Year 2, Week 10 Results: 19.6 oz of plastic waste!

What does it mean when your cat's poop suddenly turns red? Could be some terrible disease. Or could just mean your cat's been eating her red blanket and explains why she's not hungry anymore. I've been so worried about poor little albatross chicks consuming pieces of plastic out in the North Pacific Gyre, while here at home under my own nose my kitty's been chowing down on polar fleece. Look at all the holes!

This is the blanket the kittens came with. I put it in Arya's cage while she was healing, thinking it would be familiar and comforting. And I guess it was. Comfort food. (Plastic blanket, and god knows what kind of dye it's got in it.)

Little Hobble had her sutures out on Friday and is getting back to her normal spirited self, which is a little worrisome because her bones will take a while to completely heal. So we still have to keep her in the cage -- sans fake plastic blanket!

So, here's this week's tally. Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 1 85 oz bottle Sun Light gel dishwasher detergent and cap. The main reason this stuff has lasted so long is that we bought it when we first moved into this apartment three years ago and then rarely used the dishwasher. Only recently did I figure out that washing one load of dishes per week in the dishwasher is actually more efficient for us than handwashing. So, we've finally used up this bottle and have now switched to powdered detergent in a cardboard box.
  
  At the moment, we are trying Ecover Automatic Dishwasher Powder because it's non-toxic and also because it seems to have the most environmentally-friendly packaging. The box is made from recycled cardboard AND the spout is also cardboard rather than metal, like those of Seventh Generation and Whole Foods brands. Fewer types of materials means better recycling, right? The Ecover web site mentions a polypropylene cover, but I'm wondering if that is referring to some other product because our box of detergent has no plastic cover.
  
  Ecover has a statement about trace amounts of dioxane found in its products, but it seems to only apply to the liquid dish soap, not the powder. It remains to be seen how effective this stuff is. Do you guys use dishwasher detergent and if so, what works best for you? Oh, and does anyone have tips for the best way to load the dishwasher? Neither Michael nor I grew up with one, so we're doing the best we can.
  
  And yes, I'm sure we could be super efficient at handwashing and skip the machine. But the fact remains that we are not. Let's just leave it at that. :-)

And the new plastic waste:

• 1 chewed up red polar fleece blanket. Already fully described above.


• 1 plastic seal from around the neck of a jar of Fudge Is My Life fudge sauce. It's almost gone. I heard back from one person who won a jar a few weeks ago and mailed it off on Friday. Haven't heard back from the other two: Small Change and Bobbi. If you want your fudge, email me at beth [at] fakeplasticfish [dot] come before it's gone!

Only 4 items this week. Not bad!

Tomorrow, I'll report all about the ridiculous search for plastic-free water at the the Outside Lands Music Festival on Friday, and the Radiohead show that pummeled me with its exquisite noise and left me breathless with hope for humanity. (What a world where guys can make sounds that take over my whole body and soul and cause me to weep with amazement no matter how many times I hear them.)
 

 

Year 2, Week 9 Results: 2.5 oz of plastic waste.

Soots has taken over many of Arya's old duties while she is out of commission, the thorough examination of my weekly plastic waste being one of them. As I write this, Arya is lying on the floor at my feet, wishing I'd take the elegant collar off her neck and let her pull out her sutures. Friday, little kitty, Friday they come out. Then, you can lick your wounds all you want. For those who miss her, I've got video of Miss Hobble Bobble, as she's come to be known, below. But first, the tally!

Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• Plastic wrap from the final Wholphin DVD. I subscribed to these DVDs over a year ago before starting this project, and if the notice on the envelope was correct, this will be my final one.

New plastic purchased since the plastic project began and used this week:

• 1 big ass bag (34 lbs) of World's Best Cat Litter. I sent an email to GPC Pet Products in July asking them to reconsider their packaging. Here's the email reply I got in response:
  

  From: "Kissell, Luke" (luke.kissell@grainprocessing.com)
  To: Beth Terry
  Date: Mon, 14 Jul 2008 16:49:31 -0500
  Subject: RE: Contact Us: Product Performance
  
  Dear Beth,
  
  Thank you for taking the time to contact us here at GPC Pet Products Maker's Of World's Best Cat Litter(tm).
  
