I’ve Never Shopped Online So Much In My Life

Pre-pandemic I would occasionally shop online.

I most likely had an Amazon Prime order or two every couple of months and preferred to buy online and pick up in-store or leave things in my cart until I had multiple items to ship.

Fast forward the 50 days we have been in quarantine and that habit has changed drastically.

Living in a densely populated urban area like Chicago and being high risk since I am pregnant, my husband and I have made every effort to reduce our risk of contracting the virus by staying home (and luckily we are both able to work from home).

We have not set foot inside a physical grocery store in over 7 weeks. The last time I have been in an enclosed space with a number of people (that wasn’t the doctor’s office) was the pharmacy some 5 weeks ago before I realized I could just send my prescription to my house.

Every single thing we need gets delivered.

Normally I would find it annoying to get our groceries delivered in plastic bags even when we asked for paper and for the insulated bags Amazon delivers frozen items in to be non-recyclable or personal care products shipped in like 5 different shipments.

BUT, since we have a baby’s arrival rapidly approaching, the number of boxes and packaging we receive is exponentially more than just the standard young couple due to baby shower gifts and trying to stock up for the baby.

You see, I have this fear that it is going to be 3 AM with our newborn and we need some specific item and we try to buy it, but it is sold out or on backorder and won’t ship for an obscene amount of time.

To combat this scenario, I have been trying to be proactive and stock up on newborn needs before they arise. This means my cart at Target.com has approximately 20+ items in it, which is just insane. And with talk of diaper and wipe shortages, I am just trying to make sure we have enough to get us through an unknown amount of time.

So on top of the groceries and baby shower gifts, we are also getting those shipments.

This means we have A LOT OF BOXES coming through our house. Like A LOT.

Our vestibule on a normal day.

A lot of boxes, a lot of plastic packaging, and a lot of waste and it seems to be never-ending.

I have to write notes for when deliveries are occurring each day throughout the week just to make sure I don’t forget to get something on the doorstep (you know since I don’t leave the house).

After opening items, we flatten the boxes and keep them outside on our deck until recycling day, which means from the alley down below, we look like crazy box hoarders. The reason we don’t take them down to the recycling carts immediately is two-fold:

1.  More boxes will most likely be delivered the next day
2.  Everyone else is ordering stuff too so the recycling carts are always packed full. We legit have to wait until Monday afternoons after the recycling gets picked up and then we run downstairs and stuff the boxes in the carts.

Not shown: the boxes behind me, the boxes still in the nursery, and the unopened boxes still in the vestibule.

I have also been collecting the plastic bags, wraps, and bubble mailers that can be recycled in this gigantic plastic bag to one day recycle. Unfortunately, I don’t know when that would be. Anyone want to take my giant bag to the grocery store?!

Anyone want to take this to the grocery store to be recycled for me?!

All the other non-recyclable packaging gets tossed in the trash.

It’s rough and I hate it, but there is not much I can do about it. Staying home and staying healthy is our number one priority right now. And there is no way I can do that without online orders.

Hopefully, the boxes should be slowing down with shower gifts petering out and most of my last-minute we-might-need-this-for-the-baby-because-this-list-says-so shopping completed. We still obviously need to get groceries though…

 

 

I Paid Money To Properly Dispose of My Mattress

That old saggy, squeaky mattress.

Everyone has one or will encounter one eventually.

Ours came from a friend in college. My husband used it for a while post-graduation, then it was our bed when we moved in together, and then it was finally relegated to the guest room when we moved two summers ago.

It has to be at least 10 years old and we tried to cover up the body divets we created with a mattress topper, but this baby is done.

We also don’t have any space for a queen-sized bed anymore because an actual baby is about to take over the guest room.

Bye-bye mattress! 

As we purge the items in the guest room to make room for its new inhabitant, I am trying to be very cognizant of where everything is ending up. I could have definitely posted the mattress, box spring, topper, and metal frame on Craigslist or Facebook Marketplace for an extremely low price or even for free. I also could have put it in the alley and hope someone picked it up before the garbagemen did. It is important to note that most charities do not accept used mattress donations.

