Mugsey, yess! The re-soled shoes! We were 3 generations in a 3 bed. one bath house with a den livingroom dining rommom and kitchen. The den was used also for my kid brother’s bedroom. Gramps was the Elder and he was like Uncle Bub on My Three Sons. Did everything. We had a pair of keds each summer for play. We had a pair of dress shoes, cheap because we outgrew, and we had our leather school shoes of good quality. The sole would come off a bit and the shoe came off and down to the cellar on gramp’s vice where he shaved or filed and glued and it sat overnight and ready to go for the mornin’! He put on new heels also. Then the shoes when outgrown went to a younger relative or a neighbor kid. You are right, nothing was wasted. Wants cost too much and needs cost enough. Pop was only on a weekend day and not every weekend. Had to be a special occassion. Snacks were popcorn, or cherrios tossed w some melted butter and salt and put on a cookie sheet in the oven to get crisp. Weekends also. Daily after school snacks were dried apricots or prunes gramps boiled up or a molasses or applesauce cookie. That was it. 3 meals with dessert in the evening and i snack a day! I never remember asking for more. I remember hurrying so I could get back outside to play with the neighbor kids, winter, spring, summer, and fall, and even in the rain on a hot summer day if there was no lightning! Anyway. Plastic bottles everyone should just get rid of for gawds sake. If you still need to be bottle fed get a thermos! Create Savings business if you are retired or outta work. Collect used things from trash day and sell for little, or fix up and sell for more. Take that SUV you’re stuck with a start a taxi service to work places or shopping where you carry a few people. There is nothin’, hear me? Nothin’ —like your imagination! Mugsey, yah, the polishin’ of shoes. Loved the smell of that shoe polish. This was our Sunday night job after we came in from playin’ —shoe polishin’ and bath! During the week it was sink baths. And you had to fill the bowl and put a plug in it, no wastin’ And you know, we were never sick.

For me, it’s about organizing my life so I do my shopping, banking etc. on one day and try to eliminate using so much gasoline. Wildflower Buttitta

BOXES, ANYONE? I shop a lot via catalog; too hard to get my TBI buddy to the mall. CATALOG companies are horrendously wasteful with the boxes and shipping materials they use. Is there anyone out there who could maybe stage a campaign for smaller shipping materials? I don’t have the time or energy to do it, but really think the issue needs attention. The more expensive stores are the worst offenders. Think they think they have to add “box” value to their expensive goods. We gotta tell them that ‘smaller’ and ‘less’ is the luxurious, classy way to go these days. BOXES ANYONE?

Back to my 45 min showers…I am completely intrigued by the heat as you use tankless hot water heaters. I understand they have been used in Europe for over 30 years. Since our current tank style one is about to take a nose dive, I am wondering if they are really worth the $999 price tag (before installation). Any input?????

run water while i wash the dishes

I, too, like my long hot showers, but I’m weaning myself. Main thing, though, is hubby and I work together and take separate cars to work. In the beginning, was a necessity as I had to leave mid day to go pick up kids after school, doctor appts, girl scouts, etc. But now that they are long gone, we still take our own cars. Hub-bub tends to stay longer than I do and I hate just hangin’ around waiting for him. On the plus side, at our business we do recycle the paper. The city will not provide us with a recycle bin (“Sorry, Ma’am it’s for residential only”). So, we have a separate trash can that we put all paper in and take it home when it’s full and put it in our home recycle bins. There are 4 of us in the office, so I think it adds up over the years. And, lastly, I’ve seen many remarks about bottled water. I, too, used to have one with me always. Then I noticed our business parter using his thermal coffee mug to drink his water at the office and in the car. He would fill it with hot tea for the morning commute and throughout the day would just keep filling it with water. No waste there. So now we’ve all begun to do that.

I look that the planet as the only place we has people have and we should takecare of it because it now bitting us back hard she is trying to tell us somehing about how we are treating her to us and us alone we better stop it you may think that her is telling us something but she is

I thank all of you that wished me a happy birthday. I am so proud that we are becoming a great deal more aware of what we need to do to protect our planet. Even though Earth Day has been around since 1970, I find it amazing that we have taken so long to pay attention to our earthly problems. May we continue to make progress!

wasteful i have been but lately i have rethought my every nuance - turning the shower water on till it turns hot, (lukewarm isnt so bad) ; is is better to nuke the tea water than wait for the electric eye - watch the dryer to get clothes out in a timely manner - turn off all the lights that we dont need - use more candles (getting more expensive as well) - use cloth towels rather than paper - merge errands into one circuit instead of several trips to save gas- swap plants with friends rather than purchase annuals - the paper plates against washing china - whew! its an ever ending battle to be less wasteful - enviornmentally friendly and conscious of the overall enviornment and rising costs. buy american products - store brand items rather than name brands - use last year’s fashion trends and be proud - grow our own vegetables from seed - put a blanket on us rather than heat / turn a small fan on with open windows rather than air conditioning / if i use the oven - bake two things at once to save electricity - move to crock pot for more dinner options/ use coupons for food / dumpster dive at the local petsmart for thrown away pet / bird food (sorry)/ drive a dirty car / use the towels at least twice before washing/buy energy saving bulbs for lighting/ shut off appliances not being used including cell phone chargers / gather rain water for plant watering later in week/ pump water off pool and save in bucket for plant watering / plan dinners better for left overs ….dont take anything for granted - bleed each nickel for what its worth. if ive forgotten something let me know - waste not want not

I have one of those big tubs, and I fill it up every day. I take long baths no matter what. I also do 2 to 3 loads of towels on a daily basis. I waste way too much water

I waste money by trying to hit it big on the slots at the casino so that I can give it away to poor people I know. Instead I have become a poor person. But rich in spirit…and I love beans and rice.

Well, it is late and Earth Day is coming to a close. Have we stepped into the past and created another pagan celebration? Or what? Every day is earth day for me. Living near LA I have felt overwhelmed by that smog since I was born. Fortunately at an early age we move to the burbs where the skies were clean, but unfortunately, everyone else decided to move up here as well. Most of the ranches are gone - the acreage filled with houses. One thing those houses brought were people who plant trees. I’ve planted 27 on my property, they haven’t all hung in with me, but I still tend many of them. Peaches and apricots - yum. I read that 80% of your water bill is dedicated to keeping that lawn green, so this week I have been taking out a major portion of my lawn. Don’t want to waste anymore water. I guess I wasted a lot. I let my lawn get kind of crunchy in places during he summer, but that is boring and goes against my sensibilities, and it didn’t save that much water anyway. (See I was raised on a ranch and we had a well that my dad was constantly worried about going dry - so at an early age I learned how to conserve. Try taking a quick shower on a really cold morning, you never get warm.) So now I am pulling out the lawn and planting a great water wise garden. The birds love these, and I love the birds.

I have been a hard-nosed recycler for years now. Even got a little uppity with folks who were so wasteful. But boy I have a guilt that negates all the good I have done in the past. I adopted my two-year-old greatgrandsons and I use disposable diapers. I always used cloth diapers for my kids and harped at my children when they used disposable diapers for their children. At 61 years of age my retirement has been turned upside down I really don’t have the time or energy to wash and dry 20 diapers daily. I was watching a PBS documentry a couple of weeks ago and the subject was disposable diapers. I changed the channel but still haven’t gotten over the guilt. My only redeemtion is that as soon as the boys are pottie trained I will quit being such a blot on the enviorment.