Saturday, August 25, 2007
The Birds Are Repurposing Our Crap
Check out this nest I found while removing brush from beside our shed. Don't worry. There were no eggs in it. As you can see, the birds that made this nest have woven in quite a bit of plastic. I'd say about half the material here is human garbage. Does the plastic keep the nest dryer? Do you think the birds know it?
Labels: birds, garbage, nest, plastic, recycling, repurposing
Thursday, December 21, 2006
Recycled Fabric
As a fabric artist, I have often wondered what to do with those little scraps of fabric left over from a sewing project. Too small to use, too large to make me feel good about throwing them away. While we donate clothing that's still usable to the Epilepsy Foundation, I never know what to do about clothing that is ripped or has holes. Into the garbage it generally goes. Fabric recycling seems to be the answer for these fabric bits and ragged clothes, but I have yet to find a place that takes anything but the good stuff. The good news is that there IS fabric recycling for the good stuff, but it comes at a price for Africans. Did you do a double-take at that last word? Yes, our clothing recycling doesn't exactly leave a rosy picture for Africans, which I discovered in an article posted on Reddit. It's an ABC News report on what really happens to clothing Americans donate to charity. It still doesn't answer the question about what to do with the crappy stuff. (Sigh . . . .)
Labels: africa, art, charity, clothing, epilepsy foundation, fabric, garbage, recycling, reddit
Saturday, December 09, 2006
Landfill Idea
Had to take a trip to the landfill this morning to get rid of recyclables. We're having a warm day for December in Minnesota, so it was not an uncomfortable trip. We also had to dump an old piece of carpeting. To do so, we had to drive on a scale before dumping & then again after dumping, which determines the cost of the load. When we finished, as we were driving away from the landfill, my hubby shared his idea - which is more of a thought experiment, because he would never really do this. He said he'd like to go to the landfill with a light load, dump the light load and then pick something out of the garbage bins that was heavier than what we had dumped and put it into our vehicle. He wondered if, once we drove over the scale and the landfill employees saw that we weighed more upon leaving, they'd have to pay US for dumping our load. Welcome to the land of my hubby's mind.
Labels: garbage, husband, idea, landfill, minnesota, weather
