Monday, 14 January 2008
Aftermath - January 14th 2008
It is January 14th 2008. I have still not used a refuse bin. I have some cans from Christmas and a few bottles in the recycling bin which I will put out for the recycling next week. I have had my weekly fire since xmas and thoroughly enjoyed the experience as usual. I shall continue for the foreseeable future without putting out a refuse bin as I cannot revert to the plastic life I left behind. Edwin still delivers my milk, the popman still calls and the market beckons me back without a thought for a supermarket. I will continue to tread the path I have for the last three months plus without even thinking about it. I also intend to write a book on what I did for the simple reason if I can get it printed it might help to pay off the legal fees we incurred fighting the gas plant in my village and lots of people have nearly begged me to put it in writing including a full list of what I avoided and what I purchased together with recipes. So lets give it a go. I have published two books in the past but both have been on History. Lets see how I can get on as auntieplastic. Who knows perhaps more people will lose their need for a bin. That I would love. I did not embark on this journey for anything other than to prove a point. I was on the welsh radio last week and was totally amazed at how people were so shocked that it can be done. I cannot stress enough how easy it is to do, how in control I felt during the three months and how I could not give it up for all the tea in china willingly. I can wealk around shops looking at goods and just writing them off without even thinking about what is inside thd packaging. No I cannot buy you I say to the shelves and I merrily walk on with a smile on my face. This is the life for me, guilt free and charges free if they start to charge for the amount of waste produced. I shall continue to get phone calls off my personal butcher. My quilt will be put together soon and I have materials out of my box for a skirt to beat all skirts. I saw on the '(INEBG) It's not easy being green' web site which I am now attempting to join a joint effort of some people not to buy anything new in 2008. I think I might join them and take personal satisfaction in creating things from thrown away items. We are starting a drop in centre in our village one day a week on Thursdays. Refreshments and crafts. We intend to teach one another skills to enable people to create, for in creating we find peace and contentment and control of the finest sort. I shall be back but lets get writing :)
Wednesday, 26 December 2007
Wednesday 26th December 2007
My challenge is over. Now my challenge is to carry on going. I finished with 2 computer cartridges, one plastic tray, one plastic bag from around grapes and one empty washed tin of beans in my carrier bag after three months. I shall photograph them before taking them to the tip. I have no intention of putting out a bin. My microwave packed up on me just before Xmas and that is out side waiting to be disposed of. I think I will ask for a free collection from the Council to pick it up as that is the most carbon friendly way of disposing of it as the lorry makes lots of pick-ups on each journey. I am going to attempt to live without another microwave but will keep my options open. My son is not amused about that. I survived xmas with giving home made food and quilts which I just about managed to finish on Xmas Eve morning. I think everyone is happy and if there are any complaints I will own up. Only thing I will change next year is I shall start earlier with my xmas gifts and also will source throughout the year so I have more goods available. I also start right now not purchasing anything made out of the United Kingdom. I shall carry on this blog and list what I buy and where I sourced them. I have one major issue with Tesco's even though I did not shop there for Xmas. I was at my daughters. She had visited Tesco's. I am putting in here a photograph of the plastic wrapping which she purchased her cauliflower in from Tesco's. Who can tell me where this cauliflower was grown ? I asked my daughter who had frantically rushed around Tesco's in the crowds as had most people. She said, it is Welsh of course it says so on the packaging. I know I have bought plastic she said to me, but it was Welsh. Well it is not. It is French and surely this is misleading advertising. I will find out but would be grateful of feedback to see what anyone else thinks. This made me mad, how many people paid top prices for cauliflowers covered in bilingual messages believing them to be British at least. I rest my case of wine on someones toes, hopefully it will be Tesco's. I am appalled and I will be back.
Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year to all who have troubled to read my inane titterings for three months, thank you from the bottom of my heart.
Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year to all who have troubled to read my inane titterings for three months, thank you from the bottom of my heart.
Wednesday, 19 December 2007
Day 80
Tuesday 18th December 2007
I am 4 days away from completion of this challenge. For the last week I have been frantically attempting to finish the quilts I should have started 6 months ago. People sayI work well under pressure but gosh it is killing me. I will get there but along the way I see new opportunities opening up in front of me. The red dragons I cut out last year were in the sewing chest and so I thought red dragons on the boys quilts. I finished stitching one but it did not suit the colours of my eldest grandsons quilt so now I have to do another and make 2 cushions for their beds with red dragons on. Then the books I promised them with their names in ages ago. I might make it. I shall let you know if I do. I am no diarist. Strange being a writer but I am not. But the ideas that are now flying around in my head daily will out in the next season when all is quiet and my son returns to college and I only have myself to feed. He is home for a month so life changes dramatically. Does he think his mother is mad? Yes and no. He gets frustrated with me but also respects what I do which I am thankful for. Otherwise his quilt would have daggers embroidered on it instead of playing cards. We mothers have ways of getting back. I am getting more light hearted as Xmas looms. I have faith in my ability to get there complete with the sewing challenge. My hampers are being consumed as I speak. I had texts telling me so. The weekend will be the culmination of a lot of things. Then I will go to a supermarket as my challenge will be over. There is only one reason I will go and that is to pick up cream cheese and lpots and lots of CREAM. I will make a baked vanilla cheesecake and a lemon cheesecake for Xmas a nd they will be seeved with lashings of CREAM. The two things I failed to get on this challenge that I missed, cream and glaze cherries. Impossible for me to get not in plastic. Other things I did without such as yoghurts and did not miss. In fact I have learned to live without them well. I have another 4 days and then I will have completed what I set out to do. I will write a book on the 'exercise of cooking' for it is an exercise of the mind and body and is how I believe we should be living for our well being. I am happy I ventured out as it has changed my way of life. I have no need to change it back, once I have sated on cream this xmas I will not crave it again perhaps until next Xmas. Who knows, I shall find out.
