Showing posts with label Recycling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Recycling. Show all posts

Saturday 16 November 2019

A Handkerchief


We hear so much about recycling these days yet still get our milk in plastic or cardboard disposable cartons and use paper tissues instead of handkerchiefs  and when we see  that we need to sort our rubbish into separate containers so that things can be recycled, I think if we reused things there would be little need to recycle thing. Things would be built to last.

I used to work on a farm and bottled milk which was delivered to customers, and went it was delivered the used bottles were returned and then reused. The only disposable part of the operation was the disposable aluminium foil tops.

Now we use disposable paper tissues when I clean handkerchief feels good to touch , and after use can be washed and reused for a long time. I used to like having a handkerchief although you do need somewhere to put it and keep it, but we are generally good at things like that.

Similarly with nappies / diapers, again washing and reusing saves the need to recycle create landfill.

I think a perfect song for this is "Recycled Vinyl Blues" by Neil Innes written at the time of the early seventies oil crisis when vintl prices went up , but also saw the advent of the 12" single, as if 7" wasn't enough.

So just a few thoughts on recycling when we should be reusung.

Sunday 27 May 2012

Green Day Down at The Doctors



Well sort of . Another sunny day and I spent a lot of it making bricks for my woodburning stove from old newspapers. It is very physical but worth it and means I put less in the recycling bin because I am going to burn the stuff.

Lots of paper front pages caught my eye but I think it was the Sunday Post who were suggesting that it took 100 phne calls to get an appointment with a GP , and then you would have to wait months for it. If that is the situation change your practice . I have done it a few times and always ended up with excelent service. I've been with mine for around ten years , they are The Thornfield Medical Group based in Byker and Shieldfield and provide excellent service with and online appointment and repeat prescription service that cuts down the phone calls they have to deal with , an all round winner. Their website is here. The booking system is here.



Wednesday 2 May 2012

Second Hand Plan - HMV , Poundland and Magpies



Many moons ago Music Magpie started buying CDs and DVDs from people , I wasnt sure exactly where this was going. Then That's Entertainment appeared on the high street , selling the second hand stuff to people as a proper record shop.

The thing is you can pick up a Robbie Williams , All Saints , Sugababes , Take That back catalogue for under a tenner second hand. The reason I'm posting this is that I've noticed Poundland are now selling second hand CDs for a pound , so I'm wondering if there is a connection.

Then yesterday I was in HMV in Stratford and noticed that HMV now have a second hand section where they sell stuff for £2 a throw. This was in addition to the Orange concession , the Apple / iPod Dock and DVD player display , T-Shirt section etc. They are so losing their identity .




The biggest irony is that despite selling CDs they don't sell anything you can play a CD on , well maybe their Blu-Ray and DVD players .....

Think Neil Innes Recycled Vinyl Blues is appropriate :

Wednesday 31 August 2011

LED-ed



Bathroom Ceiling LEDs
A 3.5W LED
Just replaced my halogen light bulbs in the bathroom , for of them . Fitting the restraining clips was an absolute pain , but they use replaced my 50W halogens with 2 x 1W and 2 x 3.5 W LED ones so that should save a little more on the electricity bills, in theory.





Incidentally , wwhen I switched the bathroom lights on the energy usage went down!! Go work that one out!!

The other trouble is I'm insulated , using efficient stuff , and eventually I'm going to hit a wall where I can't do any more , in fact I feel I'm near that now. Except maybe get a wind turbine in the back garden!!

Sunday 28 August 2011

It's Not Easy Being Green




I recently attended a "Green Champions" course courtesy of my employer , and a couple of things struck me. A lot of people are committed to going good to recycle , use renewable energy and implement changes that will benefit and sustain our life style.

A couple of scary facts were put forward such as the fact that we have less than fifty years of oil left , and slightly longer with coal and gas . While that's enough to see out most of us , the edge is drawing closer. Steven Tyler , Mick Jagger look alike and lead singer with Aerosmith , made a pertinent quote about life which applies the same to our fossil fuell resourses , "Life is like a toilet roll , the closer you get to the end the faster it goes" !! , and that reminds me , one of their songs is perfectly titled for this situation , "Livin' On The Edge"



Anyway we can see that people and businesses will not embrace "Being Green" , unless it's convenient and financially viable!!

Personally , my own bit is the removal of all incandescent bulbs and the installation of an electricity monitor courtesy of my electricity provider.  This has decreased my electricity usage , although my home IT network is probably racking it up , the problem being if I want my music and film available 24/7 from anywhere in the house then the storage needs to be running 24/7 , though I think that solid state storage will help reduce this in the future , but at a cost.

I also do my bit recycling plastic and paper with my blue bin , and organics via the green bin. Paper either goes in my blue bin or is recycled into logs for my wood burning stove (see here).

I'm looking into the solar panels on the roof thing , which was part of my Green Pledge, but again , this is motivated out of a pereived benefit to me  , rather than being a "Green Champion" .  Still the result is the main thing and if I end up being moore energy efficient , then that is one more little action which makes the world a slightly better place , which can't be too bad.


Wednesday 16 June 2010

Bricking It - Logs From Recycled Newspapers





Bought a new lawn mower and one of these things for making logs from old newspapers. Apparently the logs take about three months before they are ready to use , and a weekends papers (four in our house) is enough for ten of the logs or bricks.


Making them is fairly simple but I need to wait three months to see if they are a success.