throw them in the washer, hot water and some bleach. Throw them in the dryer with a pair of tennis shoes knotted into a pillow case. (the tennis shoes beat the pillow stuffing and the pillow case keeps the rubber from the tennis shoes’ bottoms from burning onto the dryer drum.
Then, after the pillows are dry, rip the pillow cover, pull out the stuffing, and pull it apart to refluff. Then you can use it for stuffing crafts items and stuff. Or don’t rip open the pillow, the pillow might then be clean smelling enough to reuse.
We take the two insulated bags and about half a dozen cloth or string bags. The string bags take up almost no space, and in fact I carry one in my purse in case of impulse buys. If we do end up buying more groceries than will fit in our bags, why then we will use the paper or plastic bags that the store has on hand. I do like to keep a few of those paper bags on hand at all times, for craft projects. I also keep one paper bag on the floor, on its side, so that the cats can play in it. It’s a free cat toy!
As for how we determined how many bags to buy and use…we were pretty consistent in buying about 6-8 grocery bags’ worth of merchandise each week. So we bought two insulated bags and half a dozen string bags. A couple of the string bags broke, and we replaced them with the cloth tote bags. We find that one string or cloth bag holds just about as much as a plastic grocery bag, or a little less than a completely full paper bag.
As an added bonus, we don’t bring home roach eggs from the paper grocery bags. I’ve read that this is a frequent cause of roach infestation.
Our cats love boxes! I swear, everything we’ve ever bought them (with the notable exception of the tethered feather toy) has been one big yawn to them. But put down a box, and they have hours of fun with it. Jane, our male cat, will cozy up inside a box with the apparent notion that he is “safe” from everything including Jezzy, our female cat. If you try to pet him while he’s in his box, he gives you this look like, “You cannot possibly be touching me. Can’t you see I’m in my box!?”
I also use cloth tote bags, of which I have about a half-dozen, when I go shopping. For a typical “small shop,” I can fit it into one bag; otherwise, I bring two or three.
Actually, my dad still uses handkerchiefs! Puts a fresh one into his pockets every day!
As for grocery bags, I get the plastic ones at the store and reuse them. I use them as garbage bags for my small trash cans; I use them for soiled cat litter; I use them when I take my lunch to work.
I totally agree with the OP. What about people who use paper cups and plates on a daily basis? That bugs me. Although, I do use Swiffer cloths… They just do such a better job than a broom alone.
I’ve not such a problem with paper towels etc, they’ll decompose eventually. It’s all the ‘disposable’ plastic crud that gets made that worries me. That plastic isn’t going anywhere, it’s now going to be someplace on the planet forever. Unless you burn it, which isn’t that clean either.
It needs hammered into people’s heads that ‘disposing’ of something doesn’t cause it to vanish. All wonderful ‘disposable’ consumer goods should be relabelled “throwable into a big pile that’s someone else’s problem”, like those by the ever-expanding dump, or your children’s children who end up living on top of it.
What we need is more universal adoption of the Polluter Pays Policy. If a company is going to sell and market this rubbish on the basis that it’s ‘disposable’ they should pay for its disposal. Tax them heavily for every one sold. Naturally, this cost will be passed onto the consumer and suddenly ‘disposable’ won’t seem so attractive. You want the advantages of being so idle that you can’t be bothered cleaning and reusing something? Then you pay through the nose for it. You don’t get to create a mountain of junk that someone else has to live with.
I know animal shelters often ask for old towels and blankets for the animals, maybe they could use pillows too? I’m sure they don’t care if they smell bad :).
I agree 100% with the OP. Society’s greed for convenience has really gotten out of hand. And the “slices of peanut butter” that QuarkChild mentioned totally creeped me out. I get a sneaking suspicion that the Western obesity epidemic is due not only to overeating and high fat content in foods, but also due to the fact that each new thing that makes our lives easier also requires us to move less and less. e.g. turn of the century wringer washers - you needed elbow grease to get your laundry done. Now? Very little effort required. I can hear calories building up all over the continent.
About 70% of my household waste goes to be recycled. If I didn’t live in an apartment, I’d use a composter too - they’re great for making use of organic waste.
But yeah, I think it’s time for household products, especially cleaning products, to become a lot more eco-friendly. The aforementioned disposable toilet brush things especially are a huge, unnecessary waste of resources. Screw convenience.
I have income and am willing to spend it on convenience, environment be damned. I’m unconvinced of the efficacy of recylcing in the slightest. If I can afford it, I want it, and it’s available, I’ll buy it.
What IS it with those tethered toys? My girl, Emmy the Wonder Cat ™ LOVES that thing! We have a nightly ritual each day - she follows me into the bedroom at bedtime, jumps up on the bed and refuses to settle down for the night until she gets a few swings around of the feather on a stick. Sometimes, she’ll grab it in her mouth and try to run off with it, thinking she’s got a bird. This is the cat who glares at all other toys - but she will not even THINK about going to sleep until she gets to ‘kill’ her bird for the night.
Nice to know mine aren’t the only crazy ones.
And we do have a paper bag laying out on the floor for my boy, Oscar. However, the ones we had also came with paper handles, and after he got his head stuck in one of the handles (totally harmless, it would have ripped itself before it hurt him), we decided to start ripping the handles off ourselves. (This is also the cat who’s gotten his head stuck in a 12 pack Mountain Dew box before - just a cat body walking around with a giant red and silver box on his head (it was the diet Code Red stuff). We still laugh.
We do get mostly plastic bags, but only because we use them to clean out the litterbox. We do that often enough that the bags are used fairly quickly.
Some of those products are really useful. For example, the Swifer static electricity cloths. But most other cleaning products are made specificaly for anal-retentive types.
Call your local animal shelter and see if they can use 'em. The city pound near me loves old pillows of every kind to give the poor homeless dawgs a comfy sleep.
Here’s a working prototype:
A coffee can and the plastic grocery bags.
I love the swiffer. But also I have a washable static dust cloth that is fantastic, a bit more expensive than a Swiffer but you only have to buy one!
I also like the disposable toilet wipes that disintegrate in water. I don’t like using a sponge or washcloth to wipe off the toilet seat or around the bowl. I think the disposable toilet brushes are a bit over the top. I’m not worried about the toilet brush having germs. It goes in the toilet (with germ killing chemicals) and in the holder.
I thought I was the only one who did this! I always leave out one paper bag when I get home from grocery shopping so Elvis can play. He loves it. And it’s entertaining for me! We play peek-a-boo with it all the time. (A cat hiding in a bag with his tail sticking out is as much of a dead giveaway as a little kid giggling his head off while “hiding” somewhere).
And Cavasshoes, you’re like, crazy resourceful and shit. That milk-carton-frozen-in-the-cooler thing was genius.
It’s even funnier when one cat is in the bag, and the other cat sees the bag moving and POUNCES on it. Much hilarity ensues. Cats apparently don’t realize that their tails are part of them, except of course when some human grabs a tail.
IMHO (meaning alot of what I’ve seen, read and heard): Alot of the landfilll shortage and benefits of recycling news is quite often hype. I’d post cites, but much of it would be denounced as capitalist propaganda.
