Posts filed under ‘Reuse’
Reuse: Books
I like to read. I don’t get much time to do it these days what with work bending me over, but I miss it, and I read when I can. I usually have a couple of books on the go – one non-fiction, at least one fiction, and an old favourite that I can read in bed and put down easily (if my book is too interesting, I’ll get insomnia). I also usually have a fanfic on the go and read blogs like a crazy lady. Yeah, I like to read, ok?
Read green!
Keeping up with the reading habit sustainably isn’t that much of a challenge either. Yes, books are made of paper – which means deforestation. But I’ve been getting around buying new books for years (mostly cos I couldn’t afford them, but lately the environment has been factoring into my avoidance of new books too). Here’s how.
Go to the library. There’s more books than you could ever want or fit in your house, and you can ‘try before you buy’, so to speak. If you hate it, that’s ok – it’s going back in two weeks anyway. If you live in a city, like me, you’re extra lucky, because often the council will run all the libraries in all the suburbs under one umbrella. If your local library doesn’t have the book you want, you can order it in from another library – usually free or for a nominal fee. Look out for the late fees though!
Go to the second-hand bookshop. This is especially useful when buying text books that you’re not planning on reading again after semester is over. You pay for what you get – the better the condition of the book, the more expensive. They’re usually cheaper than new, and just think – you’ve not chopped down another tree just to read! Book fairs are also good – think Lifeline Bookfest. Tonnes of cheap, pre-used books!
Swap and share books. We always have books at our place that don’t belong to us, and some of our books are always out with our friends and family. Again, this originally was a financial consideration for me – if my best mate already had the book, why would I go out and buy it when I could read her copy? It ends up being as good for the environment as it is for my pocket.
Get free books from Freecycle. There are always people giving books away. Sometimes friends, family and other folks are giving books away too. Pick them up where you can.
Buy second-hand books online – you can get local books from ebay, and Amazon if you’re in one of the local countries (which is not Australia). You can also buy books from eco-friendly book vendors, like Better World Books.
Read ebooks. I haven’t done much of this, but I do have Adobe Digital Editions on my work computer to read the ‘inspirational’ ebook the company gave us as a Christmas present. (They only started with the environmentally friendly book giving last year – before that it was mass hardcover book buying. I bet the authors who wrote the books chosen as the present book each year had a massive boost in sales and probably hate us all now). If you really want that paper look (rather than the backlit monitor look), try a Kindle. Apparently they’re good. Personally I’d go a Netbook, but I’m not bothered by the backlight.
Read online. It doesn’t have to be stuff written by well-known authors, there’s plenty of good amateur fiction and non-fiction out there. You’re reading some now – a blog. There are millions of them. Fanfic is a another big winner, in just about any fandom you choose, and often branching off into original stories. Besides, reading online opens up the doors to what you can find to read. It might be hard to find a good lesbian crime novel in your local second-hand bookshop (who am I kidding, lesbian crime novels are a dime a dozen – maybe it’d be hard to find a good lesbian historical fic that isn’t Mills & Boon-esque), but online, it’s not that hard, and you can narrow it down even further based on the kinds of characters you’d like to read about. Heck, you can even write it. Don’t forget other kinds of reading too – news sites and websites with articles discussing niche areas you’re interested in, which often become less niche the more popular online reading becomes. (Think Afterellen.com, folks!)
So seriously… reading. It’s a pretty awesome thing. Your kids see you doing it and they’re more likely to do it. It keeps your brain active. It’s escapist, and sometimes, trust me, you need to get your brain out of your head and into a story. Don’t stop reading, don’t reduce it. Don’t think that reading sustainably is going to curtail your habit. If anything, it will broaden your literacy horizons. So remember, next time you’re looking for a book – read green!
Reuse: Tea Bags
I’m Australian and I drink tea. All kinds. My favourite is rooibos and I also quite like green. Sometimes the girls at work will bring in some special blends (the last ones had black, green and rose, and rooibos, green and orange peel). If I’m stressed I drink chamomile. Jasmine and chrysanthemum are good too, and peppermint or lemon if I’ve got a cold. There’s a tea for every occasion. I only drink my tea with water – no sugar, no soy or oat milk.
