I have (had) a supervisory license for chemical applications in the state of Connecticut. The exam is supposed to be brutal with only 5% of people passing because it’s difficult.

One of the things that stuck with me is that chemicals can enter our bodies through breathing and ingesting. Pretty obvious! But chemicals also enter our bloodstream directly through our skin. The more private our skin is, the easier the chemical becomes part of us. If the chemical is used daily, then that chemical becomes part of us permanently!

Take a moment to think about showering when your entire body is exposed to whatever you wash with. Your vanity might just be killing you and the planet with the products you buy and use. Look up “palm oil” some day- how it is used in products and the environmental destruction that is occurring in Indonesia as we speak. Are you a part of that with your shopping choices? Hard to sleep when you consider the orangutan population has virtually been wiped out because of American vanity. Let’s get back to my point about chemicals in your body...

​I hate to be a skeptic (maybe I don’t), but American culture dictates that if it’s on the shelf then it must be safe for us to apply/consume. Wrong.

Just consider HFCS- high fructose corn syrup... approved by our government for our consumption, but how can that be when they know it’s not good for us?

It’s in EVERYTHING as a cheaper sugar, but it causes huge issues in your body, with long term health consequences. If a product has HFCS, I don’t buy it! Period! I’d rather pay more for products that have sugar. Campbell Soups, for instance, promotes their soups as healthy for your family... ads with kids coming inside from sledding and sitting in front of a bowl of steaming chicken soup- ummmmm!

Must be wholesome, till you read the label. When I saw HFCS, I was PISSED! I wrote them a letter and they gave me coupons for some zany alternative soup they make that doesn’t contain it. From that point on, I decided to make my own soup using Goya cans of misc stuff.

Point being you CANT TRUST. You gotta educate yourself. Read the labels. Be your family’s first line of defense-we have to be our own advocate in this life, because the government is bought and paid for by the Koch brothers, Monsanto, etc. I’m not saying it’s a giant conspiracy! I’m just saying that it’s up to YOU to do the best for yourself and your loved ones, and if you don’t and then develop some condition later in life then you’ll just wonder how you got it.

So, as these doubts about these chemicals creep to the front burner from the back burner of our minds, it’s up to all of us to spread the word about alternative solutions to mainstream needs, and that’s why I’m writing this today.

​I found this great shampoo/body wash!

Label makes good reading whilst you eat cereal before work. It’ll take a week to read the whole thing. This company is the real deal!

Check out this label! All plants, two chemicals. I bought it and discovered that this bottle is enough for a year or two because you need a TINY amount to wash your hair and body. That’s it. I gave some to friends, and now they use just Dr. Bonner’s soaps. The word is spreading. There ARE better ways that are safer for you, cheaper also.

These seemingly crazy products are found on the bottom shelf usually- you have to sniff them out. I actually sold some to a fellow shopper two days ago- didn’t know the dude. He was looking for a product for his daughter that didn’t contain something that she was sensitive to. He left with this shampoo/body wash, and I’m sure that it’s the only product he will ever buy again- ever- for showering.

Try it, I guarantee you’ll like it!!!

Anti perspiration stuff. I always call it “B.O. medicine.” Chemical antiperspirants STINK BAD! You can smell them on some people when they walk by. Ever wonder what’s in them? You don’t wanna know. If it bothers you, there is an alternative... mineral salts that are mined, ground up and reformed to fit into an applicator. Just wet the tip and apply, and the natural salts will kill the bacteria that makes us reek! Today is my first day using it- till Friday, the jury is out.

Both of these products you can find at BIG Y. Stop n shop is way too scared to offer anything other than the “same old stuff!”

Please consider this a parody on human insanity- mine included.

These pages sometimes seem more like rants- too much time on my hands. I hate (HATE) running for fifteen reasons but have to for the next week. So I run with earbuds in. Used to think people who did that were losing out on all that nature had to offer- birds chirping, wind through hair, blah blah blah.

Reality is, where I run, all I can hear is the assholes gunning their engines unnecessarily fast up and down the hill. Earbuds rock so I can pretend I’m running through a “Dances with wolves” ecosystem, pure and pristine. Plus, reggae has a certain beat that pandora brings to my workout randomly- so far, so good.

Some drivers seem to see how close they can get their car to me. Oh well, I mind my own business, not so deep in thoughts as I run.

Close your eyes when you listen to this song if you want to. I just did. It’s easy to imagine half a mile going by without your knowledge while the beat regulates your feet- speeding up slightly as the tempo changes. Fists clenched as your body rhythmically and painfully thumps it’s way down the street.

GREAT RUNNING SONG!

This song took me part way up the hill- feet thumping on the shitty sidewalks in sync with the awesome tropical beat of reggae base. Since my body was occupied and my consciousness was kept company by the music, my subconsciousness was free to ponder upon the meaning of life!

I started to recognize what bothered me about my fellow trumbullites- they throw shit out the windows of their cars. Lots of stuff. I started to realize that consumption of all types of every vice whilst driving was the biggest culprit.

By far the biggest environmental criminals are the few remaining lowlife cigarette smokers who care more about the environment in their car than the environment we all wish to remain intact. They only care about themselves!

