Not Just a Granny

What do plastic bags, packets of peas, Twinings foil bags and my brain have in common? …….they all live inside my head!!! Metaphorically that is and please note I said head, not brain. 🙂

So today I was standing in the kitchen making myself a cup of tea and mulling over the fact that I just love tea, even though from time to time I do defect to the otherside and enjoy a cup of coffee; tea is my first love.

So while waiting for the kettle to boil and the tea to draw (?), I read the story on the side of the Twinings teabag box. Twinings it seems have made their boxes with wood from responsibly managed forests and are recycleable, which in itself is not really that remarkable since many other cardboard boxes are also recycleable, but what is brilliant is that the foil bag inside the box that keep the bags fresh, is biodegradeable!  And that is remarkable.  The story on the side of the box goes like this: “Forests are remarkable; they help to sustain plants, animals and the climate.  To help protect these places, we choose to use wood from responsibly managed forests to make our cartons.  What might surprise you is that even the wrap around the teabags (which looks like foil) is in fact made from wood pulp from sustainable sources.  This means it is full biodegradable, so pop it into your compost, along with your teabags and in a few months you will have ferliliser to help grow your own veg.  If home composting is not possible please dispose of in the waste bin”. (where else?)

So that got me to thinking about plastic and peas and recycling. I read an article in the New Scientist just the other day (a fab magazine if you want some great reading matter) about how plastic is not as we previously thought, totally indestructible.  In fact it does deteriorate and breakdown and eventually enters the mainstream of life via the oceanic creatures that we catch and eat.  The article mentions significant pieces of art by Russian-born scultor Naum Gabo housed at the Tate Modern gallery in London that have started to crumble without warning.

I recall that last year I started my own campaign to avoid buying or using anything that came in or was made from plastic, so that I could do my bit for the plant.  It was however, a futile attempt.  On closer inspection I realised that I would have to walk around stark naked, never buy or eat anything and not be able to ride in or on any vehicle in order to avoid plastic. It is everywhere.
The BP oil spill comes to mind when I write about this because of course plastic is a derivative of oil.  This then got me thinking about peas and I wondered if 99% of children growing up these days realise that peas come from a pod and not from a plastic packet.  And should the saying “two peas in a pod” now become “two peas in a packet”?

I remember when I was a wee girl of about 7, my mother always shopped at the local greengrocers and we were able to choose ‘fresh, grown in the field behind the store’, produce.  We bought carrots that smelled like carrots, and peas that came in a pod and had to be shelled.  What fun that was and we usually ate more than eventually ended up in the pot!

So my endeavour to avoid plastic came to nil! We are surrounded by it.
I do hope that more and more companies will go the same route as Twinings and make their products biodegradable and meanwhile I will still avoid buying stuff in plastic wherever I can. Which leads me to why I hate Tesco’s.  Yes, they are convenient, but they are also invasive, much like the plastic and you can’t get away from them.  They could also send their staff on a customer relations/attitude course.   The reason I hate them is that they don’t give a toss.  Buy a pint of milk, a loaf of bread, and various other items and you can be sure that the bread will end up at the bottom of the bag with the heavy stuff dumped on top.  The staff never look at you – the view outside is of more interest, they leave trolleys and stuff all over the store and if you happen to walk by, it is no problem to barge into and past you on whatever errand they are about. The shame of it is that yes their prices are cheaper and in these days of escalating prices sometimes you have to cave in and buy stuff from them. Like plastic they are everywhere; invasive and do the same to our high streets that plastic does to the environment.
I remember the days (a sure sign of old age) when my younger sister and I used to walk to the store to buy a loaf of freshly baked bread that came in a brown paper bag, lasted 2 days (coz it tasted so good we ate it pronto) and cholesterol wasn’t even heard of.   Now, I can’t remember what a freshly baked loaf tastes, or even smells like anymore and am grateful just to be able to buy bread that will only expire after a week.  In those days we used to have our milk delivered to the door and it tasted like milk, today milk has no taste.   It is completely mechanised from the poor cows that live in bulk in sheds all their lives, hooked up to machines, force fed and forced to mass produce babies so that we can buy it in yet another plastic bottle.  Which got me to thinking about how weird it is getting old.
The age stuff relates to my memory…. I can remember with total clarity (or at least it seems that way) things that happened aeons ago, but bugger me if I can remember stuff I did yesterday.  My brain has become a bit like a lump of swiss cheese.  I have a theory for that though….a few weeks ago my Doctors told me that my cholesterol was above 5.0 and I had to get it back below.  Now anyone who knows me knows I love my food and how much I hate dieting!    But I think my brain (the bit that’s left), has gotten in on the act and decided to keep me active and induce me to get fit.  I’m upstairs and think of something I want to do or get from downstairs, so I dash down and no sooner do my feet hit the last step than the thought disappears in a pooff!   Gone!  I stand in the middle of the kitchen like a dork, with my hand to my forehead desperately trying to remember what it was I was there for.  And I know for sure that the second I give up and trudge back up the stairs, I will just reach the top and voila…… I have to get back down….quick, before the damn thought disappears again.  This happens at least 10 times a day…I kid you not!!

So here’s the thing….if you see ‘pinkie’ anywhere, please ask him to send ‘brain’ over to my house. I don’t care a bit about conquering the world but I do need his services….my brain has gone AWOL and is RestingInPeace somewhere in Switzerland disguised as a lump of cheese!