Category: Green

California drought: $500-a-day fines for California water hogs?$500 Fine In California for Water Hogs During A Drought

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily Blog, GreenLeave a comment

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Are you one of those people who have heard on the news or read in the newspaper that you need to conserve water because California is in a drought, but you just don’t care? You think “Oh this is complete BS. They have enough water. I’ll just continue to take 30 minute showers and water the lawn for as long as I want to.” Well I hate to ruin your day sunshine, but if you still have this attitude in August 2014, you better prepare to start paying a $500 fine per day.

Source: SFGate –  California drought: $500-a-day fines for California water hogs?

I have been conserving water for years. When I take a shower, I literally only have the water turned on when I need it. I turn the water on just to get me wet, then turn it off while I lather my hair with shampoo and my body with body wash. Then I will turn the water on to rinse myself off. I probably only use a couple of gallons, if that. When I do laundry, I only do it once a week or maybe twice a month. I will wear the same clothes a few days in a row. I don’t do anything but sit at my desk in my bedroom, so there really isn’t any reason to keep changing my clothes. It’s not like I’m getting sweaty. My clothes don’t smell after a couple of days, they still smell pretty much clean. The only exception is when I do start sweating in my clothes during the summer, then I will change my clothes after my shower.

Our lawn has basically been dead for a few years. We have a huge patch that is basically all dirt because people are constantly walking on it, and it has way too much shade from the pecan tree. The rest of the lawn is dead because I never water it because of the drought. I usually water it once a week throughout the summer to try to keep it green, but I tend to not want to water because I know that I shouldn’t. I see neighbors watering all the time and think, if they can water, why shouldn’t I be able to? I’ve been watering it once or twice a week this past month or so, but now with this new $500 fine I’m not going to water anymore. Being on a limited income, I can’t take any chances. I mean, that’s more than half of my monthly income right there. I don’t know what I would do if I ever got a fine just because the water hit the sidewalk or went into the street. I would be screwed.

So this is just a friendly warning to all of my fellow California residents. Conserve your water usage or face a huge penalty. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Image Source: This is my character Edward watering his money tree in The Sims 3. Don’t you wish you had a money tree? I know I do lol.

You Don’t Get Paid To Recycle Bottles? Whaaat?

On By Michel McDonaldIn Green, RecycleLeave a comment

I am talking to a friend that I have known for many cycles.  We’ve been online buds since 1997 when I first got online and was using AOSmell going into the Astronet Chatrooms.

We are talking about recycling.  I was telling her about how much I get paid here in Bakersfield, CA for recycling cans as opposed to how much I get paid to recycle 2 liter bottles.  She lives in St. Louis, Missouri and she informs me that she gets money for recycling the cans but they don’t allow them to profit off of 2 liter bottles yet they charge her .05¢ on top of the regular cost to buy a 2 liter bottle.

This is just another example of how “the man” is trying to screw you out of your hard earned money.

This is what I asked her:

Mike:
ok just so I get my facts straight…

you can recycle 2 liter bottles but they don’t allow you to make any money? yet they allow you to make money from recycling cans correct?

and they make you pay for the blue recycling cans and make you recycle?

Susan:”
right you don’t get money from any plastics at all you can get money for cans it is like 30 cents a pound for cans but nothing for any plastics we have to have them recycled and picked up by the contracted trash company for the city. some cities don’t even get a choice

Are you listening America?  They don’t even give you a choice in some cities.  They charge you .05¢ for the bottles yet they don’t give it back to you.  That’s what the point of the California Redemption Value (CRV) is, that’s why they charge us the .05¢, so you will recycle it, so you may get your change back.

I was at the grocery store yesterday where I bought a 12 pack of diet Dr. Chill (a new albertson’s generic brand lol) and it was on sale for $2.67 which was the only reason I bought it in the first place then the total was over $3 and I was like what?  I thought it was $2.67 and she said CRV and she pointed on the screen that it shows .60¢ CRV charge.  That’s .05¢ per can.  Yeah, you are damned right I’m recycling that shit.

Green Wheel

On By Michel McDonaldIn GreenLeave a comment

greenwheelOk I found this on dvice.com

Green Wheel gives any bike an electric push

I want one of these because when I go on my bike ride on the bike trail I usually go 11-18 miles and sometimes the bike trail has these hills (that they put in intentionally to give you a workout) but I’m so tired that I just can’t make it up.  This will help.

Also I think it would help me get to the bike trail with no effort on my part then get me back home from the bike trail in 1 piece.  Usually by the time I get home from my bike ride 2 hours later I can barely walk, especially if I haven’t been riding in a while so while I’m letting it take me home my legs are resting so I can actually walk to the bathroom instead of using a walker.