​Consume and toss. Consume and toss, twenty times a day. Fuck it! Who the hell are you to tell me to actually throw my discarded butts away PROPERLY??? I’ll do whatever the hell I want to! I find that it’s not actually the stereotypical “lowlife” that you would expect to see driving down the road in poor rural America. It’s rich cars, poor cars and everything inbetween. The only common denominator is that it’s SMOKERS.

I run past literally hundreds of thousands of cigarette butts, like grains of sand on the beach on my effortfull journey up that hill. I’m completely 100% honest with you when I say that I have zero respect for these people, as evidenced by my outspoken hostility towards them during the entire course of my life. If they have no honor in their polluting behavior, I do not see why I have to have any for them. Not that what one person says to another has one bit of affect on the net quantity of biomass of disgusting cigarette filters that slither their way into our oceans every minute of every day.

I was deep sea fishing in North Carolina fourteen years ago in the crystal clear blue waters off the coast of nags head with my extended family and my bro in law kept flicking (dispassionately) his gross filters into the water. I would watch them float on the water for a long time as the still water tugged them slowly away from my sight. As soon as one was almost out of sight another one would take its place next to the boat for me to watch again, my brain cells grinding against each other as I tried to figure out what to say to this guy to stop him from an obvious insult to something I thought everyone was aware of. Turtles eat that shit and die. Never read that? Where you been? Fish eat that shit and die, I thought to myself. They die too, never heard that? You live in a cave??? After a few hours I offered him my empty beer can, having lost a filter of my own after numerous consumptions. Being buzzed has it’s advantages!

“Dave, please put those in here instead of throwing them into the ocean. Fish and turtles eat cigarette butts and die from them.”

He was taken aback, insulted, hurt. We haven’t spoken since. I tried to be polite as I could be but at some point one just has to stand up for what is right in life, and there is no sugarcoating a request like that. I guess it was a price that I didn’t know I had to pay but I don’t have any regrets.

At the virginal top of killington mountain one winter I got off the lift and skied towards the lodge to get food. Some guy flicked his cigarette onto the snow in front of me. Five milliseconds later I said “excuse me sir, you dropped something...”

I pointed to his disgusting cigarette butt still lingering smoke around itself as it put itself out in the melting snow.

The guy, taken aback by my comment, hesitated as I looked at him. I’m sure he was tempted to ignore me, but he could tell that my boldness was going to escalate if he tried. That asshole bent over and picked up his friend and the three of us made our way to the door next to the garbage can ten feet away from his crime.

It was the late 70s and I was a full blown high school jock but wanted to be a hippie. Thought that if I grew my hair to shoulder length that would do the trick (it didn’t).

I drove my car to an intersection where the light was red, pulling up next to another car in the process. The older guy flicked his cigarette out the window. I sat there for a moment... pissed. I said the same basic thing to him that I said to the skier, and the older guy-ww2 type guy- said “why don’t you get a haircut???”

Light turned green and off we went. Now, I don’t recommend that anyone else do what I do because it’s futile. People are thoughtless. They are going to do whatever the hell they want to do, and it’s YOU who will look like the loser... at least I tried!

I don’t do and say that stuff anymore but I think it, and I still have less respect for smokers now than I did before- less than zero.

After smokers, drinkers are the next worst polluters.... and NOT alcohol drinkers! NOT coffee drinkers- WATER drinkers! Hypocritical health conscious earthy water drinkers. Two faced to the core. I was surprised at my discovery. Shitloads of healthy water bottles, complete with their paid water bottle deposits ignored as they flew from the fingertips into the leaves decomposing on the side of the road. Crushed so nobody can collect the $.05. Maybe the whole ones were picked up already.

The most fun category of car window tossers to ponder upon is the tiny alcohol bottle consumers! It’s hilarious!!! Let’s think about this for a while- you JUST GOTTA GET YOUR FIX! “Hopefully, if I just consume a tiny bottle, my wife (or husband) won’t notice the alcohol on my breath.” I’ll get my fast tiny buzz, be on my way, and everything is cool!! Tons of ‘em, sitting there waiting for thousands of years go by until they turn into teentsy microplastic particles to poison other forms of life, oh well. So interesting wondering about the things that drive this sort of behavior! Ok, drink em (illegal) but do you gotta toss em out the window too?

Only ONE coffee cup. Tons of people drink coffee on the go leading me to believe that most people do not chuck stuff out the window. If most people did, there would be a TON of coffee cups but there aren’t.

Absolutely zero beer cans. Maybe because of the deposit, maybe not, who the hell knows. I’m a believer in the deposit laws though- they seem to work! Put deposits on the onesy shot bottles then.

I saw one used diaper very considerately encased politely in a plastic grocery store bag so nobody would be grossed out when the parent chucked it out the window. Tied up tight! People chuck em out the window all the time in front of the nursery. These people, though less numerous than smoker-polluters, are the absolute lowest forms of life on this planet.

This great song ran with me down the hill. The drummer seemed to know my pace by drumming his main beat each time my right foot hit the ground. Fantastic.