All in all, I figured both those options will eventually end with our mattress in a landfill. Sure, handing our old mattress off to someone else will extend its life for a little longer, but what are the chances the person who takes it is going to properly dispose of it when they are done with it?

Probably zero.

So we decided to delay the inevitable and recycle our mattress.

The most annoying part of being a responsible person is that I have to pay for this to occur, but keeping our sad mattress out of the landfill is important to me, so here we are.

The first thing I did was get a handful of quotes from mattress recycling and removal services:

• 1-800-GOT-JUNK? $186
• Mattress Disposal Plus $164
• JunkRelief $145

I ended up going with JunkRelief for obvious reasons. It was wonderful for movers to come in and just take all of it away in under 10 minutes. There was no way I was going to be helping anyone get a box spring down a set of winding stairs while pregnant. No way.

All in all, while I am out $145, I don’t feel too bad about it. I am happy it is gone and I am happy it is properly taken care of it.

ICYMI: Nothing Really Decomposes in a Landfill

Have you been greenwashed into thinking that a compostable bowl is a better choice because once you toss it, it will decompose in a landfill?

Or have you patted yourself on the back for buying those biodegradable/compostable trash bags?

Or have you shrugged it off that it’s fine to throw a banana peel into the garbage because its organic material and will break down?

I hate to break it to you, but that is

not really how landfills work.

In graduate school, our class had the opportunity to tour a nearby landfill and recycling center and let me tell you, it was very depressing.

I will never forget seeing all the things the people of southern Indiana tossed into their garbage cans, being pushed and packed by bulldozers.

And the smell! Phew! Unbelievable!

Anyway, that stuff Hoosiers tossed that day about 6 years ago is still probably sitting around, just as the day it was tightly packed into the Earth.

I am not going to get into all the undesirable aspects of landfills, such as methane production and groundwater leaching, but the best non-super jargony explanation I could find came from this article on livescience.com:

“Landfills are not designed to break down waste, only to store it, according to the National Solid Wastes Management Association. But garbage in a landfill does decompose, albeit slowly and in a sealed, oxygen-free environment. Because of the lack of oxygen, bacteria in the waste produce methane gas, which is highly flammable and dangerous if allowed to collect underground. It is also a potent greenhouse gas and contributes to global warming.”

-Molika Ashford, “What Happens Inside a Landfill“

Organic materials need oxygen to biodegrade and landfills lack oxygen when they are tightly packed and sealed. In this same graduate class, we discussed instances of landfill “archeologists” who have found hot dogs and guacamole still intact and years old newspapers completely legible. See more here, here, and here.

It all goes back to the notion that this is no “away.”

Throwing something away, be it a piece of plastic from Amazon packaging, your jeans with a hole in them, a banana peel, a piece of junk mail, an extra metal thing from your IKEA furniture assembly, to that piece of IKEA furniture itself, they will all live on in the depths of landfills scattered across the country. 

And those landfills are getting full.

For instance, Chicago’s garbage is trucked 100 miles outside of the city to 2 landfills in Illinois and 2 landfills in Indiana. Watch this video from WTTW for a comprehensive look as to what happens to Chicago’s garbage once it is put out in the alley. According to the Illinois EPA, at the state’s current rate of garbage collection, Illinois will run out of space for garbage in the next 20 years.

So let’s keep stuff out of the landfill that doesn’t belong. 

Recycle that plastic Amazon packaging in the proper place, or better yet, ask Amazon and other companies to reduce their packaging. You can email Amazon customer service and request that orders for your account come with less packaging. The environmental impacts of Amazon could be a whole blog post in itself.

Fix your jeans with a hole in them or find textile recycling in your area.

Compost that banana.

Recycle that junk mail and call the company to have your address removed.

Don’t buy cheap particle board furniture from IKEA, instead, quality pieces are abundantly available secondhand.

So next time you go to the garbage can just take a second to think before you toss.

 

 

 

Oh Hey There 2019

And just like that, it is 2019.

I am kind of pretending that time has not moved so fast and have not made any resolutions for the new year.