  We appreciate the comments you have shared with us regarding our packaging. As we look into the future, we will be looking at a new type of package. It is always nice to hear what our consumers have to say about what their likes and dislikes are about our package. This type of information helps us become more aware of what our consumers are looking for in terms of packaging. We take these comments very seriously.
  
  I will forward your comments onto the appropriate personnel for review.
  
  Again, thank you for your comments.
  
  Have a good day,
  
  Luke Kissell
  Customer Service Coordinator
  GPC Pet Products
  Makers of Worlds Best Cat Litter(tm)
  TF:877-367-9225 Ext 4790
  Ph:563-264-4790
  Fax:563-264-4788

  
  I know there were several other people who thought they might also send letters to this company. Did you get the same response? I wonder if they'll actually change the packaging.


• Plastic from the ends of a bunch of organic bananas.


• 1 plastic Rx bottle and lid. Hobble had to have antiobiotics 2x per day through a syringe for a week. I haven't included the syringe in the tally as I'm keeping it for the next time one of them needs to use it. That way I won't have to take a new syringe home from the vet.


• 2 red plastic drinking straws. Oops. My sister and her husband were in town visiting us last week, and wow did we ever eat. Restaurant after restaurant. I almost got away plastic-free until I ordered an iced tea during lunch on Friday and was having so much fun I forgot to request "no straw." Remind me to tell you about the compostable straws I learned about yesterday.

So, one more week of plastic tallied up and put away.

And here's the promised video: Miss Hobble Bobble's Adventure.



If for some reason, you can't view the embedded video, try this link to view it on Google Video: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1193517387124029086&hl=en
 

 

Year 2, Week 7 & 8 Results: .9 oz of plastic waste.

The last week was all about cats and fudge sauce. Kitty was hurt and mama was stressed. And mama still had half a case of fudge sauce calling out to calm her nerves. All she needed was a big spoon.

So, if you'll recall, I did attempt to get rid of some of the fudge sauce by bribing the Californians to write to your reps about the AB2058 plastic bag legislation. Three CA readers heeded the call: Arudous, HomeSchoolMom, and Green Bean. But Arduous and Green Bean already received jars of fudge sauce. And a couple of people who don't have the privilege of living in California, Small Change and Bobbi, wrote letters to their local officials anyway. So, I'd love to send jars of fudge sauce to HomeSchoolMom, Small Change, and Bobbi. If you all want this treat, please email me directly at beth [at] fakeplasticfish [dot] com and let me know your mailing address.

With that, here's the tally for the past two weeks. Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 1 broken plastic frog found in a cactus pot. When I first started container gardening, I thought it was fun to buy little plastic animals to live with my cacti and other plants. Wasn't thinking about any of the ramifications of plastic back then, and didn't even realize that the plastic would photodegrade over time. It does. It gets brittle in the sun, breaks down, and ends up crumbling into the soil. But it doesn't biodegrade. So we just add tiny pieces of plastic to our potting soil or ground. As the kitties say, "Not so great, ackshully."

And the new plastic waste:

• 1 outer wrapper from a case of Instinct canned cat food.


• 3 plastic tag hangers. Unfortunately, I don't remember what they came from. I don't remember buying anything new last week or the week before, but I must have to have ended up with some tag hangers. Sigh.


• 3 plastic seals from around necks of 3 jars of Fudge Is My Life fudge sauce. See comments above.


• 1 piece of plastic packing tape from box of My Water flavor essence. My Water flavor essence is sold by Soda Club to flavor homemade soda water. These two bottles were sent for me to sample. Flavor essence is made from the peels of fruits and contains no sugar or any other ingredient. And really, it doesn't actually add flavor (since the tongue can only detect sweet, sour, salty, and bitter) but rather aroma for your nose. It's for people who want just a tiny touch of fruit without sweetness. It comes in glass bottles with small plastic caps and is shipped nearly plastic-free except for a bit of tape on outside of the box. (Perhaps this is a good example for the fudge sauce lady. If these glass bottles don't break with nearly zero packaging, perhaps the fudge sauce jars wouldn't either?)

