can you live without plastic?
May 9th, 2008 at 02:46pm Jennie Pollock
i’m going to try an experiment, and it’s going to be painful.
starting monday 5/12, i will try to live without plastic for a week.
i was challenged to do so for a september/october article for rockford woman, and i will repurpose (recycle! ha!) my blog for it. apparently, a number of people are writing about this, like here and here.
i’ve been thinking about this for a few weeks, and it’s going to be close to impossible. everything is made of or with plastic: my keyboard, my tea mug, my toothbrush, my laundry basket. it’s been freaking me out.
so the rule will be this: i cannot buy anything containing plastic, but i can continue to use products that have it, if i must.
i’ve already stopped using plastic bags except as bathroom garbage can liners. because i use cloth bags, i have at times struggled to find a plastic bag in my house.
of course, what i might be forced to do is learn more about what can be recycled and what can’t. i already do a fair amount.
the worst part will be grocery shopping. or maybe not ordering anything on netflix.
let’s see how it goes.
Entry Filed under: Living without plastic
3 Comments Add your own
1. Ed | May 15th, 2008 at 6:54 am
I think you have things really confused. Going without plastics is NOT going GREEN. I think you are simply not aware of where plastics impact yur environment. It is likely that the your bed “linens” are actually a polymer, your carpet the caoting on your sink , your clothing, your shoes, your phone, amost anything made of paper that is used for afood applications is coated with plastics, , all electrical appliances, cords, etc,.
Plastics are not just the packaging and bags and containers you typicaly think of. And surprisingly things are actaully “greener” alternatives to the the products I noticed you touted furhter in your blog. It energy to produce and transport your so called greener alternatives are often more than 10 times the energy required to d the same for palstic articles.
This is so misguided. the media needs to get their information straight.
2. Joseph (Joe) Morris | May 15th, 2008 at 1:17 pm
I think it’s a great idea to try to live without things: it makes you realize how important they are to daily life; can I suggest you continue the experiment and try to live without metals?
We all know what dangerous toxins metals are; just think about lead in old paint, mercury in old thermometers and chromium in the water supply (remember Erin Brockovich?) . Then there’s the more common stuff like nickel which has been linked to skin rashes, aluminum which has been linked to decreased kidney function and too much iron which has been linked to diabetes.
I wonder what happens to those metals when they go in the trash; don’t they dissolve in water? I haven’t heard of someone getting “plastic poisoning” but I have heard of lead poisoning.
Anyway, keep letting us know what it’s like to give up the things that bug us; maybe after plastics and metals, you could try phones, automobiles or computers (although we’ll have to wait until you’ve finished to read about the last one).
3. Jennie Pollock | May 16th, 2008 at 11:45 am
joseph,
because of the variety of comments i’ve gotten on the blog, i’m not sure if you’re being sarcastic, though i suspect you’re not.
it would be a good idea to live without certain other things for a week. i’ll consider it, though it would be pretty hard because it’s so often impractical. if it were my full-time job to try these things, like morgan spurlock on his “30 days” show, then it might be easier….
Leave a Comment
Some HTML allowed:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <code> <em> <i> <strike> <strong>
Trackback this post | Subscribe to the comments via RSS Feed