Nerada's Rooibos with vanilla is my favourite kind of tea
Tea is a hot drink and the weather is getting cooler, so I’ll be drinking more and more of it as the year goes on, but that doesn’t matter really – here in Australia, we drink it year round.
You can get tea that doesn’t involve tea bags – loose leaf and things like that – but typically, I use tea bags. I don’t drink enough to worry about making a pot, and the mesh tea balls aren’t ideal for someone who typically brews tea in a hurry. The tea bags are kind of wasteful though, so I like to reuse them.
At work, my colleague and I make a cup of tea each using the same tea bag. At home, I put my used tea bag into a clean glass and set it aside on the bench to save for use in my next cup of tea, and sometimes the next after that. I don’t leave it too long though, or I think it would get manky. Sometimes Yankee Elv and I, and sometimes Mr Teeny-bop, share tea bags, but mostly we drink different kinds of tea so the glass of tea bags is well used. I guess you could put it in a glass jar with the lid on, but I don’t think it would be good to contain the moisture too much, and especially not for too long.
You can reuse the tea bags in other ways too. Cool, they are soothing on (closed) tired eyes. Apparently a chamomile tea bag is very soothing on freshly pierced skin and scars. And after you’ve finished with your tea bags, you can compost them, or even put them into your worm farm if you have one. They’re only paper and leaves – but be sure to buy local and organic (so I choose Nerada) if you can.
(Re)Use: Resources
While not an environmental concern per se, today I was flat out doing some work stemming from my trip last week. I was pretty frustrated and very tired and it got me thinking… I wouldn’t have to be doing this bloody work if someone from Melbourne had attended instead of me! I went on a trip to Perth the week before already and there were people at work who could have gone instead of me! Whinge whinge whinge bitch bitch bitch. Hello everyone, you can call me Groucho Marx, emphasis on the Groucho. I’ll also answer to Oscar.
Did I mention I was/am very tired? My eyes are seriously drooping as I type this even now. I’m not that much of a whinger normally, and I generally actually like work trips as I get to explore the country on the company dollar. I had one day’s notice this time though, so it was a bit much, really. I had to miss my workmate’s going-away party.
Me overlooking the Indian Ocean in Perth on my last work trip
Anyway, I thought about it some more and then I felt a bit crap, because in this instance, the Melbourne staff member who was supposed to attend was unable to due to stuff with the bushfires, which is why it was a bit of an emergency (read very short notice) that I go. But still – pain in the arse, although fair enough.
Throughout all my mental ranting and bitching though, I thought of these key – and environmentally friendly – points that made me feel a little bit better.
- My attendance (Brisbane to Melbourne) was better than flying the most appropriate person over from India. At least the travel was domestic.
- It was better to fly little old me to Melbourne than it would have been to fly 26 other people north to Brisbane. One versus the many.
- There was really no way to run this event via telecommuting or the company would have done it.
So for all my complaining, maybe my company did use their resources wisely, albeit mostly from a financial perspective (cheaper travel). The environmental impact is there nonetheless, but at least it wasn’t as bad as it could have been.
I still wish I hadn’t been at work until 6:45pm today. That’s so not cool. Bah environmentally-friendly humbug.
And I was so busy I forgot to empty the work recycling bin. Oops. The director will give me a gentle reminder if I don’t do it first thing tomorrow. The things we do…
Reuse: Green Bags
Ok guys – this post is kind of a continuation of yesterday’s post on reducing plastic bag use. Yes, I know it’s lame and unoriginal, but when this post appears on the blog, I’ll be in Perth for work so I’ve had to write some posts ahead of time. This is the last one left, it’s nearly midnight at my flight leaves in less than 8 hours.
So seriously… let’s reuse our green bags.
Reusable green bag from HEB in Texas (we used to shop there... cos there was nowhere else to shop)
Why? Cos it’s, you know, the right thing to do. See yesterday’s post for more detail on the why. Today, I’m more interested in the how. That is, how do you remember to bring them to the shop!?