That's all the plastic for the last two weeks. There has been some generated by Arya's traumas and vet visits, but it won't be tallied until it's used up.

 

 

Year 2, Week 6 Results: .2 oz of plastic waste.

I took my mini plastic stash (.2 ounces! Yes!) outside today to hang out with my...

MASSIVE TOMATO PLANTS!

Okay, okay, don't laugh. You guys told me I was an idiot to think I could grow 4 tomato plants using one cage, so I bought 3 more. The plants may not be humongous yet, and certainly not like Allie's plants that are reportedly taller than she. (Of course, I've never seen what Allie looks like. Maybe she's really, really short.) But don't forget, I got them in the ground weeks and weeks after Jennconspiracy gave them to me, so I'm confident I'll be up to my eyeballs in tomatoes by this fall. And learning to can them. Thanks for all your great advice.

Okay, here's last week's tally. It's all new plastic waste:

• 2 plastic tags and 2 plastic tag hangers from tomato cages. One of the three new cages was missing its tag, so I only ended up with two.


• Plastic cap loop and foam cap insert from a bottle of fresh maple syrup. Michael's sister visited us last week and brought a big bottle of dark maple syrup fresh from her neighbor's trees in Western Massachusetts. Mmmmmmmmmm! The bottle was plastic, but we decanted the syrup into a glass jar, and she took the plastic bottle back home with her in hopes that her neighbor would be able to reuse it. We'll find out.


• Address label from the card that came with my Fudge Is My Life fudge sauce. Somehow I missed including this in the week that all that fudge sauce arrived.


• 1 plastic seal from around the neck of a jar of Fudge Is My Life fudge sauce. So far, I've given away two jars and opened one for myself. Trying to limit my consumption to one moderate spoonful per day. We'll see how that goes!


• Plastic from the ends of a bunch of organic bananas.

Gotta get going to feed and pet Soots and Arya's brother Robb and step brother Ginger. Our friends are out of town, so we have new kitties to play with and torture. (Just kidding, Laura!)
 

 

Year 2, Week 5 Results: 1.4 oz of plastic waste.

This post will be short because I want to get in a review of the Blogher Conference before retiring to the woods for my vision fast. So, here's the tally:

Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 1 Ziploc bag. I've been using this bag for over a year, and finally it has a big hole in it and needs to retire. I've been using it to store bread, so far not having found a plastic-free way to keep bread fresh. I buy local bread that comes in a paper bag (like Acme Bread or Grace Baking Co) and then put the paper-wrapped bread into the Ziploc bag. Note to self: Ziploc bags and kitchen knives do not get along well together in the sink.

And the new plastic waste:

• 1 outer wrapper from a case of Instinct canned cat food.


• Tag hanger from a new broom. The rest of the broom is entirely plastic free. Check out the way I carried it home. Remind you of anyone?

• 1 Refresh Endura single use eye drop container.


• Blogher Conference name tag. Another piece of plastic that could have been avoided. I had planned to attend today's Sunday session of the conference, at which I would have returned the name badge holder to be used again. Instead, I was too tired and stayed home today, so I have no way to return it. Ah well.

More on the conference in the next post.
 

 

Year 2, Week 4 Results: 3.1 oz of plastic waste.

Move along. Move along. Nothing to see here, folks. That means you, little black kitty cat. Move!

Arya has been in such big trouble this week, causing her human mom (Beth) to yell and yell and her human dad (Michael) to cover his ears and then frantically rearrange the house to give Arya fewer things to mess with, thereby causing less yelling from Beth.

And Axelle, I don't want to hear about "Mr. Sprayer" anymore. We have "Ms. Squirter," and she does nothing to deter Arya from scratch scratch scratching on the locked bedroom door because as soon as Arya (with her super sharp kitten ears) hears mom get out of bed, she dashes under the living room sofa and hides to avoid squirtation. Mom opens the door, and no one's there. Once mom chased Arya around the living room at 3am just so she could squirt her little black butt (I just realized how bizarre that could sound out of context), but then Mom felt really, really bad about doing something so confusing to a furry little brain-damaged beast.

