Good Morning! This morning I woke to the wonderful sound of little DiMudugno girls' voices streaming up the stairs...so I came down to join them and their fabulous parents for coffee.
We have since been talking about Why trash exists and Where trash goes, Why can't the planet process it...and then I logged on and noticed Nate's comment asking about YERT's rules for the road, so I thought now's a good time to address them.
So, here it is, basically one rule that the others fall under-#1 RULE for TRASH: All 3 of us must fit our collective monthly garbage into one plastic "shoebox" (the goal, of course, being not to fill it).
CAVEAT: We are using toilet paper. And no, it does not go in the box.
#2 RULE: Try not to buy anything in a container, even a recyclable one.
CAVEAT: We are considering the possibility that at some point, when we are not staying with friends or family, and are having to be money conscious and are hungry, we might consider buying peanut butter in a jar. We will see if that becomes necessary.
Our goal is to make as little waste as possible, and since the process of recycling does use quite a bit of energy and loses materials in the process, (degrading the leftover components each time), staying out of the waste stream altogether seems preferable even to recycling.
#3. RULE: No fast food.
CAVEAT: We can go in to refill water bottles from their soda machines.
We learned in Albuquerque that we were going to need to remember our abc's going into an eating establishment:
A. ASK IMMEDIATELY for help from food-preparers/waiters in our quest to make no waste (super important, as food service workers have a certain protocol that will be administered to your order right away unless they are made aware before it's processed).
B. Bring Bandanas (for napkins)
C. Carry Cutlery (thank you To-Go Ware)
Ch. Chicobags!!!
T. Tote Tupperware (for leftovers that will travel with us in the car)
W. Waterbottles (in case of no glasses) and Watch out for toothpicks.
That spells ABCChTW! Which is short for "failure to plan is planning to fail."
so, how are we doing?
This photo shows what's in the box at Day 12. (Don't worry, there is still plenty of room for compression).
Its contents are Clif bar wrappers (Clifbar donated a box of their goodies to our trip before we left - Thank you Clif!), plastic wrapping and paper packaging from HD videotapes and Ben's Final Cut box, a couple of kleenexes which got used when handkerchiefs were forgotten (sorry, Mom! Mom donated 3 score of hankies to the cause), scraps of paper that got scribbled on before we thought about what we were doing, a paper cup w/plastic top and straw from an after-hours McDonald's Drive-Thru when all 4 of our own water bottles were empty and we were becoming dehydrated, a dead mini-carabiner from off one of the Chicobags, one pair dead earphones that didn't make it through the washer and dryer at Meghan's house, the plastic ring top to a bottle of Cranberry Extract (for Ben's kidney's) and 3 individual foil/plastic packages for antibiotic (also for Ben), and one plastic water bottle that I drank out of, in a semi-asleep state, when we arrived in Barnegat Bay (water that our wonderful host provided for us next to our beds). so, be alert! hahaha
Last night we visited a terrific family in Maplewood, NJ, where the subject of cleaning up after your dog raised another issue: Is it better to dispose of animal waste in a way that keeps harmful bacteria from leaching out into the landfill (ie: non-biodegradable bags and diapers) or is it better to use degradable bags so that eventually the waste will return to organic matter and the bag won't be left behind. Thoughts?
We'll keep trucking.
1 comment:
My personal opinion (speaking largely from ignorance on the subject) is that dog crap has always been around - surely it served some useful purpose fertilizer-wise in earlier centuries. The bottom line is if we fed our pets better food (ie. something other than mysterious animal parts containing dubious steroids and funky chemicals) we might not have to worry so much about terrible bacteria. Dogs, humans, cats are all part of nature - plastic bags are not. Nature has perfected the art of filtering herself if we would only stay out of her way. My vote: there must be some way to biodegrade dog poop etc. over time usefully that doesn't compromise the environment or human health. I say NO BAGS (unless biodegradable).
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