Coffee Cups

I bought a spontaneous coffee today too on the way to Karen's. Now I have a paper cup. I am going to resuse it as much as possible and start carrying a reusable with me always. A reusable mug, and a tupperware would be good companions to my water bottle. And Shelley, I'd love a beer before you leave.

An Epic

Part 1: So I'm doing pretty well with this whole thing- by which I mean I'm getting pretty good at rationalizing anything I happen to want. When this picture was taken, I hadn't bought anything new except for these three things, all approved by the tribunal:

• new shoelaces for my light hiking shoes
• HUGE knitting needles with which to make a bathmat out of old t-shirts
• a replacement bead for my earrings I've had in for 5 years

In general I've bought a lot less stuff than I probably would have before and I even returned some stuff to REI that I had bought in prep for Africa that I don't really need.

Part 2: And here's where I get into trouble. I started doing some reading about our trip next week and the hike that is Mt. Meru. That's the 4 day hike that we are doing instead of climbing Kilimanjaro, but for some reason I wasn't thinking of it as a trek. It's supposed to be less touristy and neat because you can actually look at Kili from a bit of distance. Anyhow, the point is, I started looking at gear and what people are wearing in the pictures of themselves on Mt. Meru and realized that the shoes I have, 4 years old and a half size too small, aren't not going to cut it.
The tribunal approved it for a couple of reasons, the main one being that Kennet will have to hear me whine about my feet for days upon days.

I exhausted my used resources- craigslist, second ascent, and the REI garage sale, before buying the shoes at Patagucci I've wanted for a while now, but had talked myself out of. This brings me to an interesting point. I wondered if this endeavor would save us all time that we would put toward shopping, freeing us up for other more creative and meaningful things. Hillary very astutely pointed out that there will be some times when it does actually take more time to track things down.

Here's the shoe:
They have a good percentage of recycled material in the sole, but not post-consumer, so not as amazing as they tout them to be. But they have a lifetime guarantee so I'm going to take them out to Dungeness Spit this weekend try them out.

I'm not totally sure what the mitigation for this poor planning is, but so far the options are that I either have to buy Hillary and Maddi beers, or figure out how to regift something I own, or both. I have no problem finding something to get rid of (what does that say about my level of stuff?) but finding something worthy of regifting and finding someone willing to accept it. I recently went through all my craft stuff and found a bunch of art and office supplies that I'm not sure what to do with.

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As far as buying nonreusable stuff when we could brought our own, like coffee cups, I am all for working under the pressure of always reusing the stuff I have now. I'm glad this came up today because I just realized I left my coffee mug at work and will want to get coffee at the ferry tomorrow- I will have to talk Kennet out of his reusable mug for a day so I don't have to get a paper cup.

I noticed that in the last three weeks I've ended up with 4 or 5 take out containers I could have planned better for. One thing I'm going to do is take a container with me to Africa so I can carry stuff around without making more trash.

Speaking of trash: I keep thinking I can take multiple small consumables with me, like toothpaste, and then just throw them away and lose the weight in my pack. But that ultimately means I'm bringing my trash from a first world country into a third world country and dumping it, which is as bad as the recycling/disposal programs that just send stuff out of the U.S. It all comes down to thinking through the lifecycle of the products we use.

Portland and my "new" shirt

I first explained the 3 pockets project to my two most wonderful college friends, Meg and Meems, when we met up in Portland for Memorial Day weekend. Being the kind of friends they are, I could tell them I was building a rocket to the moon in my backyard and they would be supportive. But I felt so encouraged there as we sat in the cafe at Powells book store, I told them...

"hey, lets go shopping."

The great thing is that directly accross the street was Buffalo Exchange, a recycled clothing store that is much loved in both Portland and Seattle. We spent almost an hour sifting through clothes and finally I came away with my much loved "new" shirt. See the photo of myself and Mia, she is clearly impressed by my shopping prowess.

Initially I was worried that my visit to Portland would be a trial. I envisioned myself surrounded by shops and boutiques that would be too tempting to pass up. But I quickly realized how it is possible to travel well, eat well, and play well while keeping durable goods completely out of the equation. I would much rather have my memory of our picnic in the rose garden than a souvenier... or even a new pair of shoes.