Eating a little snack sends me on a guilt trip because I can only imagine how many gallons of trans fats I have consumed over the years.

I can’t touch any woman’s purse for fear she has placed it on the floor of a public restroom.

I must send my special thanks to whoever sent me the one about rat poop in the glue on envelopes because I now have to use a wet sponge with every envelope that needs sealing.

Also, now I have to scrub the top of every can I open for the same reason.

I no longer have any savings because I took it all out of every bank, since they are all insolvent and ready to go under, but, now I can’t sleep because of the large lump in my mattress.

I also gave a considerable amount of money to a sick girl on the internet (Penny Brown) who is about to die for the 1,387,258th time (sent in care of George Soros).

Now I am really short on money, but that will change once I receive the $15,000 that Bill Gates/Microsoft and AOL are sending me for participating in their special e-mail program.

Or, that check from Bernie Made-off will finally arrive! Afterall, he promised, and it IS overdue.

I no longer worry about my soul because I have 363,214 angels looking out for me, and St. Theresa’s Novena has granted my every wish.

I can’t have a drink in a bar because I’ll wake up in a bathtub full of ice with one of my kidneys gone.

I can’t eat at KFC because their chickens are actually horrible mutant freaks with no eyes, feet or feathers.

I can’t use cancer-causing deodorants even though I smell like a water buffalo on a hot day.

Thanks to you I have learned that my prayers only get answered if I forward an e-mail to seven of my friends and make a wish within five minutes.

Because of your concern, I no longer drink Coca Cola because it can remove toilet stains and takes rust off of car battery bolts.

I no longer buy gas without taking someone along to watch the car so a serial killer doesn’t crawl in my back seat when I’m filling up, or someone walks by with a credit card remote reader and steals all my personal financial info.

I no longer use Plastic Wrap in the microwave because it causes seven different types of cancer.

And thanks for letting me know I can’t boil a cup of water in the microwave anymore because it will blow up in my face, disfiguring me for life.

I no longer go to the movies because I could be pricked with a needle infected with AIDS when I sit down.  Or there are bed bugs in the seats.

I no longer go to shopping malls because someone will drug me with a perfume sample and rob me.

And I no longer answer the phone because someone will ask me to dial a number for which I will get a phone bill with calls to Jamaica, Uganda, Singapore, and Uzbekistan.

I no longer buy cookies from Girl Scouts since I now have their secret recipes.

Thanks to you I can’t use anyone’s toilet but mine because a big black snake could be lurking under the seat and cause me instant death when it bites my butt.

And thanks for that great advice I can’t ever pick up a coin dropped in the parking lot because it probably was placed there by a molester waiting to grab me as I bend over.
‧

I can’t do any gardening because I’m afraid I’ll get bitten by the deadly Violin Spider and my hand will fall off.If you don’t send this e-mail to at least 144,000 people in the next 70 minutes, a large dove with diarrhea will land on your head at 5:00 p.m tomorrow afternoon, and the fleas from 120 camels will infest your back, causing you to grow a hairy hump.  I know this will occur because it actually happened to a friend of my next door neighbor’s ex-mother-in-law’s second husband’s cousin’s best friend’s beautician…Oh, by the way… A German scientist from Argentina, after a lengthy study, has discovered that people with insufficient brain activity read their e-mail with their hand on the mouse. Don’t bother taking it off now, it’s too late.

P.S.: I also now keep my toothbrush in the living room, because I was told by e-mail that germ-infested water splashes over 6 feet out of the toilet.”
‧

“NOW YOU ALL HAVE YOURSELVES A VERY GOOD DAY, AND HAVE A GREAT CHRISTMAS!”

Author Unknown

Source: Running ‘Cause I Can’t Fly

Change the World Wednesday – 12th Dec

On a roll, and can’t stop.

Read this yesterday morning…

On the 12th day of Christmas … your gift will just be junk

Every year we splurge on pointless, planet-trashing products, most of which are not wanted. Why not just bake them a cake?

Illustration by Daniel Pudles

There’s nothing they need, nothing they don’t own already, nothing they even want. So you buy them a solar-powered waving queen; a belly-button brush; a silver-plated ice cream tub-holder; a “hilarious” inflatable Zimmer frame; a confection of plastic and electronics called Terry the Swearing Turtle; or – and somehow I find this significant – a Scratch Off World Map.

They seem amusing on the first day of Christmas, daft on the second, embarrassing on the third. By the twelfth they’re in landfill. For 30 seconds of dubious entertainment, or a hedonic stimulus that lasts no longer than a nicotine hit, we commission the use of materials whose impacts will ramify for generations.

Researching her film The Story of Stuff, Annie Leonard discovered that, of the materials flowing through the consumer economy, only 1% remain in use six months after sale. Even the goods we might have expected to hold on to are soon condemned to destruction through either planned obsolescence (wearing out or breaking quickly) or perceived obsolesence (becoming unfashionable).

But many of the products we buy, especially for Christmas, cannot become obsolescent. The term implies a loss of utility, but they had no utility in the first place. An electronic drum-machine T-shirt; a Darth Vader talking piggy bank; an ear-shaped iPhone case; an individual beer can chiller; an electronic wine breather; a sonic screwdriver remote control; bacon toothpaste; a dancing dog. No one is expected to use them, or even look at them, after Christmas day. They are designed to elicit thanks, perhaps a snigger or two, and then be thrown away.

