Sunday Confession

Let's try something shall we. A weekly (or less if needed) confessional of things that we do that we aren't exactly happy about. Little things, big things, whatever kind of things you wanna get off your chest. I'll lead the confessional.

So here is my first one. I am a very eco-conscious person and do and try many things to make small and big changes. One of the easiest things by far is reusable bags, I have a good number in my car and I use them all the time but some how under my sink still looks like this:

And I have another stash in my extra closet. I forget now and then, forget to ask paper. Most are from stops at non grocery stores, Target, the liquor store, places where bringing your own bag is still somewhere you get looks for doing it. I really need to get past this. Under my sink could be used for much better things than this.

Have anything you want to share as a confession?

A look in...

One of my kitchen cabinets.

I've haven't been using much plastic in recent years and more so to what some may call and an "extreme" degree within the last year. Mostly thanks to Beth at Fake Plastic Fish. If you want to know why I am doing this go there, she's extremely passionate and explains it many times in many ways and is very detailed, informative, and knowledgeable. I have almost exclusively switched to glass and ceramic for food storage.

Here is a look in my storage container cabinet. There isn't much in there at the moment because a lot of it is being used. I bought two sets of Pyrex glass bowls/dishes with plastic lids and most of the other stuff has been gifted or given to us. My husbands grandma gave us a bunch of ceramic casserole dishes a few years back when she had to clean out her house due to a little oven fire. She also gave us a set of mixing bowls, those lovely blue glass ones in the picture. A few sets of soup and salad bowls and a set of small appetizer plates that now function as our cat food dishes. I don't know where I would be without those. I have a set of thinner glass bowls with lids that I was given and a few things are actually from our wedding registry. Maybe we should get married again so we can get some more things.

But my problem is I still have all the plastic Tupperware, Ziploc and Gladware stuff. I did separate out all items that aren't a 1, 2, or 5 plastic but that didn't amount to much. The few things I did find were mostly 6's and have been re-purposed to hold non food items. Throwing away all those things isn't really something I wanted to do. A few things have found uses elsewhere holding things that are waiting to be used or turned into something. But there is still a lot of random containers that occupy a second shelf in my cabinet.

Then there is a whole other shelf of things that rarely get used or just don't have a use, mostly plastic but also some other stuff. There is a wok in there that is just not compatible with our electric stove, a strainer bowl set that is just too big to use, it doesn't fit in our sink so I can't clean it. There is a cupcake and a cake holder that I do use occasionally but not often. There are some lids that don't have containers to fit on and some containers without lids. There is a cup in there that I can re-use for discount refills at the Wild Animal Park or The San Diego Zoo but I go there so infrequently I'm not sure it's worth actually buying them in the first place. There are a few containers I have used to hold my kitchen compost material so I don't have to take it out right away and well I then forget to take it out and now the stuff just smells of compost. This is also the home to a few things that I can't find a use for and don't have numbers on them.

At some point I am just going to have to throw this stuff out or perhaps I can find someone to take the majority of plastic stuff but that all takes effort and planning and if I just leave it in the cabinets I can "forget" about it and I don't have to deal with it.

Plastic Packaging

Here is an item that is just totally over done in plastic and there is no alternative.

The story:

The product is basically a gift card. It is a pre-paid 60 day game card for the video game World of Warcraft. The game requires a monthly subscription to play. The game card is available at stores and instead of a gift card it come in a dvd case, a rather large dvd case, it is thicker than normal cases, not thicker plastic but it has a wider spine. So here is the breakdown of all the plastic for this little card. Shrink wrap, dvd case, and then the actual credit card sized card. A bit much, I don't see why they can't just sell cards that need to be activated like so many other services.

This game has a lot of things like this associated with it. When a new expansion come out if you want to be able to play the expansion right away you HAVE to buy a "real world product" full of multiple discs, play books, many inserts, a big dvd case, all wrapped in plastic of course. After the expansion has been out for a while you can just download the necessary files for the same price from the website. Also for each account you have to purchase separate expansion packs. Me and my husband play and we each have an account and we had to go to the store and buy two separate expansion packs. We contacted them about it and they said that there had to be a "real world product" blah blah blah.

Why the NEED for a "real world product" only though. The game would not be any less successful if us nerds who play got to sit down at our computer and NEVER have to get up or leave. When a new expansion is coming out so many people struggle with how to buy it, do I pre-order it online and possibly have to wait a week before I have the actual product arrive in the mail or do I go and stand in line all night so I get get the actual product and get home and play as soon as possible. If they could pre-order it online in digital format and have it at midnight believe me they would, so many of them would.

I'm not saying they need to get rid of the real world product because there would be those that want the booklets that come with the game and there would be those who would wander across the game at the store and purchase it there. But why do they really need a "real world product" only that is what I do not understand.