It certainly won’t surprise anyone familiar with my blog that I use cloth napkins for every meal. In fact, the only paper napkins I have laying around are a few I’ve collected here and there when grabbing a bite to eat on the road. With only a couple Starbucks and Chipotle paper napkins in the … Continue reading
Soon we’ll be emptying our dressers and closets of wool sweaters and winter coats preparing to send them off to the cleaners for their final cleaning before storing them. If you thought the bill for dry cleaning half your winter wardrobe was the worst part of this seasonal ritual, guess again. Many dry cleaners have … Continue reading
This video presentation by conservation photographer Garth Lenz shows and explains the devastation of tar sand mining, and it’s a video everyone ought to watch.
A reader, Doug, sent us this question on how to clean paint brushes.
QUESTION: How should I clean latex paint out of brushes, rollers and trays? Is it better to rinse them off in the sink so the water goes to the treatment facility, or to rinse them off outdoors over the ground so the … Continue reading
Aerosol cans didn’t go away with the US ban on CFC propellants (due to ozone depleting properties) in the 1980s. Then and now, alternatives with lower ozone depleting potential have allowed the aerosol can to live on.
Aerosol containers are pressurized products that sometimes contain flammable or poisonous chemicals. And about 90 percent of them … Continue reading
Unless you’ve got egg laying chickens clucking around your backyard, you’ve seen the dizzying selection of eggs at the supermarket. Cartons touting everything from “free range” to “vegetarian fed” to “no antibiotics”—up to a half dozen claims and labels that can lead to confusion instead of confident decisions about what it all means.
In this … Continue reading
Time’s almost up and you still have _____ (fill in the blank) people to shop for! OR do you? Do you really need/want to head “out there?” The last-minute holiday shopping rush is an ugly, spirit-killing scene. Parking wars, crowds, long lines, short fuses, crying toddlers that have been stuck in a shopping cart for … Continue reading
Of all the repurposed products to come through my office in the past twelve years, few have impressed me more than the creations of The Green Glass Co. Green Glass salvages used and condemned beverage bottles and artfully transforms them into unique tumblers and stemware.
The company’s website states that their goblets have been chosen … Continue reading
The out-of-town guests and Thanksgiving feast leftovers are long gone, but there is one thing from last weekend that hasn’t disappeared yet—the
greasy, splattered mess inside my oven! My poor oven paid a price for giving us one very crispy, brown-skinned bird and two juicy apple pies—among other things! Time to clean it out before the … Continue reading