The fatuity of the products is matched by the profundity of the impacts. Rare materials, complex electronics, the energy needed for manufacture and transport are extracted and refined and combined into compounds of utter pointlessness. When you take account of the fossil fuels whose use we commission in other countries, manufacturing and consumption are responsible for more than half of our carbon dioxide production. We are screwing the planet to make solar-powered bath thermometers and desktop crazy golfers.

People in eastern Congo are massacred to facilitate smartphone upgrades of ever diminishing marginal utility. Forests are felled to make “personalised heart-shaped wooden cheese board sets”. Rivers are poisoned to manufacture talking fish. This is pathological consumption: a world-consuming epidemic of collective madness, rendered so normal by advertising and by the media that we scarcely notice what has happened to us.

In 2007, the journalist Adam Welz records, 13 rhinos were killed by poachers in South Africa. This year, so far, 585 have been shot. No one is entirely sure why. But one answer is that very rich people in Vietnam are now sprinkling ground rhino horn on their food, or snorting it like cocaine to display their wealth. It’s grotesque, but it scarcely differs from what almost everyone in industrialised nations is doing: trashing the living world through pointless consumption.

This boom has not happened by accident. Our lives have been corralled and shaped in order to encourage it. World trade rules force countries to participate in the festival of junk. Governments cut taxes, deregulate business, manipulate interest rates to stimulate spending. But seldom do the engineers of these policies stop and ask, “spending on what?” When every conceivable want and need has been met (among those who have disposable money), growth depends on selling the utterly useless. The solemnity of the state, its might and majesty, are harnessed to the task of delivering Terry the Swearing Turtle to our doors.

Grown men and women devote their lives to manufacturing and marketing this rubbish, and dissing the idea of living without it. “I always knit my gifts,” says a woman in a TV ad for an electronics outlet. “Well you shouldn’t,” replies the narrator. An ad for a Google tablet shows a father and son camping in the woods. Their enjoyment depends on the Nexus 7’s special features. The best things in life are free, but we’ve found a way of selling them to you.

The growth of inequality that has accompanied the consumer boom ensures that the rising economic tide no longer lifts all boats. In the US in 2010, a remarkable 93% of the growth in incomes accrued to the top 1% of the population. The old excuse, that we must trash the planet to help the poor, simply does not wash. For a few decades of extra enrichment for those who already possess more money than they know how to spend, the prospects of everyone else who will live on this Earth are diminished.

So effectively have governments, the media and advertisers associated consumption with prosperity and happiness that to say these things is to expose yourself to opprobrium and ridicule. Witness last week’s edition of Radio 4’s The Moral Maze, in which most of the panel lined up to decry the idea of consuming less, and to associate it somehow with authoritarianism. When the world goes mad, those who resist are denounced as lunatics.

Bake them a cake, write them a poem, give them a kiss, tell them a joke, but for God’s sake stop trashing the planet to tell someone you care. All it shows is that you don’t.

George Monbiot

How right he is, we are literally trashing the planet to buy and give presents that are, in the main, useless trash.

The challenge

Show that you care this Christmas, find some alternative way of showing that you care.

or

If you must give a present, make something from recycled materials.

Change the World Wednesday – 23rd Nov

Emerson & Erick flying a kite in the street

After a heavy tropical rainstorm overnight which I was afraid would threaten the peace and harmony, not to mention the power, here we are. The power cut never happened.

I mentioned last week about the ‘amendoeira’ tree in our front yard shading the house. In the photo of Emerson & Erick (my stepsons) you can see that the whole front of the house was in the shade afforded by that tree on a sunny day.

This weeks Change the World Wednesday challenge:

This week make a conscious effort to waste no food. If you need some ideas on how to accomplish this, please read the article referenced in the previous paragraph.

Or …
If you never, ever waste even a morsel of food … WOW … you are a hero. Pat yourself on the back and then sit back and relax in the knowledge that you are doing a great thing for the earth!

I would early love to say that I can sit back and relax, but I can’t.

I am very conscious of food waste at home. This comes from having a very wasteful wife many years ago. I am by nature frugal and I don’t like waste. My ex would hop across to the supermarket and buy silverbeet for a meal, when we had fabulous silverbeet in the garden; that used to bug the shit out of me.

The yield of a side of hogget

Veges & Vegans should avert their eyes and jump to the next paragraph.

I also used to buy a whole side of hogget (I don’t think Americans have this, it’s the stage between lamb and mutton) and butcher it in the kitchen, making packs of chops, the leg, stripping the fat off the flank for stewing and bone out the shoulder and stuff it for roasting. Then into the freezer rather than buy individual cuts of meat from the butcher which were more expensive.

I have also suffered some financially lean times during my life where frugality was essential; most of us have. I still have this tendency. I hate waste, but I’m not perfect, there are the odd times when a part cabbage ends up on the compost heap (I bought a small half and then only used a quarter) like last week. Then there are times when I cook too much, usually it goes into the fridge or freezer for left-overs, but sometimes I dally too long and it has to go. It’s difficult to cater for a household of one. I even think twice before I scrape the half eaten fritter off my plate (last weekend), I even cringe a little.

As I am not catering for Christmas this year… again, there won’t be any excessive waste. But I can’t say that I don’t have any.

So I guess I am part way between the two parts of the challenge. While I can’t relax, I don’t chuck much; I still remain vigilant.

Update:

I have added ginger to my garden. If you have a little space, it’s so easy to grow.

.

.