Soots, on the other hand, who is never in these pictures because he knows better than to tangle with Beth's stuff, is now officially Mom's favorite, even though he bites her chin every morning to wake her up.

It was a slow plastic week, so I thought I'd just fill space with kitty news. Okay, here's the tally:

Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 1 plastic spice container & lid. Reused for a while, but now it's just gross and needs to be retired to plastic purgatory.


• 1 Method hand soap container & pump. We were reusing this one for a while, too. (Haven't used liquid soap in nearly a year since switching to bar soap.) But that's another one of the problems with plastic: it can't really be cleaned properly. Plastic attracts oil. Have you ever noticed how hard it is to clean grease off of it? So this container is now ready for retirement as well. Ah glass. Just love how squeaky clean it can be. Plastic will never squeak. Remember that.

And the new plastic waste:

• 1 outer wrapper from a case of Instinct canned cat food.


• Piece of plastic from ends of a bunch of fair trade organic bananas.


• 1 bandaid. See? This is boring, huh?


• 5 Refresh Endura single use eye drop containers. My eyes were doing so well (considering the chronic cornea problem I've got) but this week, they really flared up. I'm guessing they are aggravated by the smoke that's invaded the Bay Area from forest fires burning around us in Northern and Central California. We're all dry and sooty in these parts. Wanna come visit? Bring some rain!

I'll have a funny Styrofoam story for you tomorrow.
 

 

Year 2, Week 3 Results: 4.5 oz of plastic waste.

Yikes! This photo reminds me of one of the plastic tallies from Fake Plastic Fish, The Early Days. So, in the interest of brevity and my own sanity, I'm going to group some items so the list doesn't seem so long.

Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 2 AC Transit bus passes, finally used up. These are not the only plastic transit passes I've gone through. Oh no. BART tickets are made of plastic, and I use those all the time. It's just that BART tickets get sucked back into the machine and the end of their lives, whereas AC Transit passes stay with you forever. (I've learned more about those plastic BART tickets, by the way, and writing about them is on my FPF To Do List.)


• 1 random piece of plastic found while cleaning. It broke off of something. We have no idea what.

New plastic purchased since the plastic project began and used this week:

• 1 big ass bag (34 lbs) of World's Best Cat Litter. I've already discussed the various litters I've tried. Haven't had time to try making my own. But I did finally (today) send a letter to GPC Pet Products, the company that makes World's Best Cat Litter. Will publish it in a separate post later this week.


• 3 plastic labels from jars of King's Cupboard dessert sauces. These are the free sauces I wrote about 2 weeks ago. I didn't realize at the time that the labels were plastic. And I doubt I would have refused free fudge and caramel sauce if I had known. And I have to say that Friday, the espresso fudge sauce really came in handy after I gave up coffee and alcohol. I ate the whole jar in one day!
  
  I meant for it to be the last chocolate for a while. Another one of the crutches I use to avoid emotions. But today, I received a HUGE box in the mail from the Fudge Is My Life company. Take a wild guess who sent that to me. Someone getting me back for all the chocolate bars I sent him! More on that, and the packaging involved, later. For now, let me just pledge not to open any of these jars until next month.


• Plastic from new bike purchase: 4 plastic straps from my lock and basket, 1 plastic wrapper and 1 foam insert from the cell phone case that came with the bike. I was surprised that there was not more plastic packaging involved, but maybe the bike shop discarded it before selling the bike? And yes, there is plastic on the bike itself, although not much. And of course my helmet is made from plastic. But for the sake of my skull, I think I can live with it.


• Plastic baggie from a set of Red Cross refrigerator magnets. My Red Cross card came in the mail this weekend, along with some refrigerator "reminder" magnets. I don't need them, but they are the least of my worries where the Red Cross is concerned.


