Wasting Waste

Have you ever just paused to take notice of just how much STUFF is in stores? It's staggering. Staggering. I don't really wander into very many stores very often. I don't buy a lot of clothing right now, and when I do, it's usually in my favorite thrift stores. My husband handles a lot of the grocery shopping... So the rare time I get to a "big-box" or whatever you call them store, it's like culture-shock all over again, every time.

That stuff all has expiration dates. Think about it.

There is more stuff in most stores than can possibly be bought. What happens when it all expires? It gets thrown out. It's not like last year's out-of-fashion fashions; this stuff goes bad. It doesn't get sent to the needy, it doesn't go to feed some third-world country... it just gets tossed.

I would rather see grocery stores run out of things than throw so much away. I mean, sure, you see them run out of stuff in emergency situations, like major snow storms - oh, wait, we didn't have many of those this past winter, did we? There's no such thing as climate change - and the battle hymn of "Bread-and-milk-bread-and-milk" - because, yeah, when was the last time you were snowed in so long in most civilized areas that you were in danger of starving because you were out of bread and milk? That always ALWAYS made me crazy. Headline: "Family of 5 Runs Out of Bread and Milk, Found Starved to Death After Roads Were Cleared One Day After 6-Inch Snowfall." Yeah. That doesn't happen. (Wow, that was a bit of a brain barf just then... thanks for being there for it.)

Yet, what would shelves emptied of product say? That the store was poorly run? Bad stocking, and you won't go there again? If a store runs out of something you want, you leave and go somewhere else and never go back to that one again. So they better stock up, even if it means wasting stuff, because gods forbid we can't have absolutely everything we want at our fingertips at every second of every day. What has happened to us? What is it that we value? Would we value things more if we ran out of stuff once in awhile? Or is it the ruin of modern civilization to think a store would run out of anything?

I'm stymied. I got nuthin'. This one isn't going to go away any time soon. We need to overhaul our whole way of thinking. I feel another blog coming up for this one... it's too big.

And that's our problem. Too big. Everything. It's all too big, too much...

Hm.

Why Things Cost More Now

Same magazine, different page. Yeah. I know.

"The Headlines, Explained" in the May issue of Real Simple. "Why do some staples cost more now?"

I don't really need a blurb in a magazine to explain that to me, but here we go. It'll be fun. The little 1/3 page article (not a Real Important topic, I guess) goes on about why food and clothing and energy costs more all of a sudden. According to Vera Gibbons, supermarket goods are going up 3-4% because recent crop failures and an increased demand for food in some countries has left the said demand ahead of the supply. Hmm. Um. A case of too many people on the planet? Hasn't someone I know been saying that? Why yes. Unfortunately, the only answer to this is to try to shop smarter. The writer's advice on this is to seek out discounted gift cards online. BUT WAIT! We can actually GROW our own food, too. We have that technology. We do. It's shocking, yes, but there you have it. We can get back to gardening and canning, like we never should have stopped doing in the first place. Because, and call me crazy here, I have a sneaking suspicion we're going to be in this for some time coming up.

Ms. Gibbons moves on to clothing. The last two years of cotton crops have been destroyed by bad weather. (Climate change much? No? OK.) This will lead to 20% hikes in clothing prices. She goes on to say designers will use cheaper fabrics to mitigate the costs. Her advice on this one? You're gonna love this: "Consider buying garments made of synthetic blends, like rayon or polyester, because they will be priced lower than cotton counterparts." This is about the time I am sure I need to stop reading Real Simple altogether. Seriously??? That's your advice? Buy clothing made with petroleum products and other super-chemicals. How about THIS advice instead: clothing swaps, thrift stores, NOT buying clothes you don't really need, doing a little tailoring on existing clothing. Now that sounds like good money-saving advice to me. Call me prejudiced for liking my own advice. I'm OK with that.

We round out these pearls of wisdom (snort) with energy prices. Higher gas and higher airfares etc. I bet you can't wait for this advice... Fill up at places like Costco, or a grocery store that offers discounts to shoppers through the reward cards. Uh huh. Good stuff, there. That's really helpful to people who don't have those options in their areas. And have you SEEN lines at the gas stations at Costco or Sam's? Holy crap!!! How about... and I know this is controversial... DRIVING LESS. *Gasp!* Or, I don't know, getting organized with friends and neighbors, and carpooling? Maybe a few fewer activities to drag the children to all the time?

You know what all three of these things have told me? (Yeah, besides the fact I can't respect this "writer", whoever she is. I'm sure she knows her stuff... in some universe) They have told me we need to SLOW DOWN, stop for a bit, breathe, and get back to the real things. We can do with fewer clothes. LOTS fewer clothes. We can be OK with hand-me-downs again. We can spend time gardening and growing stuff again. We can stop with the 42 activities per day for the kids and let them have a little time to themselves and, well, just be KIDS for a change. It worked for us. I loved my free time. It encouraged my creativity. Why do we have to keep kids active and occupied from dawn til dusk anyway? Slow down.

Is it irony that these things I suggest - in a complete and polar opposite from the "advice" in the article - also make for a healthier environment? Stunning.

To summarize: 1) I need to stop reading Real Simple for sure this time or my head's going to explode; 2) We need to go back to things that always worked before. You know why? Because they worked. It will help in many different areas of Life to bring these simple ideas back. Real simple.

Yeah, I know you know I know I won't stop reading it. It's much to fun to tear the stuff apart. Wherever would I get my material, elsewise?