Filters: You can say I don’t have a filter, but I have proof that I do.  Yesterday, I bought a reusable HVAC filter.  I’ve always heard these are a lot of work and they’re not as effective as disposable filters.

For just under $50, I got an electrostatic life-time air filter.  I decided to take a chance and ask my HVAC guy about these yesterday morning on Facebook.  I didn’t know if I would get a reply on a Saturday, but I did!  Matco answered!  I had already done some homework on these types of filters.  When shopping for something you’re not familiar with, a little googling goes a long way.  The original filter I chose had a lot of bad reviews, to the point that I didn’t see any good reviews on it.  I had landed on this one, but I waited to hear from Matco before pressing the “send order” button.

My disposable filters are about $14 a month.  Even if this doesn’t work great, it will have paid for itself in just under 4 months.  I didn’t buy the cleaning fluid, as it seems to have lots of chemicals in it.  I’m going to try vinegar water.  I couldn’t find anyone else doing this and talking about it.  I’ll keep you posted.

I did realize one thing this morning.  This will be shipped in disposable packaging.  (Sigh.)  Look, I’m doing the best I can.  I will recycle and reuse the packaging.

Litter Update

Well, this was the most frustrating thing I did yesterday.  I did not get litter.  The closest thing I could find was this bulk litter.  They won’t let you buy it unless you buy one of their plastic containers.  AND, as I was prepping my photos for this post, it clearly says “disposable cat litter” on the side of the bin.  All cat litter is disposable.  The only thing I can do here is make the best environmental choice.

I’m going to try the shredded paper route 1st.  If my cats will use it, it’s a good option.  I’ll get a paper shredder, used of course, and make my junk mail into litter.  If my cats rebel, you’ll see plan B on my blog.  Kilio (Swahili for crying), is already complaining.  She meowing non-stop, and angry that there’s minimal litter in the box.  Keep in mind, this is that cat that thinks the litter box is a also a sandbox for her to play in.

Grocery Shopping & Label Reading

This was quite the adventure,  Here are the grocery stores I visited:

• Whole Foods
• Trader Joe’s
• Market Street

My normal places to grocery shop are:

• Aldi
• Kroger
• Target

To keep this simple, I’ll just bullet point some of the things I learned yesterday in this process.  There are many options to be environmentally friendly, but not enough options to go cold turkey and not use anything disposable.  I need to rewrite the Madonna song Material Girl and change it to Disposable World.

Preparation.  I brought all of my green bags, and I have a lot of them.  I brought all of my saved containers to see if the stores would allow me to use them.  (Yes, my family has an addiction to sour cream.)

In addition to these items, I will add a Sharpie marker and my Pyrex glass containers.  Most bulk food requires you to write a PLU code on the container so they can ring it up.  Pens don’t write on plastic.  A grease pen would work well too.

As for the glass containers, I was scoping out the raw chicken, and placing that in plastic containers just seemed off.  To have enough containers, I will have to make a small investment in Pyrex containers, which I don’t mind doing since I use them so often.  I can only do this is they don’t come in disposable packaging.

Buying bulk deli food & meats.  This went well.  Both Whole Foods and Market Street were okay with me bringing my own containers.  They weighed them first, as to charge me properly and placed the labels on the lids.  Here are a couple things to know about this:

• You can’t eat the samples.  They are all in disposable containers or stabbed with plastic swords.  (BTW, that photo is not of me eating a sample, although I wanted to.)
• 
  Plastic prep.  Most likely, there’s plastic involved in the process of getting the food into your containers.  In the meat department, they use the plastic bags to pick up the meat.  If you’re not using it, they still have to.  Kind of defeats the purpose.  :(
• Make sure your containers have lids.  Obvious?  Yes.  But they did make sure I had them before filling my containers.

Apparently, a lot of people do this at Whole Foods.  Their stores seem to be more geared toward the radical hippie types and tree huggers.

Buying bread & bakery items.  This was a bit depressing.  I love sweets.  There are just not many options for sweets.  Bread?  No problem.  The loaf I got was placed directly into one of my washed green bags.  The label was placed on a piece of disposable wax paper.  Again, the process involves a lot of disposable stuff.  The cashier also looked incredibly confused as I was explaining what it was and why it was.

The sweets are contained in shiny plastic boxes, displayed neatly everywhere you go.  Even in a great store like Whole Foods, plastic pornography is in every aisle.  The bread was in paper bags, but they add the little plastic windows so you can see what you’re buying.  I get that, being in marketing and all, but can’t we just display one loaf?  Of maybe even show a photo of it?  They do the “display a plate” in the restaurant area.  Display the bread too.

Miscellaneous bulk items.  Whole Foods had a lot of these.  I know the Kroger near me has a bulk section, and I’m sure I’ll be hitting that soon.  There are a few things to consider here:

• Spices.  To get bulk spices, you have to unwrap a new plastic spoon, use the disposable plastic spoon to scoop your spices, then place it into a plastic bag.  Other than the obvious plastic crap waste, your container is going to weigh more than the little bag.  this is self-serve, so there’s no way to reset the scale on this area.
• Raw ingredients.  Okay, so cooking isn’t my thing.  If I had to make something out of all these raw ingredients, it would more than likely be an art project, not an edible food dish.  Go to the store with a list.  Know what you need.  I was overwhelmed and in gridlock in the bulk section.
• Your containers.  Like the spices, there’s no way to change the scales for your specific container.  Bring leftover plastic, lightweight ones like I did.  They’re close to the plastic containers they provide in the store.

Shopping in non-bulk places.  My two favorite stores, Aldi and Trader Joe’s, do not have much in the way of no packaging or 100% biodegradable packaging.

I bought a bag of flour, a lemon and 2 limes.  The bag felt uncoated, although it did not say that.  I might have been pushing my limits on this one.  My two favorite stores might together have about 10 items I can purchase.  This is obviously more expensive, increasing my grocery expenditures.  :(

Got milk?  I’m really getting freaked out about this one!  There are no options for milk!!!  I was looking for refillable glass containers, and Whole Foods does that in some of their stores.  Not in Cookiecuttersville, where waste and wealth rule.  I even consulted Siri, who was exhausted looking for this, saying she’ll try harder.  I have a half gallon left as of this morning.

I knew going into this challenge that this was a big problem.  My kids and I drink a couple of gallons a week, or maybe more.  As I was explaining the challenge to my sister, she laughed, suggesting I buy or rent a cow.  As we were making jokes, my nephew looked up from his iPod game and said, “My mom can just pump some extra for you.”  He went back to his game like he had just solved world hunger, and it was such an obvious solution.  My sister is nursing, and no, I don’t want to go that direction.  That would rank up there with the cat box cake.

Dinning Out

I was running our single’s group outing last night.  We went to Strikz, a local bowling alley to bowl and eat.  I asked for my bowling alley fries to not be placed on paper.  It worked, as my fries were on a reusable plate and my beer in a glass.  I forgot to bring a napkin, so yes, I used my jeans.  My kids were still hungry.  As I said earlier, I’m not making them participate, but they do have to make the non-disposable choices when possible.  They wanted some cheese fries.

As it turns out, the cooking process involved baking them on wax paper.  I agreed to that, not realizing the jalepeños and ranch come in plastic cups with plastic lids.  Then, of course, my kids are miraculously full and the plate of food is still mostly untouched.  I was not happy.  Joe got a styrofoam box and took the leftovers.  I’ve taught my kids to not be wasteful with food, so I’ll choose not to go to battle on this one.