• Plastic from new Penguin soda maker: 2 plastic shipping labels, 1 plastic box handle, 1 plastic CO2 cartridge wrapper. I was surprised this week with the gift of a Penguin soda maker. An employee from Soda Club, the company that distributes these machines, read about the Take Back The Filter campaign and then my post on Fake Plastic Fish about the Penguin, and decided she wanted to send me one. And I've got to say that having fizzy water this weekend has been very, very helpful when I wanted to imbibe other, less benign things. I plan to write a whole lot more about this machine in a future post, so stay tuned.


• 1 plastic strip from around a can of frozen juice. I use a small spoonful of frozen, unsweetened juice to flavor my fizzy water instead of sugary syrups or other flavorings.


• A few pieces of scotch tape from some thrift store plates. The plates were held together as a group with the tape.


• 1 piece of plastic from a bunch of organic bananas.


• 1 plastic insert from my glass bottle of household cleaner, aka vodka. It's gone. I'm switching back to vinegar, even though I don't care for the smell, because vodka is just too dangerous to have in the house right now.

That's it! It was a busy, busy week.

Thank you to everyone who left such supportive comments in response to my last post. I was a little worried at first about writing it. It didn't, after all, relate directly to plastic or environmental issues, and I wondered if I was turning Fake Plastic Fish into too much of a personal journal. But then I remembered what Robj98168 wrote in response to my post, The Loneliness of the Long Distance Blogger. "I just blog on what interests me and damn those who don't find me interesting!" Okay, maybe I wouldn't put it that bluntly, but he inspired me to open up, and so for that, thanks Rob!
 

 

Year 2, Week 2 Results: 1.8 oz of plastic waste.

It was an interesting week. Attended a funeral. Ate a whole lot of chocolate. Bought a bike. And began a Vision Quest. Went through a bit of plastic, too. So here's the tally.

Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 1 Sicilia lemon juice bottle and cap. It took over a year for us to finish this, and we've got another one (expired) in the cupboard. We mostly use fresh limes and lemons now. I guess we should use up the bottled stuff before it gets moldy, if it hasn't already.


• 1 Sicilia lime juice bottle and cap. Same as above. And we've got another one of these in the cupboard too.

New plastic purchased since the plastic project began and used this week:

• 1 prescription bottle and cap. As I've mentioned before, these bottles cannot be refilled in California. It's against the law. Even our vet won't reuse them.


• 1 bit of plastic from a bunch of organic bananas. No, I haven't found any other brand of organic bananas in my area without the plastic, as another commenter suggested the last time.


• 1 fork from the after funeral luncheon. An amazing man died this month. He was one of the founders of the company I work for and the father of the current owner and her sister. He survived prostate cancer for over 15 years and rode his recumbent bike all the way down the West Coast of the United States. In his latter years, he became a vegan for health reasons but still liked to sneak the ocassional cigarette. He enjoyed hanging out in the accounting office with my co-worker and me, and we will miss his energy and humor. So yeah, I ended up with a plastic fork that day (and a plastic cup which I washed and replaced in the kitchen) but honestly I had other things on my mind.


• Plastic return envelope from Cell Phones For Soldiers which came with a book I express ordered from Amazon.com. Okay, where to start with this one? I don't normally order from Amazon.com, but I needed a book right away for a group I joined this month and couldn't wait to find it used. The group is run by Jonathan Gustin, the founder of Green Sangha, and as a member, I'll be partaking in a Vision Quest retreat later this month. Please don't ask me what a vision quest is. I'm still finding out. Suffice it to say, (or suffice to day, as some believe the saying goes) I didn't expect a plastic Cell Phones for Soldiers envelope and I just can't even start to analyze my ambivalence about that.

So there's the plastic waste I ended up with last week. But there was more plastic waste that I had a hand in generating. While my parents were in town a few weeks ago, they discovered a chocolate bar that they absolutely fell in love with. Divine Milk Chocolate. They loved the sweet, creamy taste. And while I much prefer dark chocolate, I loved that the bar is organic and fair trade. So for Father's Day, I ordered 20 bars to be shipped to Maryland.

