Author Topic: "GREEN THING"  (Read 823 times)

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Offline mrclose

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"GREEN THING"
« on: April 14, 2019, 12:55:38 am »
If you are old enough, this will make sense to you as well as bring back some memories!


Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to the much older lady that she should bring her own grocery bags, because plastic bags are not good for the environment.

The woman apologized to the young girl and explained, "We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days."

The young clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."

The older lady said that she was right -- our generation didn't have the "green thing" in its day.

The older lady went on to explain:

Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled. But we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.

Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things. Most memorable besides household garbage bags was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books. This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags. But, too bad we didn't do the "green thing" back then.

We walked up stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.

But she was right. We didn't have the "green thing" in our day.

Back then we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.


But that young lady is right; we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.

Back then we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief(remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana.

In the kitchen we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.

When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.
Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.
 

But she's right; we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blade in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.

But we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family's $45,000 SUV or van, which cost what a whole house did before the "green thing."

We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the "green thing" back then?
"Hell is empty, all the devil's are here!"
~ Self

Offline Elderberry

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Re: "GREEN THING"
« Reply #1 on: April 14, 2019, 01:42:14 am »
And the Hudson gas station near the house sold recycled oil in mason jars. You'd just buy the oil, not the container.

Bottles were like money in the bank. I was in the Navy and one Christmas Eve I lost my wallet. I cashed in enough bottles to have Christmas dinner.

Offline Elderberry

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Re: "GREEN THING"
« Reply #2 on: April 14, 2019, 01:53:54 am »
And we didn't buy jeans that were holey and ripped.

Every year before school started my mom would buy me 2 new pairs of jeans and iron on patches over the knees.

Offline Joe Wooten

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Re: "GREEN THING"
« Reply #3 on: April 14, 2019, 01:07:29 pm »
And the Hudson gas station near the house sold recycled oil in mason jars. You'd just buy the oil, not the container.

Bottles were like money in the bank. I was in the Navy and one Christmas Eve I lost my wallet. I cashed in enough bottles to have Christmas dinner.

There used to be a small oil company in West Texas called Pride Refining. They sent trucks around to all the gas stations (remember when gas stations did mechanic work like oil changes and fixing flats?) to take all the used motor oil. I remember Dad getting 5 cents or so per gallon for the oil in the 100 gallon waste oil tank. Pride would take that oil filter and re-refine it, package it in a can and sell it for about half the price of virgin motor oil. Then in the 1990's, along comes the RCRA which defined motor oil as hazardous waste and required onerous paperwork and piled more regulatory crap onto re-refiners like Pride. They could no longer afford to pay the gas stations and oil change shops for the used oil. The refinery in Abilene, TX is long closed. A successful recycling business gone in the name of the environment, our Holy Green God....

Now, no one re-uses od motor oil and a helluva lot more of it goes down the sewers, the dumps or thrown on the ground.

Offline Elderberry

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Re: "GREEN THING"
« Reply #4 on: April 14, 2019, 01:26:18 pm »
I have a metal melting furnace that is currently running on propane. I've hoarded about 100gal of used oil and am ready to convert the furnace over to running on oil. I'll start each run on propane and once the furnace is hot, I'll switch over to oil.

Online roamer_1

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Re: "GREEN THING"
« Reply #5 on: April 14, 2019, 03:25:06 pm »
And we didn't buy jeans that were holey and ripped.

Every year before school started my mom would buy me 2 new pairs of jeans and iron on patches over the knees.

I had 13-patch pants. A baker's dozen. Mamma would only put on that many before the pants were done. And she would commonly reinforce the knees once they faded sufficiently to where the patch did not look out-of-place.

Not that we were poor, though there were times we were. It was more about getting all you could out of everything you bought. And living frugally is part of the efficiencies which present when one is living within one's means.

And those retired pants? They were not discarded... They were cut up to become the patches for the next generation, and a plethora of other things... One of my favorite possessions is a patchwork quilt my mamma made back in the day... Within is a wool army blanket. The outside is patchwork denim, and the inside is patchwork flannel - Both the denim and the flannel being the last bits of my various pants and shirts through many years.
« Last Edit: April 14, 2019, 03:26:55 pm by roamer_1 »