Freecycle

I just signed with a Freecycle forum, thanks to Nancy for posting about it. It is pretty self explanatory. If you have something you don’t need any more, you can post it and see if there’s someone who could use it. Or if you need something, you can see if anyone has it to give. You can search for Canadian and US cities to join the forum close to you.

It is a terrific idea. It’s great for saving money, to help others, and keep things out of landfills.

Like I’ve mentioned before PF I shopped lots and was basically a stuff queen. Slowly and steady I’ve minimized my possession to things I love and need. I’m towards the end, but I’m still getting ride of some books, clothes, DVD’s and other stuff. I have a routine with stuff I want to get rid of.

First I see if anyone I know want it. Then I try to sell it online. Then I give it to charity. One thing I worry about giving to charity is that fact that they get so much stuff. Combine that with not enough staff/volunteers, it could happen that things you think other people could really use get thrown out or forgotten. Now I can make sure it finds a good home with free cycle.

I love it when things important to me all come together, like environment, personal finance, and good will.

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Changing businesses

I wanted to make pizza yesterday, so I went to my nearby grocery store for the stuff. As usual I brought my own canvas shopping totes. After the cashier ran in my purchases, she asked if I wanted the bag credit applied toward my bill or to charity. Huh? Well turns out that they now give credits (3 cents per bag) to people who bring in their own. Impressed!

I told my friend this. She shops at the Superstore. Apparently, if you bring in your own bag/carrier you get extra PC points. Awesome!

Glad to know that Businesses are making good changes.

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No bag please

Mum, Sis and I went shopping over the weekend. We were at the grocery store, the drug store, and the garden center. Everywhere I tried to minimize the amount of plastic bags. Mum was surprised. I don’t know how she felt about it. She complained at having to carry a bottle of cooking oil, which has a handle and doesn’t need a plastic bag! But then she said I’m always a weird in a half proud kind of way.

When we got back to Sis’s place we helped her put away everything including the plastic bags. Her plastic bag filled one small cupboard! Must be hundreds of bags. I could barely push another one in there. The point? We reuse plastic bags. But never as much as the number we get.

I was watching CBC Friday. A documentary on the plastic bag says Canadian use 6 billion bags a year. Considering there are 30+ million Canadians that is a whole lot of bags. They talked to people on the street. I’m surprised at the number of people who didn’t know they are made from oil.

Other bad things? What about the energy used to produce then, the landfill problem, the birds and fish killed because they swallowed them, and the generally cluster.

I had a browse through the Internet, and there are many justifications for using plastic bags. For example, we reuse them. Well, obviously not a solution judging by Sis’s overflowing cupboard. They take more energy to produce than paper bags. Um, how about not using bags? They don’t take up that much landfill space, or the oil/energy used is not nearly as bad as car exhaust. So that makes it ok? We got to do everything we can to minimize our impact on our environment.

I’m going to approach this like I do my personal finance. Every penny earned/saved counts. Now I’m going to count every bag that I don’t use. I’m going to put it up on the sidebar to see how many bags I can eliminate just by bringing my own (very cute, baby blue) tote and saying no to bags.

P.S. I know this is not exactly Personal Finance related but it could be. In stores where you have to pay for bags, the savings are obvious. Indirectly being friendly to our environment can have benefits too. Like possibly, if stores spend less money on bags, operating costs go down down, which may trickle down to customer savings? Less in landfills means good for our city budget and property taxes? Just some ideas.

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Shades of Green

Given the focus on the environment this week(April 22 was Earth day), I learnt a few things. I learnt that you can’t lump everyone into green or not green. Depending on how dedicated and involved people can be labeled different shades of green. I guess as a country Canadians are not as green as we thought.

I’m disappointed. I really thought that we are pretty green. But we come in third in the world in terms of per capita greenhouse gas emissions. Australia is #1 and United States is #2.

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Take what you need, no more

I was craving greasy junk food yesterday and I went out for a fast food burger with my co-workers. The combo of course includes fries and a drink. I can never finish the drinks, actually I barely make a dent every time. So after paying the regular price I tried to tell the cashier to give me a small drink instead of regular size. I’ve tried this many times before without success.

I try asking for a smaller cup or I try to get them to fill the cup to half. I usually just get blank stares.

Then they give me a whole stack of napkins with my meal, which I barely used.

As I am thinking how much waste there is, I see a couple of kids taking thick stack of napkins out of the dispenser, by the garbage people are throwing away trays with extra forks and spoons they didn’t use, piles of fries they didn’t finish.

Maybe that’s why I get such weird looks when I ask for less. Because people would rather have more and throw away what they don’t use, than be bothered with not having enough.

How about we all stop and think about what we need beforehand, and take just what we need? Waste is so sad. We all share this world of resources. Just because we have a society of abundance doesn’t mean we should waste it this way.

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No more Junk mail

I don’t like getting junk mail. Not only does it stuff up my mail box but it kills trees! What a waste.

Anyway, if you are Canadian you can sign up for the Do Not Contact list at the Canadian Marketing Association to stop getting addressed junk mail and calls. When you are at the website just search for Do Not Contact List.

Soon, there will be a National Do Not Call List (estimated date 2008 Fall). I will keep my eye out for that.

Also, put a No Junk Mail sticker on your mail box for those unaddressed junk mail.

*edit* Thanks to Wooly Woman, here is another link to fill out to reduce junk mail.

If you are in the United States check out this link

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CFL Bulb Recycling

CFL bulbs are a great idea. They save a lot of energy (a 60 Watt equivalent CFL bulb uses only 13 Watts!) and they last a long, long time. Eventually after years of use when the bulb dies, do remember to recycle them as they cannot be thrown out in regular trash. Home Depot is now going to have recycling boxes for used CFL bulbs. Yay!

While I’m at it, there are a few more things we can recycle.

1. Batteries. Lots of electronics stores and battery stores like Best Buy and Battery Plus have battery recycling boxes.
2. Used cell phones.
3. Printer cartridges

In Toronto there is this great program called thInk Food where you can collect used cell phones and inkjet cartridges and raise funds for the local Food banks. I’m sure there are similar programs in other cities. I quickly Googled ‘cell phone recycle’ and ‘cartridge recycle’ and got lots of results.

Why not start an environmental club at work and encourage people to bring in their old batteries, cell phones, and printer cartridges :)

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