I am not tracking plastic consumption like you are, but I’ve made horrid mistakes like your taco bell one too. And I wish I could just let it go and just move on. But I’m still thinking about the OJ and soup I bought two weeks ago that came in plastic or plastic lined containers.

I just noticed your list of plastic free alternatives and have linked to it so I don’t have to do so much extra work when you already have. I didn’t realize you had already tried using baking soda for brushing your teeth. :)

Here is a response from someone who works at a vets office:

Yes, all of our canned cat food comes with a big plastic bag.

1. Wet food: Cats are naturally a desert species and normally get their liquid from the foods they eat. Having sufficient liquid in their diet is thought to prevent the likelihood of kidney disease, the top disease of elderly cats (pretty much if your cat is over 13 it probably has kidney disease).

2. Dry food: is less expensive, less messy, and (probably) better for the environment: less packaging and less weight to ship from wherever its coming from, and less use of metals which are a huge burden on the environment to generate. AND it prevents dental disease, which wet food doesn’t. But it could lead to an increase likelihood of kidney disease.

My take? I feed dry food and make sure my kitters drink a lot of water. :-)

PS I <3 Taco Bell. I had three tostadas (no cheese) for lunch, husb had a double decker veg taco (beans for meat) and two bean burritoes (no cheese) and we had no plastic wrap at all!

*shudder*

I have black cat(s) also – I regularly find strange whiskers in my bed or other places. They definitely shed their whiskers just as regularly as other hair.

But I’m with you about changing the way you should. It is slow and gradual but suddenly different. I rarely buy name brands anymore – either because I looking at the ingredients makes my stomach hurt or thinking about how the animals were treated or the chemicals inside make my stomach hurt.

And yes, our cat loses his whiskers from time to time and also his claws.

Of course, you have to get a true premium brand of cat food to make the dry food (or the wet for that matter) any good. We’re big fans of Felidae, but due to illness, can’t use it (have to use an Rx food). Basically, if you can buy it at a regular store or a national chain pet store, it’s not really premium. It has to come from a specialty, usually local, pet store.

Unfortunately, many cats won’t eat dry food once they’ve gotten used to wet. Luckily, our sick cat was just fine afterwards! (Thank goodness, because I hated the expense of wet for just a month and would refuse to give it to a cat on a permanent basis.)

Good luck with the food… an easy way to make wet cat food yourself is to pressure cook a chicken (bones and all) with a few veggies (carrots, sweet potatos) for an hour. The bones turn to mush and are really healthy for them. Just mix and serve… makes enough for a week for one cat.

Mold and mildew are best removed by wiping dry, keeping warm and spraying on vodka and tea tree essential oil.

Ample supplies of demerara sugar and fair trade cocoa keep us out of the fudge jars with their secret tamper-proof plastic rings. Maybe you could make some fudge up and stash it in a jar in your fridge? Medicine for the soul!

Love & RRRevolution, Tracey