M86: Miscellaneous

Today is starting with me feeling way behind. Forgive me for giving this short shrift. I am going to share a few highlights now. I hope I can update with more and better bloggery.

meals on wheels
Yesterday the solar oven I'd ordered came. By the time I unpacked the huge box, gave the booklet a cursory read and mixed up a couple of practice meals it was 1:30 in the afternoon. My new black enamel pots were filled with beans, lentils, rice and lots of other goodies. This kind of fare was supposed to take 2-3 hours. Well, this first day was a true science project. A neighbor and I kept moving the oven to new locations to capture the moving sun. I only had 3 hours of sun and it kept getting shady, so the pots never boiled - so to speak.

Today I decided to set it on top of one of my old oil barrels on wheels. Yes, now I can move it around to follow the sun. I even added the optional reflector wing things. But, I am not hopeful because the sun has gone behind the clouds for the last two hours. Aaargh. But, I still think 'meals on wheels' is a funny line.

my mom's tip
I am always really pleased to get a letter from my 84 year old mother. It is work for her to 'keep up' (her term) with my letters. When she actually responds to a question or enquiry I am particularly pleased. Today was good little pile of clippings, photos, images and notes. Among all of these was a great, natural stain removal tip via Heloise. I wrote before about my mother being a Heloise fan in my youth. Anyway, this is the tip:

Homemade Pre-wash
Mix equal parts of water, household amonioa and dishwashing liquid and put the mixture into a spray bottle. Apply directly to the stain. Wash the garment immediatly after applying. Remember to treat the stain as soon as you see it, and don't dry the fabric until you're sure the stain is gone.

manual washing machine
Also receiving my WonderWash this week means I will be using it today to wash my very first load. For the first time since the beginning of December I may run out of cloth wipes. Oh noes. Air drying would also be helped by a shining sun. The afternoon is half over and its looking pretty gray. I may have to use my folding rack to dry inside.

make-a-plan garden layout
I measured the community area of our mobile home park yesterday. The next step is to get it drawn up and then go back to locate existing plantings, trees, buses. Once I have all of that information I can print it up for us to use as a planning tool for our garden. I am not moving forward on this as quickly as planned. I have had a lot more interactions with people and letter writing time than I'd planned. Maybe tomorrow . . .

money versus magic
Let me just say that these gifts to myself are a real treat. I wrote about both the solar oven and the washer right after I started this blog (around Thanksgiving). I would have preferred purchasing in 2007, but I couldn't find the money. I am not sure why I waited until April, possibly waiting for magic. It seems magical that so many good things seem to happen without consciously budgeting, spending. In this case, not so much.

mishaps
First load of clothes went really well, except . . . I wondered where the directions were and had to look online. When I was done washing I found the directions in a million little pieces of wet, lint-like fibers all over my load. Great. Next, I had another mishap that started well on Monday. I started soaking a cup of dry chickpeas, let them soak for more than 30 hrs and then put them in the crock pot for another day. I turned off the crock Wed night and put the pan into refrigerator until morning. Thursday afternoon I strained the chickpeas and put them in the food processor with the lemon juice, tahini, garlic and seasoning. After adding the chickpea liquid and some olive oil and letting the processer do its thing, it looked weird. (Aside: I am in the meantime setting up the big solar oven science fair exhibit in my driveway.)

I tasted the wannabe hummus. GAK! The stuff was raw! Either the crock pot is ready to die or I accidentally had it on low. Then I decided to throw this crunchy puree back into the crock pot. I let it cook with several cups of the chickpea liquid all night long. By this morning it was a vile, steaming mass of darkened, crunchy hummus. Absolutely delicious treat for my worms (once I let it cool) and a monstrous concoction for me. It has been awhile (christmas baking 2006) since I have had this big of a culinary flop. I just couldn't salvage this cup of dried beans.

It is gray and chilly so my solar oven cooking has become my third mishap for this day. I brought the pots inside and I am finishing the barley, mushroom dish on my little craptastic electric hot plate. (Note: February's mishap was the death of my induction cook plate. I am still mourning.)

L73: Laundry

This last Christmas Eve I spent the evening with my son. We went to the laundry together. We each had four or five loads because we decided to end the year with clean bedding, towels and all of our clothing fresh and organized. We had a good time strolling down memory lane. I reminded him how he was in charge of doing all of the laundry when he was a senior in high school and we lived in South Philadelphia. He hadn’t remembered that I insisted he do all the laundry all the time because his was the lion’s share of the loads.

My observation was that my kid used a towel and threw it in the laundry, wore a pair of jeans and threw it in the wash pile. My strategy was to make him responsible for it all. Now that doesn’t sound too onerous unless I mention that this was in Philadelphia where we had to schlep our laundry up and down stairs and walk blocks to the Laundromat. The thing is, it hadn’t really changed his heavy laundry loads.