Honestly, I do not need another to-do list.

Last year, I hoped to accomplish the following resolutions.

Here is how I did based on the following scale:

Neah= didn’t even happen

Meh= kind of did it

Yay= accomplished!

1.) Buy in bulk: neah

This just didn’t happen. Will work on this for 2019.

2.) Reduce clothing purchases: yay!

I did make a real conscious effort to reduce my clothing purchases. For instance, I went to a clothing swap, borrowed white dresses for wedding-related events, and only bought a pair of pants and socks for my honeymoon.

3.) Be conscious of what goes in the trash: yay!

I am overcome with legitimate sadness whenever I see things being thrown out that shouldn’t be. It has even rubbed off on K, which is amazing. To bring my lifestyle into our wedding, we had composting and used less wasteful wedding vendors. We collected 227 pounds of food waste in 2018 and I finally worked up the courage to approach the subject of having a compost pick up service in our office. Also when we moved over the summer, I made sure that boxes, bubble wrap, and plastic went to the right places.

4.) Bike to work: meh

So I did bike to work once. I was a little terrified, especially because after I got to work, I found out a cyclist had died the day prior after gotten hit by a truck. Needless to say, I didn’t do it again and now its a bit cold…

5.) CSA Round 2: meh

While we did get another CSA share for the summer, I cannot say that we did a better job of trying to get through all of our produce before it went bad. I did go through a phase of freezing a lot of the veggies, so that was a plus!

6. Remember to say no to straws: meh

Sometimes I remember, but most of the time I don’t. Our biggest win in this category was asking the bartenders at our wedding to not provide straws unless our guests asked for one.

Overall, I am pretty content with how we did in 2018.

2019 will be some more of the same.

What are your plans for 2019?

Batteries Can Be Tossed

I often get asked what to do with stuff.

What do I do with plastic bags since they can’t go in the recycling blue bin? Where do I take pillows? And sheets and towels? Textiles that can’t be used? Salvation Army or Goodwill?

Recently my dad asked me if he has to recycle alkaline batteries, and not long afterward, a friend texted me the very same question.

Back in the day, your regular TV remote battery couldn’t be put into the municipal trash because they contained harmful mercury that could leach into waterways. Nowadays, batteries do not contain mercury, which is good.

In Chicago, alkaline batteries are accepted in the garbage cart, while rechargeable batteries are considered hazardous waste due to nickel cadmium and must be recycled accordingly.

These batteries can now safely go in the trash/landfill, which isn’t necessarily that great.

Yes, they can be thrown out (like a lot of things), but you can also go one extra step and find a place that recycles them. You can look up where to recycle your batteries here, and for the most part, it is going to depend on where you live and what your town or city collects.

So check it out and do something with that pile of dead batteries in your junk drawer.

Resources:

• Here’s what to do with your dead batteries
• How to recycle rechargeable batteries

Talking Trash: Garbology

You know you are nerdy when the current book you are reading is a book from the library on garbage.

But hey, whatever.

I am reading Garbology by Edward Humes as part of Zero Waste Chicago‘s BYO Books March Book Club, and so far it has been a bit challenging to get through.

“Americans make more trash than anyone else on the planet, throwing away about 7.1 pounds per person per day, 365 days a year. Across a lifetime that rate means, on average, we are each on track to generate 102 tons of trash.”

-Edward Humes, Garbology

It is an informative book for sure and definitely eye-opening, but I often have trouble reading (and watching) about things that are just so darn negative. It is why I haven’t watched Cowspiracy.

The best part of the book was finding another, more meaningful book.

Let me back up and explain.

I hang out with my grandma a lot and when I go over there, she tries to give me stuff. I love old things and usually take what she offers me (we have started a collection of old cookbooks from her now). A while ago, I was helping her clean out a room and we went through books that had been on a bookshelf for probably 40 or more years. I took a couple that sounded interesting and a few that just looked cool.

Fast forward.

As I was reading Garbology, Humes referenced a book from the 60’s called The Waste Makers.

