Monday Moaning

This is a moan, but it’s more of awareness. An awareness that we landlubbers rarely see.

Here’s a glimpse.

Next time you buy a bottle of water, remember the baby albatross

Like finding rubbish on Everest, when I crossed the Atlantic I was dismayed to see so much plastic – and that kills seabirds

‘The particles of plastic, many of them ­minute, enter the food chain and do terrible damage to all forms of life.’ Photograph: Lucy Pemoni/AP

The picture of the baby albatross that starved to death after being fed nutritionally useless bits of plastic by its parents shows just what happens when we treat the world’s oceans as a handy system of waste disposal. A few years ago, I got a do-this-before-you-die chance to sail across the Atlantic, among the best things I’ve ever done.

One startling discovery was that the sea is actually a kind of desert. For most of the trip, we rarely saw a bird, we caught no fish, and the only living things apart from us were the Portuguese man-of-wars, evil-looking jelly fish that drifted by in ominous numbers on calm days. But, like discovering rubbish on Everest, there was always plastic. Big bits – weather buoys that had come adrift, fuel containers and suchlike – and small bits, and even smaller bits. There are 269,000 tonnes of these fragments, according to the newest estimate. They come mainly from single-use plastic containers like water bottles, but even so-called biodegradable plastic only degrades quickly in commercial composting systems.

The particles, many of them minute, enter the food chain and do terrible damage to all forms of life. And because they are not only on the surface but also suspended deep beneath, trying to remove them risks doing more environmental harm. So next time you buy bottled water, remember the baby albatross.

Source: TheGuardian

Simple Green Ideas

Some simple green ideas from the kitchen.

Hideaway trays for small bits and pieces

Source: Lushome

Now go and have a look at 9 more ways to use stuff and save space. So simple.

Make you Fink on Friday

Reblogged from EcoGrrl

Simple Green Ideas

We are always talking about recycling…

Then we go and buy these to recycle:

Plastic Recycle Bins

Does that make sense?

Is that being green?

Have you got some old wood around, a pallet, maybe?

Then be green!

Make something.

It doesn’t have to be fancy. It doesn’t even have to be in the kitchen.

It can be down the bottom of the garden, in or behind the shed.

But, please don’t use plastic and say you’re being green!

Change the World Wednesday – 23rd Jul

No photos to bore you with today.

Nothing really to update either;

Click the banner for the full post

So let’s roll right along with this week’s CTWW.

This week Small has done a bunk.

She’s M.I.A.

Actually, I knew this was coming, just didn’t know when. She’s moving.

Good luck! I hate moving house.

So, the CTWW is continuing what we did last week. Click on the CTWW banner or visit my last week’s CTWW post.

This week my old cellphone gave up the ghost. I can’t complain, it was given to me, the same as my first cellphone. I have had 10 years of cost free cellphones.

I eventually got a new one on Monday.

Steam Punk Cellphone

Of course, it’s made of plastic. Only Steam Punk cellphones are made of steel.

I had looked around some shops and all they had were smartphones, I didn’t want a smartphone, I am smart enough to figure most things out.

I eventually found a kiosk selling such items in another department store I visited.

Simple, camera, music, sms, qwerty keys and it even makes phone calls. $129 (about US$55); it fitted the budget.

I expected it to come coddled in plastic and was pleased to find that it didn’t.

Only the battery was sealed in a small plastic bag, that and the rest was packed in a simple cardboard box.

Now, I have the problem. How to dispose of an old cellphone. It’s not repairable, it was too old when I got it; so that is not an option. I am looking now for a responsible way to dump it.

Not so easy when you live so far out of town. The velho oeste (Wild West) where I live is devoid of such niceties.

In the meantime, it RIPs with other PC bits and pieces in a box waiting a solution.

Perhaps the monitor repair chappy, knows. When I see him next, I’ll ask.

My new cellphone, Fire Orange…

So that’s my continuation of last week’s CTWW on plastics.

Monday Moaning

Hidden Plastic

I got a surprise yesterday, reading a new blog found through their comment here.

The blog: Treading My Own Path

The post that caused me to blink…

The Scandalous Plastic in Tea Bags – Who Knew?