The grocery stores have taken to putting up signs reminding us that green bags only work if you remember to bring them. The only thing that does is make me feel guilty that I’ve forgotten. A sign at the shop is a bit too little, too late, you know what I mean? As I mentioned yesterday though, before we switched to a mini-rubbish bin, I used to use way fewer plastic bags, and thus used green shopping bags all the time. I had some secret ways of remembering to bring them.
- Have quite a lot of bags so you can have bags in different places.
- Keep a bag in your work bag/backpack for emergency shopping on the way home from work. You only need one, as you don’t normally buy much on the way home from work when you have to carry things on the bus.
- Keep some bags in your car boot – we normally take the car when we’re going shopping for lots of stuff.
- Keep some bags inside the house in case you want to walk to the shops. Keep them out of reach of naughty cats who pee on things. Trust me on this one. Don’t think the top of the fridge is safe, either.
- Have spare bags so you can keep on using them while you’re mending the older bags that start ripping.
- Have at least one insulated bag so your cold stuff stays cold while you’re walking home from the shops – this is most important in hotter climates like Queensland. Yes, I know we’re not the ones having a heatwave this summer (sorry Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney), but normally it’s hotter up here. We also have an insulated backpack, which works better if you’re cycling, scootering or skating to the shop.
- Put your bags back where they go as part of your grocery-putting-away routine. For example, after a big shop, gather the bags up and put them back in the boot of the car. Otherwise, you’ll get to the shop next time and realise you left them on the kitchen bench. That sucks. Once it’s part of your routine it will seem normal.
- It’s ok to buy the odd new green bag, but don’t go crazy. That’s emergency times only, and only if you’re a bit low on green bags at home.
- You can use any old bag, not just a green bag, if your groceries will fit. I’ve carried lots of stuff home in my laptop backpack before. It also makes it easier to carry on the bus.
- Enlist other people to help you remember and help you put the bags away as part of your routine. If you’re too lazy tired old busy doing incredibly important things, you can always have the kids do it.
How do you remember your green bags?
Reuse: Second-hand furniture
I love a good bit of second-hand furniture. My boss (sorta) does too – she collects antiques. She loves them for their beauty and history.
I don’t collect antiques, but I do buy second-hand furniture – partly (and originally) because it’s considerably cheaper, and I have never been a wealthy person. These days though, the low impact nature of using pre-loved furnishings is the main reason I do it.
Second-hand furniture - For the Win!
Reusing furniture is great for the environment. When using pre-loved furniture, you avoid pollution from the following sources:
- Deforestation, water use and land use to make wooden furniture
- Chemicals/smog, drilling and mining from making plastic furniture
- Strip mining to get the metal to make metal furniture
- Quarrying to get rock and sand for stone and glass furniture
- Water and land use for plant-based fabrics
- Water use, land use and pollution from animal-based fabrics
- Excess water use in any type of furniture production.
You can get second-hand furniture for free from Freecycle. Sometimes though, what you want isn’t there, so you have to go shopping. There are a bunch of different places you can go to find second-hand furniture.
Op shops (also known as thrift shops or consignment stores)
Op shops, like Lifeline, St Vinnies or the Salvation Army often have big stores which carry a variety of (mostly crappy) used furniture. If you wade through the crap though, you can usually find a gem hiding in a corner somewhere. I’ve gotten a desk chair, wicker phone table and a bedside table from op shops.
Second-hand furniture shops
Second-hand furniture shops tend to have stuff that is a bit nicer than op shops, but it’s also a bit more expensive. Look out particularly for the kind that sell ex-display home pieces. The furniture looks good, has been hardly used and is significantly cheaper than buying new! They’re located all over – you’ll just have to search for them. I’ve gotten a coffee table and my dining table and chairs from second-hand furniture shops.
TradingPost, Craigslist, TradeMe, ebay or similar sites/newspapers
Online and print classifieds listing items for sale, from computers to textbooks, not just furniture. That being said, you can get some really good deals here, and often from places close-by.