And this is the first thing I want to say about laundry. I think Americans wash clothes more often than necessary. Clothes can be worn more than once unless one’s day is in a physically demanding, filthy place.

Next I want to jump in with the 2008 program I have been following. As I said in past post, air drying and appliances, I air dry my clothes and use the community coin washing machines at $1.25 a load. In that post I also said I’d like the Wonder Wash and I still do. The thing is I decided to buy a solar oven today (another post for another day). I was arguing with myself this afternoon because the cost right now is killing me. It is only $54 with shipping. That will pay for itself before the year is out. That helped me decide to go for it.

Lastly, the major change this year is with the cleaning products. I wrote about getting rid of household cleaners and replacing them with natural products like vinegar, soda, salt, etc. Well, I have also quit with the petrochemical detergent and gone with Soap Nuts.

I use Maggie’s Soap Nuts as these were recommended to me by a neighbor and I can get it from a store within walking distance. According to the website text:

Maggie’s Soap Nuts™ are the only laundry soap that grows on trees!
Truly effective, 100% natural and safe for your most sensitive skin.
Soap NutsTM are the dried fruit of the Chinese Soapberry tree.
They contain saponin, a natural cleaner used for thousands of
years to clean clothes, just like the plants used by Native Americans
for washing.

Simply put a few Soap Nuts into the included cotton sack and drop
it in your laundry. Your clothes come out clean, vibrant, and soft.
Replace your laboratory detergents and softeners with the soap
made from Nature by Nature. Your clothes, your skin, your family,
and your planet will thank you.

I couldn’t be happier with this product. It really is pleasant smelling. A part of me questions how this really works as the soap nuts bag stays in the machine during the rinse because the commercial front loader doesn’t allow me to open the door during the whole process.

When I get my Wonder Wash I will be able to remove the little bags prior to rinse.

Another justification besides cost will be no electricity, saving water and the soap’s better efficiency. I will confess to one more advantage. I will be able to launder my toilet wipes at home rather than dragging them to the community laundry. Ha! I am seldom this discreet, but it happens.

Kidding aside, these two consumer goods purchases represent major lifestyle changes towards sustainability. I realize that I am ready to take this on as a life change, not just a sustainability experiment. Yet, I am full cognizant that there will be those who read this and decide it is just off the charts impractical (for him or her). That's cool. For myself there is a growing impatience with half measures. The longer I pursue living simply the more attractive it becomes. It also gets more efficient as I practice. I wonder if it is even coincidental that chile, green bean and others are writing similar words? Somehow it is all connected.

laundromats by Patrick Q at flickr

K67: Kitchen Daydreams, dish drying edition

The kitchen daydreams continue with another wonderful design called Flow. Here is an incredible prototype invented by John Arndt that completely captures the reuse, reduce, recycle concept and more. It is called Flow and it incorporates whole systems in drying dishes, watering plants and composting kitchen scraps. I don’t even know if it is for sale. I know that I am going to create my own knock-off of this inspired design. I think you will enjoy this.

This whole system includes the terra cotta clay pots with specific functions including evaporative cooling fridge box and planters.
The hole in the counter and rolling compost bin with worms is pretty cool. I am not interested in that because my composting is handled.

The table yesterday is still appealing to me for the bits of trash from meals and mail. And, frankly I don’t have a spot in my set up for a kitchen counter composter. The real stars though are the hanging units for the plates. I think I can figure out how to rip off the glass and cup concept, but the plate rack is a balance issue that has me puzzled. I will have to daydream about this for a very long time.

The dishrack takes advantage of the smallest amounts of wasted water and puts it to use to water the herbs and edible plants growing in the planter boxes. The rack also eliminates the need for a cupboard allowing the dishes to be easily accessible. The plants also help attract dust which helps to keep the dishes clean and the dripping water helps to wash off the dust.

My own kitchen has some problems. It is temporary as I ran out of money when I moved in and renovated. I re-used the old white (stained) laminate counter I’d pulled from the trailer and tossed. The old counter is resting on two IKEA cabinets without doors. My kitchen sink is a big plastic laundry sink I bought for about $20 with a faucet costing 3 times that amount. I made curtains for the fronts from a paint cloth. I made a top channel in each and threaded them onto an electrical conduit or pipe I installed with electrical clips. This is the setup until I have enough money or courage to buy or make a concrete counter with a stainless steel sink. To make this would not cost much, but the work demands some real strength and competence. It intimidates me something fierce.

The temporary nature of my kitchen set-up also includes the old jalousie windows that leak. These windows were originally lower, but I asked the handyman to raise them. It turns out that the new location is perfect for catching all the rainwater that flows off the curved trailer roof. When it rains I line up cans with bowls and pans on top of them to catch the row of droplets coming in the back windows. So, wouldn’t a window conservatory affair with planter inset at the sill height and these dish draining racks above be perfect? I think so.