Did I think about what it would entail to ship 20 bars to Maryland during a heat wave? Kind of. I did request no extra plastic packaging materials in my order. Alas, the message was not relayed. The chocolate arrived at their house in pristine condition, "And look what came with your delightful gift," my dad writes in his thank you email, "(the choc is in the small plastic bubble-wrapped box in front of the STYROFOAM cooler) plus a dry ice plastic bag, plus 4 plastic bags containing gel plus - YAY - a slew of paper packing --"





Look how cute my mom is.

"Are you going to count this on your web site for next month's tally?" my dad asks.

Well, no. It goes in your tally, Dad. But I did report it, just to keep us all honest. Please reuse the ice chest for your next picnic.

I'll have more plastic to report next week related to the bicycle I bought this Sunday, and a full report on the bike with photos tomorrow.
 

 

Year 2, Week 1 Results: 4.1 oz of plastic waste.

Back to dealing with plastic. I wonder if it'll be another whole year before I have a second plastic-free week.

Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 1 plastic wrapper from a Wholphin DVD. I subscribed to Wholphin before starting this project. I believe I've received my last DVD, and I won't be renewing. The really stupid thing is that I haven't watched any of them since I subscribed. I used to buy a lot of things that I didn't end up watching or using. My friend Axelle is currently borrowing these DVDs. Hope she's enjoying them.


• 1 Ikea fluorescent light bulb. The weight of this week's tally includes both the plastic and the glass because I can't weigh them separately. Instead of saving this light bulb in plastic purgatory, I'll be getting the mercury out of the house as soon as possible and dropping it off at Cole Hardware on 4th Street in SF. Yes, I realize Ikea will also take them back. But Cole Hardware is easier for me to get to via BART.


• 2 Bandaids. Or as they call them in the U.K., plasters. This will teach me not to to let the kitties' nails get too long! Had to cover up some nasty scratches on my foot.

New plastic purchased since the plastic project began and used this week:

• Plastic bag of Instinct dry cat food. Mostly Soots and Arya get wet food from cans, as I've previously mentioned. But we do give them a little dry here and there so their teeth will have something to crunch.


• Plastic pizza box top holder upper thingie. I found this under the refrigerator! I think it arrived in a pizza a few months ago before we started remembering to request pizzas without the little plastic thingie in the middle. Nowadays, we always ask, and our pizzas never stick to the top.


• 1 Refresh Endura single use eyedrop container. My eyes have been doing pretty well without drops until this last week.


• Plastic shipping label cover from a package sent from Canada. Don't know if this type of plastic is required to ship from Canada. Anyone else know?


• 1 plastic tag hanger from a To-go Ware tiffin I bought from the Ecology Center. I'm thinking this little container will be much safer for bringing home hot leftovers than the plastic Tupperware to-go container I had been using.


• Plastic seal from around the neck of another jar of Fudge Is My Life fudge sauce. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Fudge Is My Life is the best fudge sauce I have ever tasted. Axelle and I had a little taste test this weekend, comparing it to some sauces from The King's Cupboard, which we got for free at Whole Foods. (Why? Because the guy in the chocolate sauce department liked us!) The TKC sauces were good. But FIML won hands down.

Okay, gonna be more careful this week. After all, I have enough dessert toppings to last for a while. What else could I possibly need?
 

 

Week 52 Results: 0 oz of plastic waste. Happy Blogiversary, FPF!

This Week:

A Year Ago:


What a year it's been. I've given Fake Plastic Fish a little makeover, and I've uploaded the year's worth of plastic tally photos to Flickr, where they can be viewed all together or individually with links to the original blog posts.

bethfly1's Plastic Tally Weekly Results photoset www.flickr.com

I've learned a lot, but I'm not done yet. Sure, I was careful not to accumulate plastic waste last week, but there will be more this week and in the weeks to come. Even after a year, we still have some products in plastic containers from before I started this project, and those will enter my plastic purgatory at some point. And there are plastic dilemmas I still haven't solved: mainly in the cat food/cat litter arena.

I may take a mini blogging break this week to focus on Take Back The Filter work, getting through my email finally, and basically being a nice person for my Michael, Soots, & Arya to live with. (Yes, we finally made that chore chart last night.) Or I might not. Regardless, I have a lot more to say and even more to learn, so I'll be back!