Oh tea-bags, you innocent-looking things, you. Thinking that just by turning yourselves into a delicious cup of tea I wouldn’t question you. In fact, I didn’t question you. Luckily for me, others did, which led me to this revelation: teabags contain plastic.

Source: Treading My Own Path – The Scandalous Plastic in Tea Bags – Who Knew? Read more of this great post, then come back and see if you agree with my opinion.

Opinion:

Teabags, apparently, contain a small amount of plastic. I didn’t know this, and I wager that you didn’t either.

Personally I am a coffee drinker, but I do enjoy the odd cuppa, especially if I’m crook (ill, for our American cousins), got a sore throat, a dodgy belly and the like.

When I drink tea, it is black (or green, or orange) without milk and sugar, which is why it is great for cleaning out dodgey bellies.

Because I drink so little tea, it is convenient to use teabags. There is also the fact that I have never seen loose tea in Brazilian supermarkets, but then I haven’t looked either; if it is here it doesn’t exactly jump out at you from the shelf.

But I will look.

Especially now that I know about the sneaky teabag plastic.

The blog post suggests that 165m teabags are used in UK alone. If you extrapolate that figure to a global one, the number must be staggering.

Evil, sneaky teabags

Once again we have a situation where our love of convenience (making a cuppa with a teabag) is, a] using oil reserves to make the plastic, and b]  creating a further problem with disposal.

And once again, companies don’t want us to know their dirty little secret.

I believe it is now our duty to spread the word, so that more people can make a cuppa with a choice, loose tea or teabag.

There’ll always be those who moan and say it’s not cost-effective to make a pot of tea when you’ve got those handy little teabags that make just the cuppa I need at the moment.

Tea tong

My mother had one of these in the kitchen drawer all my childhood. Sometimes it was used, although she usually brewed a pot for my father, he was not a coffee drinker.

I have not seen one for years, but browsing around just now, I see there are modern versions of the same thing.

I’ll check around, because if I can find loose tea, and a pair of these, teabags will become a thing of the past. And my life will be just a little greener.

Spread the word, so that this dirty little secret become common knowledge.

Simple Green Ideas

Here’s one. Those annoying clamshell containers.

You all had them, got them and out they go in the trash or recycle.

But wait, what can you use them for?

Have a check of Repurposeful for some ideas.

You can even get the kids involved, check out this video clip. Follow the links at the end, there’s no end of ideas.

 

Or you can do what I do. Wash them, stash them under the sink and use them for fridge containers for leftovers and cat food.

Beats Tupperware! Because you can see what’s inside and not forget it.

Change the World Wednesday – 2nd Apr

Update

The fruits of my labour…

An orange tree has sprouted from seeds I threw in a box, and some garlic on the left

 

Ginger grown from the green nodules broken off supermarket root

 

Self-sown tomatoes growing in the soil (my compost) from an ornamental plant

 

Pineapples grow slowly, but still growing

 

Passion fruit growing up the side of the house, ready for fruit next year

Good News

On Saturday we gained a new little sacolão (fruit and vege store) in the neighborhood. It’s only small, but handy; and only 30 metres (32 yards) from home.

Sacolão, small, but handy

And the good thing is they don’t get their produce from CEASA, the state supplier. With CEASA you can’t guarantee the source. But they get their produce from a smallholder in Teresópolis in the north of the state. They have a choice of organic and pesticide-free veges.

A small range of produce

And they’re not expensive.

They already know that I don’t like plastic bags and put the produce in my carry bag.

This morning when I took the photos, there was a big plastic bag of cauliflower trimmings, I asked and was able to take it to add to my compost heap. The bag… well, that will be used to put my recyclable water bottles in for the Tuesday recycle collection.

 

Click on the banner for the full post

On with this weeks CTWW.

This week it’s a biggie…

This week, begin by educating yourself on the ocean. Do a google search using the words “protect the ocean” and read some of the articles which come up. Visit the Marine Conservation Institute or NOAA for information.

