do stuff to help the earth

i know it’s a bit late for an earth day post, but i just read a quote/monologue by Bill Maher that inspired me to recommend something everyone can do to help. stop using plastic bags! well, stop tossing out plastic bags. just say no to bags whenever possible; when you’re going somewhere where you know you’ll need a bag, bring one with you to use. use a huge purse all the time like i do, or get yourself a big tote bag that can fold up and be shoved into a smaller purse or pocket, or bike basket or whatever. if you’re lucky enough to work in retail like me, for smaller purchases always ask the customer if they need a bag, they say no at least half the time. when you do get stuck with a plastic bag, save it for later use. all the obvious things, like trash bags, pooper scoopers, etc…

and now here’s where the project comes in: if you are capable, knit or crochet a big tote with those bags! i’ve crocheted one little practice version, and i’ve just started a big knit project, which i plan to make nice and huge:

here are some links to get you started:

• one way of making the “yarn” – long single strands
• another method – double stranded (this is how i do it)
• diy network’s knit version – requires sewing pieces together
• marlo’s crochet corner’s simple crochet version
• photo of another bigger crocheted bag

there are tons more tutorials and pictures all over the web. also, the awesome book craftivity has a tutorial for a crocheted tote, featuring a photo of an amazing, unique bag by Diane Bromberg. this book is just super rad all the way through, i highly recommend it as an all-around cool crafts book.

i am not a great example for these kinds of things (i watch too much tv, drive a car, accidentally leave lights on, the list goes on), but i feel the need to remind anyone reading this to just do what you can. change over to the good kind of lightbulbs, walk/ride a bike/use public transit whenever possible, reduce reuse recycle…… just be aware.

i’m posting the long quote behind a “more tag” which i’ve never used before, i hope this works.

From now on, Earth Day really must be a year-round thing. And…and in honor of this Earth Day, starting Monday, supermarket clerks must stop putting the big bottle of detergent with the handle on it, in a plastic bag. I don’t mean to tell you how to do your job, but you see that handle you just lifted the detergent with? I could use that same handle to carry the detergent to my car.

And while we’re at it, stop putting my liquor in a smaller paper sack before you put it in the big paper sack with my other stuff. What, are you afraid my groceries will think less of me if they see I’ve been drinking? Trust me, the broccoli doesn’t care, and the condoms, they already know.

So, here’s a quote from Albert Einstein. He said, if the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would only have four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination. No more plants. No more animals. No more man. Well, guess what? The bees are disappearing in massive numbers all around the world. And if you think I’m being alarmist, and that, “Oh, they’ll figure out some way to pollinate the plants.” No, they’ve tried.

For a lot of what we eat, only bees work. And they’re not working. They’re gone. It’s called “colony collapse disorder,” when the hive’s inhabitants suddenly disappear and all that’s left are a few queens and some immature workers. Like when a party winds down at Elton John’s house. Queens imagery.

But, I think we are the ones suffering from colony collapse disorder. Because, although nobody really knows for sure what’s killing the bees, it’s not Al Qaeda, and it’s not God doing some of his Old Testament shtick. And it’s not Winnie the Pooh. It’s us. It could be from pesticides or genetically-modified food or global warming, or the high fructose corn syrup we started to feed them.

Recently, it was discovered that bees won’t fly near cell phones. The electromagnetic signals they emit might screw up the bees’ navigation system, knocking them out of the sky. So, thanks, big mouth guy in line at Starbucks. You just killed us.

It’s nature’s way of saying, “Can you hear me now?”

Last week, I asked, if it solved global warming, would you give up the TV remote and go back to carting your fat a$$ over to the television set every time you wanted to change the channel. If it comes down to the cell phone versus the bee, will we choose to literally blather ourselves to death? Will we continue to tell ourselves that we don’t have to solve environmental problems, we can just adapt? Build sea walls instead of stopping the ice caps from melting. Don’t save the creatures of the earth in the oceans; just learn to eat the slime and the jellyfish that nothing can kill; like Chinese restaurants are already doing.

You know what? Maybe you don’t need to talk on your cell phone all the time. Maybe you don’t need a bag when you buy a keychain. Americans throw out 100 billion plastic bags a year, and they all take 1,000 years to decompose. Your children’s children’s children will never know you, but they’ll know you once bought batteries at the 99-cents Store because the bag will still be caught in a tree. Except there won’t be any trees.

Sunday is Earth Day. Please educate someone about the birds and the bees. Because, without bees, humans become the canary in the coal mine. And we make bad canaries, because we’re already such sheep.

-Bill Maher (copied from hbo.com)