Garage sales, Skip Dipping (Dumpster Diving) and Kerbside Collections
Garage sales, like Freecycle give-aways, are an excellent local place to go to find second-hand furniture. As the furniture is fresh out of someone’s house, it’s usually in good nick ad you don’t have to pay the middle man. Kerbside collections occur here once every two years, during which time everyone puts their unwanted junk on the footpath. It’s perfectly acceptable to take stuff you see – we’ve gotten lamps and a fan. If you’re lucky, you live in Canberra and have Second-hand Sundays. Skip dipping or dumpster diving (often not actually involving diving) is another perfectly legitimate way to get good stuff. We got a big couch when we were living in the USA by doing just that (clearly it was too big to be actually in the dumpster, but it was beside it).
Friends, family and colleagues
Getting furniture from friends, family and colleagues is the best idea in my opinion. You know they’re not going to rip you off and normally their stuff is in good nick and you can trust it. I, for example, have two desks, two sets of drawers, two desk chairs, a microwave, a fridge, a washing machine, a bookshelf, some massive chests of drawers, lounge chairs galore and other bits and pieces from friends, family and colleagues. Some things I’ve bought and others I’ve been given. Most often, people offer when they’re emigrating out of the country, moving generally or just don’t have the space.
So give second-hand furniture a shot – save the environment and your wallet!
Reuse: The Little Things
Have you ever broken something, and hated throwing away the broken pieces? What about when you upgrade your computer or mobile phone? Even though there are e-waste recycling centres, doesn’t it suck to have to toss stuff just because one little chip chucks a hissy fit? Wouldn’t it be great to reuse some of this junk?
So why don’t you? Yankee Elv is. Right now, her thing is making jewellery – earrings mostly – out of whatever odds and ends she happens to have lying about. She uses old beads from broken necklaces, or from a gaudy beaded purse we picked up from a Freecycle giveaway. Sometimes she uses her leftover cross stitch thread to make anklets. Her most recent creation? E-waste earrings.
Brown e-waste earrings
Blue e-waste earrings
Aren’t they awesome? She’s in the beginning stages of opening a shop on Etsy to sell some of her creations. I wore a pair to work today and all the girls loved them, and loved them more when I told them what they were originally (circuitry). Geek chic!
A friendly giraffe modelling the blue e-waste earrings on a bookshelf
It feels so much better recycling your e-waste you know you’ve really gotten everything you can from it.
Reuse: Freecycle
The whole point of reusing things is to prevent wasting unnecessary energy on recycling or to prevent things from entering landfill and becoming waste for all eternity… yeah, more like a couple of generations, but let’s not be picky. There’ll be toxic soup left for a long time, so you get my point. But seriously, landfill is nasty. Even biodegradable stuff doesn’t degrade in the anaerobic environment that is landfill. And what a way to use our earth – as a dump!
That’s why I’m like a broken record about reusing anything and everything.
So to further this end, Freecycle was invented, going on six years ago. The Freecycle slogan is ‘Changing the world one gift at a time’, and essentially, that’s just what Freecycle does. Freecycle is a place to offer up stuff you no longer want, even items you may consider junk, for other people to come and take away for free. You can also place posts asking if people have certain items that you may be looking for. You might not use the stuff for it’s original purpose (for example, Yankee Elv has plans to make jewellery out of old computer chips), but who cares, as long as it’s being used again and again, right? (See my previous argument about the festy landfill).
Freecycle Logo
This communal re-use has several positive effects:
- Items that are no longer wanted don’t end up in landfill
- Unwanted objects go to new homes where these things will continue to be used
- Recipients save money as they don’t have to buy new stuff
- Givers save time and money as they don’t have to get rid of their unwanted stuff (which is especially cool when the items that are being given away are bulky and require a trailer or truck to move, like a bed, or a car – and yes, I’ve seen both of these items on my local group).
There are rules, too, but not many:
- You can’t sell anything, you can only give it away for free
- You can’t give away people or inappropriate materials
- You can’t post a Wanted post until you’ve posted an Offer post
- You can’t blither on in your posts – you have to stay severely on topic.
Freecyclers connect using Yahoo! Groups. As of today, there are 4,629 communities (Yahoo! Groups) serving as contact points for 6,098,000 Freecyclers worldwide. That’s a lot of re-use right there!