I am 4 days away from completion of this challenge. For the last week I have been frantically attempting to finish the quilts I should have started 6 months ago. People sayI work well under pressure but gosh it is killing me. I will get there but along the way I see new opportunities opening up in front of me. The red dragons I cut out last year were in the sewing chest and so I thought red dragons on the boys quilts. I finished stitching one but it did not suit the colours of my eldest grandsons quilt so now I have to do another and make 2 cushions for their beds with red dragons on. Then the books I promised them with their names in ages ago. I might make it. I shall let you know if I do. I am no diarist. Strange being a writer but I am not. But the ideas that are now flying around in my head daily will out in the next season when all is quiet and my son returns to college and I only have myself to feed. He is home for a month so life changes dramatically. Does he think his mother is mad? Yes and no. He gets frustrated with me but also respects what I do which I am thankful for. Otherwise his quilt would have daggers embroidered on it instead of playing cards. We mothers have ways of getting back. I am getting more light hearted as Xmas looms. I have faith in my ability to get there complete with the sewing challenge. My hampers are being consumed as I speak. I had texts telling me so. The weekend will be the culmination of a lot of things. Then I will go to a supermarket as my challenge will be over. There is only one reason I will go and that is to pick up cream cheese and lpots and lots of CREAM. I will make a baked vanilla cheesecake and a lemon cheesecake for Xmas a nd they will be seeved with lashings of CREAM. The two things I failed to get on this challenge that I missed, cream and glaze cherries. Impossible for me to get not in plastic. Other things I did without such as yoghurts and did not miss. In fact I have learned to live without them well. I have another 4 days and then I will have completed what I set out to do. I will write a book on the 'exercise of cooking' for it is an exercise of the mind and body and is how I believe we should be living for our well being. I am happy I ventured out as it has changed my way of life. I have no need to change it back, once I have sated on cream this xmas I will not crave it again perhaps until next Xmas. Who knows, I shall find out.
Tuesday, 11 December 2007
Day 73
Tuesday 11th December 2007
In 12 days my challenge will be over. I have not put out one waste bin or a scrap of recycling. This has not hurt me one bit. It has enhanced my life in so many ways. I have proved there is an alternative. Today is a sad day for Welsh people in that it has been outed by a farmer that 300,000 welsh lambs are to be slaughtered between now and January 4th next year as the Common Agricultural Policy ( CAP) from the EU has changed and the Tir Mynyydd supplements to hill farmers have altered which means with the rise in maize and other grain on the world market the farmers no longer find it a viable option to farm lamb. Our hills which are full of sheep will now dwindle. Yet yesterdays paper saw reports of Gordon Brown starting an investigation into security of food supplies in this country. The farmers will be paid £15 per lamb to kill them and incinerate them. No doubt to create electricity. Carmarthenshire County Council state they cannot afford to feed their schoolchildren an organic diet. A report in yesterdays Western Mail states people will not be able to afford welsh lamb in wales. We will continue to import New Zealand lamb. Is it just me or does this seem madness to anyone else?
In 12 days my challenge will be over. I have not put out one waste bin or a scrap of recycling. This has not hurt me one bit. It has enhanced my life in so many ways. I have proved there is an alternative. Today is a sad day for Welsh people in that it has been outed by a farmer that 300,000 welsh lambs are to be slaughtered between now and January 4th next year as the Common Agricultural Policy ( CAP) from the EU has changed and the Tir Mynyydd supplements to hill farmers have altered which means with the rise in maize and other grain on the world market the farmers no longer find it a viable option to farm lamb. Our hills which are full of sheep will now dwindle. Yet yesterdays paper saw reports of Gordon Brown starting an investigation into security of food supplies in this country. The farmers will be paid £15 per lamb to kill them and incinerate them. No doubt to create electricity. Carmarthenshire County Council state they cannot afford to feed their schoolchildren an organic diet. A report in yesterdays Western Mail states people will not be able to afford welsh lamb in wales. We will continue to import New Zealand lamb. Is it just me or does this seem madness to anyone else?
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