“Vance Packard…wrote a prophetic follow-up in 1960 called The Waste Makers. In it, he accused his industry and marketing critics of sparking a crisis of excess and waste that would exhaust both nation and nature, until future Americans were forced by scarcity to ‘mine old forgotten garbage dumps’ to recover squandered resources.”

-Edward Humes, Garbology

I sat on the couch pondering this book he referenced. It sounded so familiar. So I got up, and I peered into our bookstand TV case.

Sure enough, The Waste Makers was stacked between Catching Fire and The Martian. It was one of the books I had taken from my grandmother’s.

I immediately called her and asked about the book, curious about who was the original owner. Unfortunately, she couldn’t entirely remember, but we deduced that it was most likely my great grandfather’s, a German immigrant who was adamant about planting trees.

I can’t wait to read this book that my great grandfather read. Even though it is 58 years old it is absolutely ahead of its time and scarily accurate.

“Wastefulness has become a part of the American way of life. [The people of the United States]…must be induced to step up their individual consumption higher and higher, whether they have any pressing needs for the goods or not. Their ever-expanding economy demands it.”

-Vance Packard, The Waste Makers

Actions for A New Year

Happy 2018 Everyone!

I spent New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day hanging at home, getting recharged for the year ahead.

In general, a lot is coming up in 2018, and a lot of big and small decisions will be made that will have both big and small impacts on the environment.

There are definitely actions I can do better at and these are what I plan to focus on in 2018.

What are your goals?

Do you have any suggestions on how to reach these goals?

 

 

10 Most Overlooked Ways to Reduce Waste: Part 2

Welcome to Part 2!

If you missed Part 1, you can check that out here.

Let’s get right into it.

#5 Vote with Your $$$

Every time you purchase something, you are contributing to its demand. This is simple economics.

Put your money towards products and companies that you believe in. If it is important to you that your items are produced using renewable energy, then support companies that do.

For instance, there is a fair trade shop just around the corner from our apartment and it is currently struggling, so after work today I popped in and used my dollars to buy wool dryer balls and Bee’s Wrap. My dollars did not just get me faster-drying clothes in the dryer but they made a statement that I support these kinds of shops and want them in my neighborhood.

Resources:

• Huffington Post- Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is. Vote with Your Dollars.

#6 Your Pantry and Fridge

Open your fridge.

Now open your pantry.

How much of the stuff in there is going to end up in the trash can/landfill? I am not just talking about food packaging and wrappers, but food waste too.

Keep this in mind when you are at the grocery store. I am not asking you to only shop in the bulk aisle of Whole Foods, but just start noticing.

Once you do it is hard to shake it.

 

Joining a CSA helped us cut down on packaged produce, but sometimes we still received things in plastic. 

 

Resources for Cutting Back on Packaging:

• The Zero Waste Chef- How to Store Produce without Plastic
• Wild Minimalist- 5 Tips for a Plastic-Free Minimal Fridge
• Going Zero Waste- How to Stock a Zero Waste Pantry
• Treading My Own Path- The Definitive Guide to Storing Food without Plastic

#7 Wait it Out

When I find something that I want (not need), I bookmark it in my browser under a folder called “Things I Want to Buy.”

And then I leave it there for days, weeks, and months.

If I am still thinking about it long after I saved it, then I will consider it further. If not then it gets deleted, and to be honest, not many things have survived the “Things I Want to Buy” folder.

Basically, avoid impulse buys by having a waiting period for each item. You might find that you didn’t like it as much as you thought, or get home and realize you already have 5 black sweaters.

Resources:

• Litterless- On Waiting to Make Purchases

#8 Put Some Effort into What You Already Have

Did something break? Then fix it.

Do your jeans have a hole in them? Sew them.

The #8 overlooked way to create less waste is also known simply as taking care of your stuff! Wash and dry clothing according to the directions. Store equipment in the proper place. Use a coaster. Give your car regular maintenance. Fix the soles of your shoes when they have worn through.

Putting a little extra effort or elbow grease will make your stuff live a longer life.