 

THEN …

Choose one (or more) of the following activities:

• Say NO to plastic, especially plastic bottles and bags. The world’s largest “landfill” is floating in the North Pacific Ocean and consists of plastic.
• Contact your state officials and encourage them to vote against off-shore drilling.
• Walk, ride a bike, or take public transportation this week. If you must drive, drive less.
• Maintain your car and fix any leaks (oil on the pavement gets washed into storms drains and ultimately finds its way to the ocean). Never toss used oil down the drain.
• Avoid fish and seafood this week. If you must eat it, make sustainable and healthy choices (look for the Marine Stewardship Council label to ensure that it is sustainable and environmentally friendly).
• Take part in a beach clean-up.
• Eliminate the use of toxic chemicals in your home.
• Avoid the use of herbicides and pesticides.
• Scoop pet waste. Letting it sit on the lawn means that it will enter our waterways.
• Stay off the water. If you must boat, do so responsibly (don’t toss things into the water and use a human-powered boat rather than a gas-powered version).
• Dispose of all trash properly and pick up litter if you see it.

 

Leaves me breathless just reading it.

Part One

The plight of our oceans is disheartening. I have eluded to this in the past. Just because we can’t ‘see’ under the ocean, we seem to forget that is is just as susceptible to pollution and predation as the land.

The ocean is threatened by plastic. Obvious plastic that we can see the plastic strewn beaches, the Pacific gyre are a public disgrace; and the less obvious the micro-pellets from our washing machines that enter the water chain. The ocean also is affected by the run off of pesticides and agro-chemicals from our farmlands. Then there are stupid politicians who make assinine decisions like the Australians to dump millions of tons of waste on coral reefs like the Great Barrier Reef. The oceans are subject to warming which is changing habitats, the you have massive problems with radiation from the likes of Fukushima in Japan; already 100% of tuna caught off the American coast have levels above the acceptable limits for consumption.

The oceans aren’t safe for anyone, let alone the fish. The governments have stopped testing (American and Canadian) because the results are just too embarrassing. The latest IPCC report classifies Fukushima radiation as an ‘extinction event’. Oh, don’t get that wrong, it’s not just the fish that are affected, ALL LIFE on the planet will be affected. Cancer/radiation related deaths in babies, new borns and foetuses are already increasing on the west coast of the USA.

Now that’s just a tad more than serious.

Why isn’t this in the news? The governments don’t want you to know.

Furthermore, there are problems with over-fishing serious straining the life-cycles of marine life.

This week there was good news. Japan has been banned from it’s ‘research whaling’ (read commercial whaling in disguise) in Antarctic waters. Japan has said it will bide by the ruling, but are already looking at loopholes like reduced quotas.

So to put it in a nutshell, we have totally destroyed the planet.

Not only the visible portions, but the invisible as well.

Man’s irresponsibility is drawing us closer and closer to our own extinction.

It’s time we woke up!

It’s time we let the governments know!

It’s time we got rid of the incumbent arseholes and their pandering to the corporations.

We need to take the dog by the tail and wake the bloody thing up, because until we do, we’re f**ked!

This CTWW by Small is probably one of the most radical we face; certainly it is the most global.

We really need to educate the masses, because most of the populace is just sitting on its sanctimonious backside saying “oh, it’ll never happen!” They are lulled into complacency by the lack of news, the government’s ‘do nothing’ approach. And, worst of all the blatant bullshit of the deniers!

Well, I’ve got news for them: It is happening, here, it is happening now!

Part deux:

• While I am not perfect, there is plastic in my life, but I go out of my way to reduce it to a minimum.
• I am bound by public transport, no car; no car, less planetary resources used and wasted.
• I will not avoid fish, I consider that fish is an important dietary aspect. I do however, spurn fish like panga produced in the Asian sewer known as the Mekong River in Vietnam.
• I don’t go to the beach, but I am active and vocal in keeping our neighbourhood clean.
• I use products that are non or less toxic where possible.
• I am now shopping at the new sacolão who are supporting fruit and vege with no pesiticides and organic produce (this is a new aspect in my life).
• My pet waste is composted. The worms do a good job.

There you have it, my CTWW.

The Pacific Gyre

If you get closer, it looks like this…

Some of those plastic bottles may be yours…

Makes you proud, doesn’t it?