Basically, all you do is go to the Freecycle website, find your local community, sign up (make sure you go for daily digest format in your emails or your inbox will be inundated), and start Freecycling!
We have gotten rid of lots of excess stuff we didn’t want (mostly books and electrical items), and we’ve received quite a few useful things too:
- TV stand
- Spice rack (quite sizable)
- Old coffee jars we use to store our tea
- Books coming out the wazoo – so many!
- Candles
- Craft materials
- Plates
- Clothes and cloth
- Toys
- DVDs (including a favourite, What the Bleep Do We Know?, which we found at a Freecycle Giveaway, like a free garage sale. It is true that I mostly watch this movie/doco for Marlee Matlin,
but it also discusses some interesting points).
Freecycle has some drawbacks though. I am still disappointed that the above ground pool we saw listed was too big for our courtyard.
Don’t think Freecycle are the only ones getting in on the re-use act though. There are alternatives to Freecycle. A good example is Freebootr, a pirate-themed site which aims to improve upon Freecycle by not depending on Yahoo! Groups (which is nice cos I’m a bit over Yahoo!) and having just the one site for everyone, rather than separate local groups. I haven’t tried them yet as they are only new and don’t have a community in Australia so far. I like them cos they seem more personable than Freecycle – I follow them on Twitter and they have a blog.
But did I mention they’re pirate-themed? They claim they “practically invented The Three Arrrs.”
Arrrrrrr!
Reuse: Jars
We have a lot of glass jars. Like, a lot. Half a cabinet full. We haven’t thrown any glass jars out for about 18 months. Based on the fact that we use maybe one glass jar a week (pasta sauce, curry sauce, salsa etc), I think we’d have at least 52 jars sitting around the kitchen. That’s a pretty conservative estimate – there are probably more!
We use empty pasta sauce jars to store dried fruit, mushrooms and nuts.
So why do we keep them? Mostly because they’re such handy containers, and because we can’t bring ourselves to recycle them when there’s so many things they can be used for. You see, recycling is the third R for a reason – reduce and reuse come before it. You should only do it if you couldn’t manage without something (that is, couldn’t reduce) and once you’ve used it, you find yourself unable to reuse it anymore. Recycling (while better than landfills or creating new things) is energy intensive, creates pollution, and not everything can even be recycled. I’m not saying recycling is bad – it’s not – but it’s also not ideal.
We got these empty coffee jars on Freecycle and use them to store our tea
So we keep trying to reuse things as long and as much as we can. Especially jars, it seems. We even get all categorical and use particular jars for particular things. We use jars for:
- Storing nuts and dried fruits
- Storing baking goods like cocoa, chocolate chips and coconut
- Storing grains like polenta and barley
- Storing food in the fridge, like pineapple chunks or pickles
- Storing craft supplies, such as buttons, beads and cotton thread
- Storing tea and tea bags – we Elves are a family of tea drinkers so we have a lot of different kinds
- Storing tea bags in my drawer at work
- Making and storing sauce and dressings – the best way to mix up a homemade sauce or dressing is to put it in a jar and shake it, and you can store it in there too
- Containing picnic food – we go picnicking with nuts, dried fruits, pickles, pimento stuffed olives, fruit salad and other little snacks in jars, which don’t leak!
- Giving – we fill up a clean, non-curry scented jar with lollies or chocolate covered sultanas, peanuts and scorched almonds and give them to people as gifts
- Storing Yankee Elv’s OCM mix in the future (she just has to get some castor oil, then she’s starting that)
- Storing dog treats
- Storing stationery – pencils, pens, thumb tacks, paper clips and so on
- Storing kitchen utensils on the benchtop (typically near the stove) – chopsticks, wooden spoons, tongs and so on
- Holding flowers
- Holding water for Mr Pre-teen’s painting (he puts the lid on if he wants to walk around with it, which prevents spills… for this reason alone, jars are possibly the most awesome invention ever.
We store wooden kitchen utensils in empty Marshmallow Fluff jars
Essentially, we use jars wherever we can. And we still have half a cupboard of empty ones. So what are we going to use those for? Any ideas? Anyone need a jar or two?
Or eighty?
Recent Comments