Resources: 

• Litterless- Repair Night

#9 Buy Secondhand/Previously Loved

If you’ve followed this blog, you know that the majority of our furniture is secondhand. Everything pictured below has either come from Craigslist, a garage sale, or family/friends.

Not only is it way cheaper than buying anything new, but it keeps pieces out of the landfill. Beyond furniture, I do have some pieces of clothes that are secondhand, but the majority of my wardrobe is not. It is something I am working on.

Resources to get your secondhand shopping on:

• Business Insider- 15 Things You’re Better Off Buying Used
• Green Indy Blog- A Zero Waste Guide to Thrift Shopping
• Grist- 5 Reasons to Shop at Thrift Stores

#10 Don’t Give into Trends

The fashion world likes to tell us that we need new styles of clothing every few months. If it is not the 70’s bell sleeves, the chokers, or those “cold shoulder” shirts, it will be something else tomorrow. That way you can buy, buy, buy.

Don’t give into that crap. You don’t need any of it. I like to think that the clothes I purchase will be something I wear for a long time, so I stay away from trends and keep my closet pretty neutral.

Whatever the next ridiculous trend is, pass on it, and just wear your regular sweater that covers your shoulders with pride!

More Resources:

• Huffington Post- 17 Reasons to Stop Following Fashion Trends
• Forbes- Fast Fashion is A Disaster for Women and the Environment 
• Chicago Tribune- Fast Fashion Can Kill Your Wallet and the Environment: Here’s How You Can Help

 

What else would you add to the list?

The Great Compost Fiasco of 2017

With all of our CSA produce, we have been producing a lot of food scraps that we toss in our compost bucket. So much so that the bucket is totally full before pick-up time.

The first time this happened, I tossed some compost extras into a double lined paper (compostable over plastic) grocery bag, folded it over tightly and left it in the space between our fire escape’s door and the screen door. When pick-up day came, I just put the paper bag out with the compost bucket.

It all worked out just fine.

Before we left for vacation, I tried this bit again, putting the paper bag of food scraps in between the doors. I kind of forgot it was there and we jetted off to Europe for 10 days. Little did I know that it was going to basically be 90 degrees in Chicago the entire time we were gone.

Thus it was a recipe for disaster.

When we got home, the apartment had a little bit of a funk, but I did not think anything of it. I went to put our shoes on the fire escape to air out and a flock of bugs spewed into the apartment! Quickly shutting the door, I came to the terrible realization of what had happened. Unfortunately,  I was not able to actually open the door for confirmation unless I wanted to be assaulted by insects.

So I had a hot, smelly, rotten, bag of food scraps sitting in between our doors.

Great.

The only way to clean up this mess without letting all the bugs in the apartment meant I had to climb up the fire escape and open the screen door from the outside.

Armed with a trash bag, I took a deep breath and opened the door to free the insects who made their home in my bag of bug food. I scooped what I could into the trash bag before the soggy paper bag ripped, spilling old peppers onto the vestibule.

I plucked them up from the decaying food slime that had oozed out of the bag and shoved them into the trash bag. I propped the door open to air out the stink/bugs and ran back down the fire escape to the trash can.

Once inside, I filled up a pitcher of water and poured it over the ooze layer between the doors. Finally, I sprayed some Lysol over it to maybe make it less smelly.

So I tried to keep some organic matter from a landfill and failed miserably…

I won’t be trying the paper bag bit again anytime soon.

 

Compostables, But No Composting at Work

The kitchen at my workplace is stocked with compostable plates and bowls.

Which is awesome.

But only if there is actually somewhere to compost them.

As you can probably already tell where this is going, there is nowhere to compost these items at work.

While I applaud facilities for going for what seems like the right choice, they need to take it a step further for it to achieve the desired result.

Our break room has 2 clearly labeled waste cans; one for recycling and one for waste. All they need is another for compost.

Since I do compost at home, I end up smuggling the occasional plate or napkin home in my lunch bag to add to my compost bucket. One less thing in a landfill, right?

 

Banana peel and compostable plate ready to head home with me

 

The next step is to talk to Facilities about providing composting services. Someone has got to be the one to bring it up? Might as well be me.