Don't use plastic while I'm gone.

Beth
 

 

Week 51 Results: 4.4 oz of plastic waste

Wow. I actually got my butt outside yesterday and did some heavy non-computer related labor. Finally planted the tomato seedlings that Jennconspiracy brought me weeks ago. Hope they will live. I've been so tied to my desk chair that I let most of my outdoor potted plants in the roof garden sizzle and dry up. I rationalized my laziness as water conservation, which it actually was! We are officially in a drought here, and I can't justify ornamental plants in pots on the hot roof. Also, we now have access to some ground in the front yard, so I can actually plant something useful like veggies.

I had about 20 little funerals (in my own mind) yesterday as I lugged each heavy terra cotta pot with its dead flower arrangement down to the front yard, dumped it out, hacked up the solidified potting soil with a trowel in order to reuse it, and deposited the dried up corpses into the green compost bin. I envisioned what each plant had looked like at its peak and felt a little sad. But then I looked around at all the flowering plants in my neighborhood and realized that if I just get out more, I have a huge garden to enjoy just by walking down the street!

Included in this week's tally are some plastic items I came across while dismantling the roof garden and mantling (?) the new front yard garden, which at this point consists of 4 tomatoes plants and a whole bunch of dirt and compost. Oh yeah, more on the compost in tomorrow's post.

Plastic items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 1 plastic bag of Black Gold organic potting mix. Still had about 1/4 of a bag left, so dumped it out into the front yard.


• 8 plastic plant identification tags from deceased plants. I kept any tags that were blank on one side to reuse. These in the tally have printing on both sides.


• 1 plastic case from a set of chopsticks. Found in the silverware drawer while putting dishes away.


• 1 totally scrungy, funkified yellow/green sponge. I think I've eaked out every bit of life from this thing, and it's time to let go. I have a few more funky synthetic sponges I'm using up before switching to the Twist natural cellulose/loofah versions I bought at Whole Foods. (Don't like dish rags, so please don't try to convince me.)


• Flexcar membership card. Flexcar was bought out by Zip Car and the card replaced with a brand new plastic Zipcard.


• Tiny piece of scotch tape from something I can't recall.


• Little green plastic frog from one of my plant pots, half of which is now charred black. When I first started container gardening, back in the day, I thought it was cute to put little plastic critters in the pots. How this thing got charred is a mystery. Could the sun do that to plastic? Crazy. Another roof garden casualty.


• A wad of electrical tape I pulled off some electronics this week while trying to figure out why the TV sound wouldn't come on. A big waste.

New plastic purchased since the plastic project began and used this week:

• Plastic outer wrapper from a 24-pack of Instinct canned cat food. No decisions in the pet food arena yet.


• Outer seal from a 1/2 pint of Ben & Jerry's ice cream. The second one from the parental visit.


• 1 bit of plastic from a bunch of organic fair trade bananas.

One more week to go before the 1-year anniversary of Fake Plastic Fish!

My goal this week: 0 plastic waste. In this entire year, I have yet to complete a week completely plastic-free. But I'm determined that week 52 will be that week. To that end, I'll be taking precautions. I've already tallied the cat food wrapper, and we won't go through another whole case in a week. No one is to buy take out food for me. In fact, I won't visit any restaurants that I haven't already personally certified as safe from plastic. Maybe I'll just avoid restaurants altogether. Also, no bananas this week, since I only buy the organic variety that come with plastic around the stems. I will not order anything through the mail. And I'll put a sincere request out to friends and family: please, please, please no plastic this week!

I have an idea in mind for my Week 52 photo, but it will only work if there is no plastic.
 

 

Week 50 Results: 1.1 oz of plastic waste

Finally, the tally for week ending May 31. At this point, Fake Plastic Fish is 1-1/2 weeks away from its 1-year anniversary! What will happen in year 2? That's what I've been contemplating for the last few days, in between eating out with my parents, watching movies, taking walks, enjoying just being. Here's the tally. I do have a lot more to write about, but I also have work to catch up on for my employer today, so this will be short and sweet.