I will continue to daydream and to draw up plans on the computer. It is just a matter of time because it always works out somehow with found objects, barter or bargains. It just does.

Check out Flow.

A4: Air Drying and Appliances

For the make-a-(green) plan challenge, I refuse to use my hair dryer. I have owned this little hair dryer for a couple decades I think, though I have let my hair air dry for years. So, putting this old thing out in the shed is really only symbolic. I am not going to throw it away. For one thing, I think I will be using it soon on an ugly decal on my truck. I was told a hair dryer was a good method to remove decals. This reminds me somewhat of the No Impact Man’s similar plan wherein he and his wife removed things from their home for the challenge, with no permanent decision about what they would reuse when the year was up. (Note: they brought their washing machine back.)

I am also air drying my clothes on my new clothesline out back. In a pinch I use a folding rack I found two years ago by the dumpster. I use it for drying during rainy weather. I may have to use it this week. I would normally use the dryers at the laundry room a few doors away. Besides saving the energy in a general way, I will be saving money. Who doesn’t love the smell of line dried bedding and towels? I listed gift ideas in November and included the Wonder Washer. This is one little manual appliance I’d like to get in the mail. Feel free to write me an email and I will give you my shipping address.

Another major appliance I won’t be using this year is a dishwasher. I will be washing dishes by hand and letting them air dry. But, I don’t own a dishwasher, so that isn’t a stretch. In fact, I haven’t had a dishwasher in my home for most of my life.

Other small appliances which have gone the way of the shed: waffle iron, iron, toaster, hand mixer, curling iron and a popcorn popper. All but the first of these were given to me or I found for free or at a thrift store. If you are counting, there are now half a dozen small appliances I won’t be living with this year.

This leaves the following appliances in my home, and I may re-think my use of these as well.

1. Microwave – I believe this is non-negotiable as I use it frequently and I’d argue for its effectiveness.
2. Induction Cook Plate – I love, love, love this technology that cooks with magnetic waves. This is my primary cooking method and I’ve found that it cooks faster than any other method I’ve used before.
3. Toaster Oven – This isn’t used much when I eat healthy. When I am eating crap I use it a lot. Note: The aforementioned Gift List also lists the details for a Solar Oven. Hint.
4. Coffee Maker – I found my coffee maker at the Community Thrift for $2. I brew and put in a carafe to be conscientious. So, this is no real biggie.
5. Food Processor – As I mentioned yesterday with my Arugula Pesto recipe, I make hummus most weeks. I am not ready to mash, chop and blend by hand. It could happen.
6. Space Heater – From December to March I use this about an hour or two a day to keep my daytime air temperature 62 degrees and nighttime 50 degrees.
7. Fan – I usually have a fan going non-stop all summer. Sometimes I am not sure if it is the air movement or the white noise I am addicted to here.

Now these are all small appliances, but even my more major appliances are pretty small. None of these that follow are sacred, but I am not ready to consider removing them this month. I have a restaurant version of an undercounter refrigerator without a freezer. I have a countertop ice machine, television set, CPU, monitor and a laser printer. These last ones are equipment rather than appliances, right? What differentiates these two words, appliance versus equipment?

ap•pli•ance

A device or instrument designed to perform a specific function, especially an electrical device, such as a toaster, for household use. See Synonyms at tool.

It isn’t clear what differentiates these words appliance versus equipment, but by inference anything that is for household use is not considered very ‘serious’ when one starts exploring the world of electrical engineering. This is true of countless areas besides electrical, but that too is another post.

Now it occurs to me that this all sounds like a real Riot for Austerity. It is and I make no apologies. Many middle and upper class bloggers have written about taking it slow and that it isn’t necessary for austerity to be the way forward. That might be so for many, but the majority of Americans may not have a real choice. I emphatically believe we are headed towards a whole series of crises and my desire is to go forward on that premise. I won’t cite the articles in this post for the economic meltdown, peak oil to biofuel corporatist push and the food / water shortages I have been reading about this year. These are for another day. My mission is to take this very seriously and consider all options for reuse, recycle, reduce or eliminate.

On the other hand, the Buddhist teaching of the idea of a Middle Way is close to my heart. After all, perfectionism may be as destructive force as indifference. My make-a-(green) plan will not solve these international and national or even my state or local calamities even if I aced everything. If I were a perfect austerity nut I still would not make a huge dent in the global dilemmas. That’s okay. I will still feel more empowered than waiting for the politicians to do anything to save the things that really count. Oh, and the other thing is this, what will it hurt to give it my best? It took me years and years to get the this place of understanding.

Photo from Flickr