Community Chat

[wagirl]

My favorite is--packing a box inside another box---love that--I can see if it were a tiny box but mostly its a large box inside an even larger box---

[candys mine]

Funny that.  As I recall that's All they used to use.

That and Paper bags.  Anyone else remember the UPROAR over switching to those thin plastic bags at the checkout line way back when?

I keep those thin bags.  They're great to keep in a pocket just in case you pick up a couple things at the store on the fly.  No paying for a bag.  and they fold up to nothing in your pocket.

Welcome  back to the good old days.   We were Right all along.

[Sakuya]

I remember the switch. I didn't understand why plastic was supposed to be better and I was very young.

[JoyFilled Warrior]

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@hkrgrl wrote:

YUP, 

we went from paper for everything:  shopping, butcher, lunchmeat (waxed) 

to plastic for everything, now going back to paper.

AMAZon said the paper used to stuff boxes is coming from 100% recycled content, so that a good thing!  

they need to come up with better ways to recycle what we use from soup to nuts!!

we have 2 old TV's that we can't get rid of, trash or recycle. still looking of how to dispose of.  wrote to House Rep, no reply.

township will take for $40 each!!  i am sorry, i pay for trash yearly, sewer rent yearly and all my other taxes to boot.  no i am not giving my township $80 to dispose of tv's.

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Hi  @hkrgrl   

Does your City/County/BBB offer "Shred It Days?"  Often those kind of days offered, take personal papers that they Shred, but they also take Paint, Batteries, TV, Puters, etc.  Good Luck!

[gardenman]

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@Sakuya wrote:
I remember the switch. I didn't understand why plastic was supposed to be better and I was very young.

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The paper bag/plastic bag argument largely came down to preference. For me, plastic was far better. The handles let you carry more than one bag at a time. Paper bags would typically need to be supported from the bottom. Try to carry one from the top and the bag would often tear and the bag and contents would hit the ground. Paper bags also had issues with moisture. Rain or a wet item in the bag could lead to the bag turning to mush in your hands. Plastic bags were viewed as better for the environment initially as they could be recycled or used to dispose of dog/cat waste and no trees were cut down to make the bags.

Most major stores using plastic bags had recycling bins where you could drop them off and then they'd be turned into things like Trex decking for your porch or deck or other recycled products. Paper bags were often not recycled by many communities where newspaper and cardboard were the only paperstock they'd accept for recycling. You could either compost them or throw them away. They weren't very usable for pet waste, garbage, or the like. You'd tend to use some other plastic bag lying around (bread wrapper for example) for those issues.

A few months before NJ's ban went into place, I bought twelve reusable plastic bags from Amazon. They've been great. Each one holds fifty pounds of stuff and they're about as thin and lightweight as the old disposable bags. I wasn't sure how well they'd hold up, but so far, so good.