 

Change the World Wednesday – 12th Mar

Cloro was a great one for licking his nuts, apparently, he kept them in good working order…

I am crazy. It’s 2am and I’m at the keyboard with a tankard of iced sparkling mineral water, it’s too early for coffee; and too hot (I’m sweating). But don’t expect me to stay up and finish this, it’s just until I get sleepy again… then it will be crash until coffee.

I am still catless, but apparently not for long. You’ll have to read Legacy to find out why.

Carnaval is well in the past, back to work. The garis (street sweepers) and council have reached an agreement and are back to work.

My PC is still behaving like a PC should, so it seems as though my troubles are over for the present, despite the fact that it looks like a gutted box beside me with its blinking lights.

I like the lights blinking on and in the PC, they’re a comfort, they indicate that things are as they should be.

I had an interesting conversation with a fregües (regular) at the bar during the week. He uses disposable cups for his beer, which I think is totally crass.

The terrible convenience

The bar has them for the kids who buy soda to drink in the praça (park) and some of the regulars have taken to using them for beer.

I challenged him on it. He just considered a convenience. When I asked him how many barrels of oil would be wasted in his lifetime just for his convenience, he replied, “guilty as charged.” Now this guy is no fool, he’s a maritime engineer, but even for educated Brazilian, it’s hard to get the message across. The next time I saw him at the bar… yes, he was still using a disposable cup.

Click on the banner for the full post

On with this week’s CTWW. It’s a good one and I can get right into it.

If you haven’t already done so, replace at least one incandescent light bulb with a CFL or LED bulb.

 

OR … If you have switched all your bulbs to Eco-friendly varieties, please conduct a brief analysis of your home furnishings. Are items sustainable and Eco-friendly, made from materials like bamboo, cork, or recycled content? Were they made locally? How many pieces are second hand? Do any items contain foam (cushions, pads, etc.) which typically are treated with fire retardants (toxic chemicals)? Has anything been varnished or finished with lacquers (both contain harmful pollutants)? Do you have wood furniture? If so, do you know where the wood came from and whether or not the trees were sustainably grown? The idea, here, is to start thinking about the sustainability of our furnishings and raise our awareness on the types of items we should both support and avoid.

Part One I am in the process of changing over, as much as I was against CFLs initially, because of disposal and breakage problems, I have had to toe the line, because in Brazil this year incandescent light bulbs will become illegal, to make and to sell.

I would prefer LEDs, but I haven’t found them in our part of town yet, we do live out in the styx a bit when it comes to innovation. You see people think that Rio stops after you have passed the posh suburbs of Barra da Tijuca and Recreio, once you go over the hill Grota Funda (now you can go through it, we’ve got a tunnel) the world ends. But I will keep looking.

Part Two (This will have to wait until the real morning, you know with coffee and daylight)

Daylight √

Coffee √

Okay, we’re ready to continue…

At the start of summer I made a big purchase; not a thing I do often. I bought two new fans.

Now fans here in Brazil, and probably everywhere, are big on plastic.

You can see them in all the stores.

In my efforts to avoid plastic, it was a criteria that I set myself.

I found what I was looking for a nearly all metal model.

One was an upright, the other on a tube base for a table.

The only visible plastic is the name plate on the front, the blades and the small clips to hold the front grill in place.

So yes, I consider the environment when I buy.

Now as for the rest of my furnishings.

In the living room, I have two new items, a coffee table and a bookcase stand; both are made of wood. But the wood is a composite type, which I consider more ecological that real wood because it is usually made from recycled wood.

Everything else is second hand and some is just boxes, like my beer box.

Oh, there is another one on the other side of the TV for my wine bottle candle holders.

My sofas, 3 & 2 seat, were rescued from the street as discards by a neighbour, they have foam in them, actually they had foam in them, there is not as much as there should be. But to compensate for this, the one I use most is covered by a camp mattress and a blanket and the cushion is an old doubled over pillow.

So rather than rushing out and buying new stuff, I make do with what’s available. When I do, I do consider the environment as well as the cost, because I can be a real Scrooge.

Satireday on Eco-Crap