9 posts tagged “green living”
We have two inexpensive torchere-style lamps that the bases of fluorescent bulbs simply would not fit into - the wide part (ballast maybe?) of the compact fluorescents are just too wide for the way the lamps are made. I was buying compostable Bio-bags on Gaiam and spotted these socket extenders. They arrived today and work perfectly, allowing enough clearance that I can put those CF bulbs to use and ditch the incandescents. You can probably find these at a local hardware store too.
By the way, if you live in an area that collects compostable garbage separately (as we do - Cleanscapes has special, less expensive, bright orange bags for it), or if you have a compost pile but want to collect a few days worth of scraps, the 3-gallon sized Bio-bags are terrific. We drink a lot of tea and so have quantities of wet leaves (in addition to all the greasy cardboard pizza boxes and paper sandwich wrappers and various food waste) - they are collected in a Bio-bag lined covered dump bucket and removed to the special orange bag in the chest freezer every few days. Once the bag is full, it's hauled out to the alley for pickup.
So, if you decide to get a Smart Catbox (which really is working out very well for us) or go my DIY route and construct a draining litter pan that uses sunflower or safflower seeds for the litter, don't think that just because your cat has peed on the seeds they won't still sprout. Because if you let a few wash down the sink or shower drain, soon you'll have a tiny green forest, right in your bathroom fixtures.
Arguments for streaming/downloading music vs. buying vinyl/cds etc
1) Better for the planet.
2) More room in the house.
3) More cost effective
4) Easier to get rid of embarrassing tracks/bands you used to love and now make you cringe.
So, check out Rhapsody - you can listen to 25 tracks for free every month, or sign up for $13/month for completely unlimited listens. I've streamed close to 250 tracks since I signed up on Monday. Very good value.
Last night, Mr. Jaq sniffed my head and commented it was getting a bit "earthy". I had bought a small bottle of Dr. Bronner's liquid peppermint soap over the weekend, thinking it would be a good thing to try in the hair experiments. It was nice and tingly, and certainly nice smelling. It didn't make my head itch. It also didn't lather a bit (I only used a tiny amount) and left my hair pretty stiff and easily tangled and dull. Not a happy hair day.
I received two samples of mild shampoos from DHC today, and have been doing a little research on SLS (sodium lauryl sulfate) vs. SLES (sodium laureth sulfate). SLES is much milder, causes less skin irritation, etc. All in all, I'm happy with this new hair care routine - shampooing once a week or so, rinsing every day, using baking soda every 2 or 3 days, so I'm calling the experiments a success overall. Saves money, easier on the planet, easier on my scalp - all good things.
Started over on Flickr:
A daily photo or two, along with notes on what I did to it that day prior to the photo.
The boar bristle hairbrush showed up late yesterday afternoon. It looked well-made for less than $12, ecologically harvested wood, ethically sheared bristles ("like wool is sheared from sheep..."). It smelled odd, perfume-y, not completely unpleasant, so I brushed my hair 100 strokes. This stuck my hair completely down to my head, but it was obedient and fluffed up via some finger-combing.
Mr. Jaq stuck his nose in when I came back downstairs and inhaled deeply. "Does it smell like oatmeal? Does it stink?" I cringed. "No....... It's sorta musty though." I had only rinsed with water on Thursday morning, probably should have considered the baking soda rinse instead. Either way, I washed with a tiny amount of shampoo this morning, so little it barely lathered my whole head. My hair is a slightly unmanageable puff now. It probably needed a few drops of jojoba while wet and I forgot. That was Saturday morning to Friday morning of no shampoo.
A casualty though - the new hairbrush stunk up the bathroom, left in there overnight. I decided to wash it, as the care instructions said this was okay as long as it wasn't submerged. I dried it fairly well, but not well enough. I also think leaving it bristle-side up contributed. The wood swelled and split, from one of the bristle clusters down the side of the handle. Oh well.
Two other things my hair needs: cut and color. I haven't sussed out an alternative to Hydrience and will be sticking with that for the near future.
Okay, I am officially amazed at how well this "not shampooing" is working for me. My head doesn't itch, my hair isn't stuck flat to my head, it actually looks pretty great. Here's the continuation of the experiments:
Monday night: Had a tiny bit of itchiness, so decided to try some sweet almond oil. I massaged approx. 3 tbsp into my scalp for 5-7 minutes, then showered to rinse most of it out.