The tally this week includes all new stuff:

• Plastic outer wrapper from a 24-pack of Instinct canned cat food. No decisions in the pet food arena yet.


• Outer seal from a 1/2 pint of Ben & Jerry's ice cream. This is what I do with my parents when we get together: eat ice cream! Hurray! It was late at night when they arrived in the Bay Area, and all the natural grocery stores were closed, so we shopped at Safeway, and B&J was the best I could do. There will be another of these plastic seals next week.


• 1 plastic seal from a jar of Fudge Is My Life hot fudge sauce. I did forego the High Fructose Corn Syrup-laden jars of Hershey's and Smuckers and held out for my fave local fudge sauce the next day. This stuff rocks!


• 1 plastic cork from a bottle of Pepperwood Grove pinot noir. Michael won this bottle at a triva contest! He's such a smart guy.


• 1 plastic salad dressing container from Razan's Organic Kitchen in Berkeley. I'm always surprised when I go out to dinner what disposable plastic I'll end up with unexpectedly.


• 1 plastic tag from a Cascade Green tomato cage. Jenn! We bought the tomato cage, but we still haven't planted the tomatoes you brought over! I water them every other day to keep them alive. I swear we will plant them this weekend. But the hard part is transferring the compost from that god-awful Compost Tumbler on the roof down to the front yard and mixing it up with the dirt down there before planting.

That's it. Rosa asked if my lifestyle changes when my parents visit. It does, a bit. I eat more ice cream than usual. I eat out in restaurants more than usual; however, I was diligent about bringing my containers with me for leftovers, and we never went the fast food route. I drive more than usual (they rented a car), but driving is necessary because it's difficult for my mom to walk very far, especially when the whether is chilly.

I fully enjoyed their visit, and it was nice to take a little blogging break.
 

 

Week 49 Results: 1.75 oz of plastic waste

First, last week's tally, and then a follow-up report on a letter I sent couple of weeks ago. Items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• Plastic wrapper from a package of Memorex DVD+Rs. I've had these sitting around for over a year and finally broke them open this week to save Mark's and my Amazing Race application video.


• Plastic blister pack of mini DV cartridges. Intended to record our Amazing Race application video on these, which had also been sitting in a drawer for several years. Unfortunately, the video camera turned out to be broken and we had to scramble to find another one before the deadline, one which didn't even use mini DVs. Ah well. The waste still exists.


• 1 wrapper from aforementioned unused mini DV cartridge. Gonna have to find a place to fix my video camera, which I haven't used since January of 2005!


• Hard molded black plastic from package of AA batteries from Costco. Bought over a year ago. Still using them up and will certainly be switching to all rechargables when they are gone.


• 2 plastic wrappers from some electronics cables found in a drawer while searching for the mini DVs. Plastic is still hiding everywhere in our house.


• Broken plastic scissors handle. Broke this last Sunday while working on my BRITA costume for the Bay to Breakers. The weight included in the tally is only the plastic. We're keeping the blades to use for scraping.


• Tiny plastic wrapper from a AAA battery.


• A bunch of plastic fishing line.
Used to attached garbage to Christa's Bay to Breakers landfill costume last Sunday. We had it, so we used it.

New plastic waste purchased since the plastic project began:

• Plastic wrapper from my Bay to Breakers timing chip. Which I ended up not even using.


• 1 piece of plastic from a bunch of organic bananas.


• Plastic outer wrapper from the Blue Vinyl DVD I wrote about here. And yes, the case and DVD itself are also plastic, but I hope to keep and use them for a long time.

That's it for last week.

I also wanted to show you this beautiful card and note I received back from Santa Sabina Retreat Center in response to the letter I sent them on May 7 regarding their use of Synthetic air fresheners and antibacterial hand soap. The note reads:

Spring 2008

Dear Beth,

With thanks for your gentle reminder re: hand soaps, air fresheners. We have changed to natural soaps and Ecco-mist [and something about green awareness that I can't make out.]

Harriet Hope and Susannah

What a nice reminder to me that "gentle reminders" are often the best way to approach people before stronger measures are taken.