Recycle Your Christmas Presents

No, I don't want you to take back your nice shiny new phone or iPod. I want you to recycle the old electronic goodies your new gizmo's replaced. Cellular phones can go back to the store where you bought the new one, and most electronics and computers can go back to the major electronic stores.

It's not the best site, but the EPA's electronics recycling page gives you a lot of good ideas and links to make sure your old toys don't end up in the landfill. I know you'll want to keep the old stuff for a spare...it's the older stuff I'm concerned about. A good New Year's resolution is to shed weight...on the basement shelf that stores all those electronic orphans that used to be 'the latest thing.'

New Hope for My Plastic Bags

My stories have evolved into how many challenges there are in doing the "Green Thing." One of my big problems, or more important, one of my biggest guilt trips, was handling plastic bags. The grocery bags were the ones that piled up the most, and I just couldn't remember to take them back to the store.

While I haven't found a solution to making my memory work better, I did find a way toward more effective recycling of plastic bags. The trash company recyclers don't want them, so I found a web site dedicated to Recycling Plastic Bags, and, while they didn't help me find an easier way to get the bags back to the store, they did show me how many kinds of bags can be recycled once I do take them back. Now at least when I get around to it, my efforts are more effective.

And your bags don't need to go back to the store they came from. The containers are for all qualifying plastic bags, and I didn't know how many were recyclable until I looked it up. I found out about this web site on the plastic bag my newspaper came in. Sadly, it's from the Rocky Mountain News, a newspaper that will probably shut down next year which will cut down on the need to recycle as much newsprint, but will also silence another effective voice in the media.

Mom's "Quick List"

In this "soundbite" generation when we have an attention span of just a few seconds, I've decided to go with the flow. Instead of making potential 'greeners' go through all my explanations about how and why to do each particular entry on my Green List, I have created a nice short "Quick List" which shows all my great Green ideas in one, printable compact form.

You get about one sentence of explanation and then, if you need a more info, you can get all the details on the Green List. Mom makes it even easier, to keep you from making excuses. And if the Quick List doesn't flip your switch, flip over to the "If You Can't..." page. That's where you'll find my last gasp of Green Short Cuts.

Recycle Something

I changed my Number 1 Green Short Cut on the Home Page from recycling aluminum cans (I said i wished I drank more beer), to recycling something. If your efforts to recycling have been as difficult as mine, trying to save cans and bottles and dragging them to the curb in inconvenient containers, you could easily give it all up. Don't! Just make another choice, like I did.

I also added some new times to the Green List: Close the Garage Door and Buy Refurbished Products. To the Not Green List, look for: Doing Just One Thing and Wooden Kitchen Utensils.

I'm Not Easy, Am I?

As green as i try to be, I am ashamed that I just can't get into the recycling habit. Last week the recycling & trash trucks came by and I missed them both! I literally ran after the trash guys and they laughed and then came back. After Thanksgiving, the 1-day pickup delay threw everybody off, but sadly the recycling truck was long gone. Of course it would not be Green of me to call the service and ask them to burn more fuel to come back and get my one little tub of aluminium cans and plastic bottles.

I'm beginning to realize curbside recycling isn't really "easy", which is what my web site is all about. If you can make it part of your lifestyle, good for you. But it has become difficult enough for me to consider taking it off my "easy" list.

I guess this means it should remove a little guilt from your shoulders if you're having trouble recycling. Don't give up! Choose something else! I just put on slippers so i can leave the thermostat down.