Mindful consumption quest

[Chicken lady]

I bought only food (defining wine loosely as food). I skipped the crackers!

my doctors office has gone more electronic and my visit generated only two sheets of paper, a paper sheet, an exam table cover and a little plastic.

i took my bags to the store, but I bought some food that was pre wrapped. In part because I had no choice except to not eat that type of food, and in part to save money. I brought home 5 styrofoam trays in order to save a total of $8.85. I am now regretting that.

on the up side - the deli guy says the store takes the plastic deli bags back for recycling. I have been throwing them out. (I would love to wean dh off deli meat)

on on the way home I stopped at whole food and took notes of what I can buy in bulk that will store a long time because whole foods is rarely on my way anywhere. They will let me use my glass canning jars and lids.

[Chicken lady]

Yesterday I stopped at an indoor farmers market on my way home from work just to see what they had. I let the woman selling napalese food give me a sample in a plastic cup with a plastic spoon. - it just smelled so good! And it was.

i would like to stop and get dinner from her one day, but I will have to take a container and see if she will fill it, because she has styrofoam clam shells.

[Chicken lady]

Today I took two of the styrofoam trays I should never have bought to the art teacher who uses styrofoam plates for paint trays (that's another battle). And I grabbed the (clean, dry, not broken) play dressing table and Barbie princess castle out of my neighbors' trash about 30 seconds before the trash truck arrived. The toys are in my car to be dropped at the goodwill on my way home. (I left the missing a drawer rolling cabinet and the needed new paint child's chair, since I have no way to know if the original paint contained lead.)

[Chicken lady]

Took the cat to the vet. Three plastic syringes, one sharp, one plastic pill bottle, two pieces of paper, one ziplock bag.

[Tybee]

Took the cat to the vet. Three plastic syringes, one sharp, one plastic pill bottle, two pieces of paper, one ziplock bag.

Am trying to follow what you are keeping track of. Is it things you are acquiring in life? Do you want to reduce the number of things, or is your aim to recycle things out of your life? Just trying to understand better.

[iris lilies]

Yesterday I stopped at an indoor farmers market on my way home from work just to see what they had. I let the woman selling napalese food give me a sample in a plastic cup with a plastic spoon. - it just smelled so good! And it was.

i would like to stop and get dinner from her one day, but I will have to take a container and see if she will fill it, because she has styrofoam clam shells.

Ack I HATE those styrofoam take out containers.

On the other hand, I like some of the plastic ones used in restaurants around here. I reuse them many tomes for frozen meals I make at home. I use them until they break.

[iris lilies]

Took the cat to the vet. Three plastic syringes, one sharp, one plastic pill bottle, two pieces of paper, one ziplock bag.

Our cat had surgery on Tuesday and have no idea what waste was generated from that. She is not dong well, we are giving her sub-q fluids at hme which is generating needles and one bag for the fluid. Fortunately i keep a very large stash of old towels and padding for pets, sick or healthy. We seld M use paper towels for pet cleanup events, but I do a LOT of loads of wash.

[Chicken lady]

It's not about the things in things out, although I am still working on reducing the net volumn of things in my life while increasing the median value of those things to me. That is a seperate fight.

this is more about my place in the resource stream - being aware of the resources I am using, reducing the quantity of those resources, examining the type and impact of resources I am using, the justification for using those resources, and wether they pass out of my life as resources or waste.

it would have been better to not bring the styrofoam trays into my control. I feel better about releasing them to a location where they will be used one more time before entering the waste stream because that reduces the waste stream by two styrofoam plates.

i feel good about diverting the toys into my control, because they are now out of my life with a good probability of future use before becoming waste.

i find the waste generated by vaccinating and deworming my cat to be an acceptable trade off, but I feel a need to be aware of it. I actually intend to wash and reuse the oral syringe I brought home because I am familiar with the medication and I can safely use the syringe to administer oral wormer to goats 4 or 5 times before the rubber gasket degrades.

i am happy that the excellent vet I used is also the shortest drive.

sort of like your money or your life, I am trying to start with awareness, then evaluation, then change, but it's difficult for me not to jump ahead. Honestly, if you were doing the your money or your life plan, and you wrote down on day two that you just spent $6 on coffee, and you realized while writing that you do that twice a week and you don't really like the coffee, you wouldn't keep doing it just for the sake of not changing your behavior during the research phase, would you?

[Teacher Terry]

I like the plastic ones from restaurants and I send guests leftovers home with them in these containers. Some seem to last a long time.

[Mary B.]

Our cat had surgery on Tuesday and have no idea what waste was generated from that. She is not dong well, we are giving her sub-q fluids at hme which is generating needles and one bag for the fluid. Fortunately i keep a very large stash of old towels and padding for pets, sick or healthy. We seld M use paper towels for pet cleanup events, but I do a LOT of loads of wash.

Hope she'll recover, iris lilies. We did sub-q fluids for a cat for a while and i found it quite stressful.