Tuesday morning: Dilute baking soda rinse
Tuesday night: Hair looking a little oily at the roots. Decided to try using oats as a dry shampoo. My original plan was to grind up some rolled oats coarsely, but it was late so I just used some coarse cut scotch oatmeal from Bob's Red Mill instead. I wanted something not too floury/powdery, as I don't own a hairbrush yet. And I picked oats over cornmeal because oatmeal is soothing to the skin and has less oil than corn. Worked about 2 tsp into root, mostly at the crown, down part, and front. Worked pretty well, but next time need to shake head out over a towel instead of all over the place!
Wednesday morning: Warm rinse in shower, spritz damp hair with moisture spray.
I bought a natural bristle brush with a reclaimed wood handle from Amazon, it should be here tomorrow. Be warned, when searching for boar bristle hairbrush, I got a lot of spanking erotica links :D
In the interest of limiting my daily exposure to hydrocarbons and synthetics, and because the oil cleansing method is working so well on my face, I'm starting to do some "no shampoo" experiments on my hair. The only styling product I use is a spray that is basically salt water with some castor oil and natural fragrances. So far:
Saturday: Washed hair in the morning with coal tar shampoo and rubbed 2 drops of jojoba in after towel drying. Hair spritz after towel dry.
Sunday: Worked 8 oz of warm water mixed with 1 tbsp of baking soda into hair and scalp and rinsed well. Everything felt squeaky clean and so shiny, all day.
Monday: Rinsed really well in the warm shower spray. Noticed a tiny bit of itchiness around 3 pm, but hair still looks pretty great, not flat at all.
The other ingredients to be tried out: cider vinegar as a dilute rinse, jojoba and/or sweet almond oil and/or olive oil as a scalp cleanser, ground rolled oats mixed with baking soda as a dry shampoo.
I had never heard of vermiculture until one day when the future Mr. Jaq and I were scoping out a house we were considering moving into. There sat a largish wooden box on the sidewalk near the kitchen door and Mr. Jaq, being a curious sort, peeked in and exclaimed "Oh! Worm bin." I thought he was kidding - who would keep a giant box of worms? But then I started researching and in a few months, with the gift of a starter quart of worms from our good friends BB and CW, I had my own giant box of worms on the sidewalk, where they happily chowed down on every scrap of produce and shredded newspaper I could feed them. I would open the lid of the huge Rubbermaid container they lived in every few days and hear their little mouths smacking away on coffee grounds and tea bags and broccoli stems and banana peels and the occasional citrus fruit that ended up rotting in the fruit bowl.
In my heart, I lusted after a worm hotel, a sleek stackable model with removable trays and a handy spigot to drain off the potent "worm tea" to use as fertilizer.
Then, circumstances changed and we moved from the house in the greenbelt to a mid-rise apartment in downtown Seattle. The worms could not come with us, but we found what I thought would be a good home for them, with family members who were gardeners and cooks and therefore (theoretically) could appreciate the many benefits of maintaining a worm bin. I found out later they simply dumped the contents into their parking strip (which, okay, they were landscaping, but still.)
A year later, and again new circumstances for us. We moved from the apartment across the state, first into a miserable, cold and badly ventilated townhouse, then into a duplex with a yard and, more importantly, room for worms.
Eventually, our worm-bearing friends came to visit, and brought me a new starter container of red wigglers (it's important to use composting worms in your bin; nightcrawlers will not work). I set up another giant container, for the worms that would eat nothing but produce and paper, and bought my fancy worm condo for the worms that would eat produce but also the cat poop. (Composted cat poop should not be used on anything but ornamental plants, due to possible pathogens.) I had the large container of worms in the garage, to keep them in the shade in the summer. As winter set in, I started worrying they would get too cold out there and had Mr. Jaq haul them down into the basement.
Eighteen months later, we decided to move back to Seattle. A word of advice: giant containers full of worms and dirt (because that's what the worms make with your garbage, lovely lovely dirt) are heavier than you think! We did leave the cat poop worms and their end product in the lawn and treewells of the house we left behind, but this time the giant box of worms came along for the ride. It's been really cold in Seattle lately though, and they are sitting outside in the elements with nothing but a plastic box to protect them. I felt so guilty, I bought them a bale of ash shavings at PetsMart, to give them a top layer of insulation until spring.
So, if you're interested in composting, consider a worm bin. You really don't have to worry much about them; I'm just odd that way. They will eat their weight in food waste every couple days and will provide you with rich soil for top-dressing and liquid fertilizer.
