The blog formerly known as   Fake Plastic Fish

Monthly Archives: April 2011

April 25, 2011

Crochet Your Own Plastic-Free Headphone Ear Pads

Back in January, I posted on my Facebook profile:

The foam pads (read: plastic) on my headphones are wearing out. Motivation to learn to crochet because I hate round knitting.

Well, this weekend, April 23, I finally summoned up the motivation to learn enough crochet basics to fix my headphones.

See, even though I use my wooden thinksound ear buds for most electronic listening, I also have a pair of big cordless headphones for watching TV late at night and another scrappy pair of regular headphones that probably came with an old Walkman or something. The foam pads on both pairs were just in shreds. And while it’s possible to buy replacements, I didn’t want any new plastic.

So, after Googling for a while (my favorite thing) I found some instructions for crocheting my own.

Crochet Headphone Covers from Craftbits.com

Crochet: Headphone Covers, Revisited from Sewhooked.org.

Great! Except I didn’t know how to crochet. My grandmother… Read the rest

April 20, 2011

Plastic Easter Eggs for Your Eco-Friendly Easter Egg Hunt?

Ah, the seasonal aisle. It’s always full of some kind of plastic. This time of year, we’re confronted by walls of brightly (some would say garishly) colored plastic Easter eggs, and bunnies, and baskets, and plastic grass, and all that stuff. Because what’s a holiday without plastic, right?

After running into the plastic egg wall at CVS and having the expected freak out, I started remembering all the fun I had as a kid, hunting for those plastic eggs with their little surprises inside. Sure, we dyed real eggs too. But the plastic ones held secret treasures! Then, as I was walking home reminiscing, I passed a local thrift store in my neighborhood, and what did I spy through the window? Secondhand plastic Easter eggs!

And more plastic Easter eggs…

And further down the street, another thrift shop had them too, as well as Easter baskets.

I thought I’d found the perfect Easter solution for folks who have kids and who really… Read the rest

April 18, 2011

Plastic: A Toxic Love Story Book Review

In the beginning of 2009, I sat in an Oakland Cafe with San Francisco journalist Susan Freinkel, explaining my plastic-free life. She was working on a book about the story of plastic and wanted to hear my point of view, which of course I shared enthusiastically, even dragging her off the butcher shop with me and my stainless steel pot to buy plastic-free meat for my cats.

Her book Plastic: A Toxic Love Story has been officially released today.  After spending all weekend with it, I’m happy to give it a hearty recommendation. This is neither a dry environmental text nor alarmist rant. Telling the story of plastic through eight everyday plastic items — a comb, plastic chair, Frisbee, hospital IV bag, disposable lighter, grocery bag, soda bottle, and credit card — the book describes both the hopes and hazards of plastic in a conversational style that’s hard to put down.

The title of the book is appropriate. In the first chapters,… Read the rest

April 15, 2011

Initiative: Getting Restaurants to Stop Giving Out Plastic Straws Automatically

GlassDharma reusable glass drinking straw

Wouldn’t it be nice if restaurant servers asked if you wanted a straw before sticking one in your drink automatically? Right now, it’s up to us to refuse those straws ahead of time.  And sometimes, we have to ask more than once for our request to be remembered and fulfilled. That’s one of the reasons I carry a Glass Dharma glass drinking straw with me wherever I go.  Whipping out my straw is a memorable way to get the server’s attention and sometimes to start a conversation about the environmental impact of plastic.  I also have sensitive teeth, so drinking cold beverages through a straw is just easier.  Some of you have mentioned that you don’t need any straw at all.  So let’s tell restaurants to quit giving them to us!

Take Action

1) Choose your restaurant(s) to write to.  Any restaurant. Preferably one(s) you frequent and that you have noticed gives out unwrapped straws automatically.

2) Write a snail mail letter.  … Read the rest

April 12, 2011

BPA-Free Does Not Mean Safe. Most Plastics Leach Hormone-Disrupting Chemicals.

Which plastics are safe?  I get that question all the time. The Internet is full of charts listing the numbers of the various types of plastic and explaining which ones are safe and which ones are not.  Supposedly, #2 (high density polyethylene), #4 (low density polyethylene), and #5 (polypropylene) are safe, right?  Does that mean the lid on my travel mug is safe?  It’s #5 polypropylene.

So is the sport cap on Michael’s Klean Kanteen water bottle.

We’re supposed to avoid plastics #3 (PVC), #6 (polystyrene), and #7 (polycarbonate). Polycarbonate is the plastic that is made from the chemical Bisphenol-A (BPA). And BPA has a bad rap because it’s a hormone-disruptor. Walk down the aisles of any drug store these days, and you’ll find rows of plastic products labelled BPA-Free.  BPA-Free water bottles…

Baby bottles…

Pacifiers…

In fact, entire shelves of baby products are labelled BPA-free. … Read the rest

April 8, 2011

How To Cook Dried Beans – A Staple of Plastic-free Living

My friend Katie from Kitchen Stewardship just released a new e-Book this year, The Everything Beans Book, and she’s giving readers of this blog a 20% discount through 4/15 (coupon code 20BEANSBK). I’m excited about Katie’s latest book because learning how to prepare and cook dried beans is crucial when you’re trying to live a plastic-free life. Why? Because dried beans are a great source of protein we can purchase plastic-free from bulk bins using our own bags and containers.

Canned beans, on the other hand, are problematic because most metal cans are lined with plastic which contains BPA, a hormone-disrupting chemical. And for me, even the new BPA-free cans are suspect because we really don’t know if the new linings are any safer than the old ones. Chemical companies don’t reveal their “trade secrets” and consumers are left in the dark.

But preparing dried beans is so hard, right? Wrong. While… Read the rest

April 6, 2011

The Truth About Pepsi’s New Plant-Based PET Plastic Bottle

Pepsi’s new soda bottle is different.

Last month, PepsiCo made a big announcement: it had developed the world’s first entirely plant-based PET beverage bottle. And although the new bottle is made from plants, it’s actually less like those corn-based compostable bottles you may have heard about and more like regular, ordinary PET (polyethylene terephthalate) plastic, the kind of plastic nearly all single-use beverage bottles are made from.

I’ll explain all about the new bottle, why it’s interesting, and what I see are its pros and cons. But first, I need to tell you about how I went a little nutty on Twitter the night after the story was published. See, normally I’d have taken the story in stride, looked into the bottle on my own time, and decided if it was worth writing about. But that night, I started seeing all these excited tweets about PepsiCo’s new “plastic-free” bottle.

Plastic-free?… Read the rest

April 1, 2011

Art of Zen Crocheted Produce Bags

 

Chriss from Art of Zen Crochet makes gorgeous produce sacks out of hemp yarn. Check out her site. Her scarves and other crocheted items are fantastic. The produce sacks are extremely light weight and great for getting your produce weighed without a plastic bag.

Just keep them away from kitties who like to play with yarn. Which is pretty much all kitties, right?

Chriss writes:

Sometimes you have to takes things apart before putting them together.

Growing up on the West Coast of Canada, on Vancouver Island exploring the beaches, mountains, and woods has given me inspiration all my life in order to create.

My shop being as environmentally friendly as possible is really important to me! Right down to using scraps of yarn for tagging items, to my shipping materials. My yarns are all chosen with the health of the planet and people wearing them in mind. When I dye my yarns I use fiber reactive dyes that do not harm the environment. Quality, I want the items… Read the rest