Bill Nye Paper Recycling Factory

On By Michel McDonaldIn GreenLeave a comment

paper-factory

Bill Nye and the Elmers company have come out with this product for kids (and older kids like me) that allows you to recycle paper. It’s called Bill Nye Paper Recycling Factory and is currently for sale at Target.com for $25

You shred paper like newspaper, paper that you printed and messed up with or like notepaper that you don’t need anymore etc.  Any paper.  Then you put it in this little bowl and mix it with water then put the lid on and crank it to mix it all up.

Once it’s all mixed up you pour it into this mold and then you press it to squeeze the water out and shape it so you get a nice piece of paper that is the perfect size that you are looking for.

You can make it into card stock for greeting cards, small sheets for note pads and on the cover of the box they have a star-shaped plate to make star paper.  I’m sure there are lots of shapes.

I think this is good for kids so you can have them make their own paper from your newspapers so they can color and draw on so you aren’t wasting any more paper.  If they make a mistake, they can recycle that sheet too hehe.

I would like to get this to make card stock for making greeting cards.  I’m sure that you would be able to put this paper into your printer to print on if it is solid enough and smooth enough just like regular paper is.  And I’m sure you can add food coloring to it so you can have colored paper instead of just white.

Recycling Numbers

On By Michel McDonaldIn GreenLeave a comment

Today we went to turn in our plastic to recycle and found out that different plastic containers have different numbers and they cannot all be recycled together.  See I never knew that.  I found this website that shows you what the difference is.

What do those recycling numbers mean?

I had all these different types of plastics.  I had clear soda bottles, milk cartons, yogurt containers etc. and they had to separate the clear bottles with the rest.  The clear soda bottles had the 1 on the bottom inside that little recycle symbol.  Those get you more money than the other ones which were 2 and up.

We had basically half number 1 and the rest were 2-6.  When the guy gave us the receipt it showed us how much each plastic cost.  The plastic with the 1 was a lot more than the rest.  I think it was $7 something for all the number 1’s but all the rest we got like .45 cents and that’s it and it was half  number 1 and the other half was all the rest and that rest was less money.  So basically it’s not even worth recycling the rest.

They basically told us that it’s a waste of time to save anything but the number 1 plastic as well as even paper.  The reason I am recycling isn’t for the money although it helps in today’s economy but also because those Brita commercials where they say like 30 minutes on a treadmill, forever in a landfill.  Those make me feel guilty for buying anything that comes in plastic or anything lol.  But, you know if they are so concerned with it then they will have a machine that goes through the trash cherry picking all the certain types of plastics and paper etc.  Darrin told me that he read in the newspaper that there is like a mountain of recycled paper that they are having trouble getting rid of, that’s why paper is so cheap to recycle.  That’s probably also why the plastic that isn’t number 1 is cheap.

I’m not saying to not recycle because the CRV items like the soda bottles/water bottles and soda/beer cans give you a lot more money but I’m certainly not going to waste our patio space recycling milk cartons and yogurt containers and other plastics anymore.  I’m going to find out about steel cans too before I waste any more time with those.  I want to save the planet but at the same time if they don’t want to recycle certain things then it’s out of my hands.  I can only do so much by using the cloth grocery bags and recycling plastic and aluminum.

It’s A Green Life

On By Michel McDonaldIn Diet, Exercise, Green, HealthLeave a comment

A few weeks ago we came home from San Diego after only being gone for a few days and discovered that someone had taken our garbage can.  The city wants to charge us $60 for a new one.  It hit me below the belt because it made me think that I do take it for granted.  Trash that is.  We normally just save soda cans and soda bottles and give them to the dumpster divers but we decided to start recycling them for ourselves.

I took it a step further though and instead of just soda bottles and cans I’d look at the back of every container we buy and those cans that food come in are recyclable too and so are milk containers.  Paper can also be recycled.  I set up 2 paper bags with the cans (1 bag for each type of can) and I’m going to set up another bag for shredded paper which I am now going to start shredding the mail along with junk mail and even bad ideas that I’ve printed.  I have so much paper just sitting around in notebooks that have absolutely no purpose anymore so those will be shredded straight away.

I’ve also become green when I shower.  When you live in a trailer or if go camping and have one of those hanging bags of water for showers you have to use the least you can use so you have enough water for yourself and others so you get wet, turn off the hose, lather your hair and body then turn the hose back on to rinse off.  Well, I’ve started doing that at home.  I don’t know exactly how many gallons of water I am saving but I bet you it’s a lot.

I started riding my bike for exercise, not to get anywhere in particular but so I can lose weight and so that’s good that I’m doing that but it really serves no green purpose for me.  But it’s at least a statement.

And we do have to drive our car to the recycling center just to recycle all this stuff.  I can’t carry bags of cans, bottles and tied up newspaper and bags of shredded paper on a bike so we have no other choice.  I feel I’m at least helping.

Below are pictures of my cans bags and a trash bag of bottles which is a new bag so it only has a couple of bottles but you get the idea.