​

Everyone has seen this by now- it’s all over the news:

http://www.hartfordcitynewstimes.com/news/nation/graham-issues-threat-to-republicans-who-don-t-back-trump/video_c94e4ac9-9f79-5462-baa7-2f823b054305.html


I WAS a registered republican but haven’t voted that way in 20+ years. I’m going to now go to town hall and change that today just out of principle (principle is a foreign concept these days in politics).

After seeing this disgusting display of playground bullying, I HAD to write him a love letter as a rebuttal to his awful display of immaturity.

I am so disgusted at being disgusted!

At some point, Americans need to stand up and shout for what we believe in. There’s a ton of “Americans” who repeat the mantra-

“Democracy is what our military men and women fought and died for” blah blah blah, but then when it’s time to actually vote or donate or volunteer, they are nowhere to be seen. It’s interesting.

At what point do we care enough about something that we actually DO something?

Writing a letter is actually the very least one can do besides doing nothing... no matter what your stance is on any given issue.

...text or call 203-444-3664, ask for Dave. Our hours in winter are dubious and varied (we are almost never there), so if you need great firewood feel free to contact me.

Washington post article:


​https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/gone-in-a-generation/forest-climate-change.html?utm_term=.ee33e8c51ffc

There are so so so many news items detailing brand new scientific studies concluding now that illustrate grim data concerning the future of our planet.

Not one study reassures us that our offspring and theirs has any hope of living on a planet with ecological normalcy like most of us did when we grew up.

Its depressing, scary, and leaves anyone who has been paying any attention to this issue over the years with a great deal of dread. What can we do about it?

Well now that is a sticky wicket when we have republicans in power. Second Bush claimed “there was unproven and inconclusive data proving global warming as anything other than a “left wing” hoax," and the current president claims that 2 degrees centigrade- is just a little eentsy change, nothing to worry about... that the costs associated with curbing carbon dioxide emissions is too high, bad for business, blah blah blah. His attitude postpones governmental intervention into our dirty polluting habits, leaving it for the next president to clean up the mess if it's not too late by then.

I can’t for the life of me figure out how it can be that the future of a civilization is cradled in the small hands of an ignorant and greedy individual.

When trump declared that that he was removing our country from the Paris accord where 200 countries agreed to TRY to reduce emissions, I decided I would speak my mind and try to spread environmental info when I could, so every now and then I plop info up on this blog when I see something pertinent.

There were a few studies that I will put links to here when I can so anyone who is interested can see what they're saying, and what to do about it during your daily lives. Maybe we do not need tRUMP to help us tip-toe towards reduced emissions? Maybe there are steps that we all can take to reduce our carbon footprint as we drive, eat, buy, wash, etc. Those daily decisions probably add up to lots more of an effect than anything tRUMP can say or do.

A simple list includes:

1. correct air pressure in the tires of your car can lead to 20% increase in fuel efficiency (saves you the corresponding cost in fuel also)

2. eat all the food you buy- studies say we toss into the garbage HALF of the food we grow- all that food production produces carbon to grow, process, ship, package, etc. Then there are costs associated with disposing it also into the waste stream

3. cut down your water use- it takes enormous amounts of electricity to process, pump, pressurize, then process waste water in the sewer system. Electricity produces emissions. Use less water,=less emissions, as well as a lower water bill for you, and in Trumbull where we are charged for the sewer use by mirroring the water bill, there's lots of money to be saved by reducing your water usage. I bought a very high efficiency front loading washing machine, take short showers, turn the water on/off when shaving and doing occasional dishes in the sink, etc, and paid for the washer in a couple of years in the savings I saw in my bills for water and sewer.

4. DON'T buy stuff with lots of plastic packaging. When I see all that unnecessary plastic, it's a total turnoff. Say no to those companies by buying stuff that is packaged with a more environmentally conscious approach.

5. consider alternatives to the soaps/shampoos/detergents that we Americans grew up with. Many of those companies add tons of chemicals that I can't pronounce, and those chemicals are absorbed right through our skin then we carry these chemicals around in our bodies for life. Who is to say the harm those chemicals do to us? I am less trusting now than I ever was about our government protecting us. A common ingredient, PALM OIL, is added to almost everything, and increased production in the orient has resulted in the near extermination of the Orangutan species, as well as their entire habitat so greedy farmers can supply vain Americans with their beauty products.

5. have a garden. Grow your own food. It's satisfying, it's great exercise, the food is FREE, WHOLESOME, and has as a carbon footprint only the effort expressed as the emissions from your toil- panting, huffing, and puffing. Plus, when you put tomato and onion salad on the table, there is a huge sense of satisfaction and accomplishment derived from seeing your loved ones eat in the most healthy style imaginable. Grow stuff that you use a lot that stores easily, and requires few or no chemicals- potatoes, onions, peppers, arugula, carrots, string beans, peas, Spaghetti sauce, blueberries, strawberries, rhubarb, to name just a few. Americans have gotten REALLY SPOILED AND LAZY. Italians somehow have maintained their connections to the earth. They know how to plant, how to grow and harvest, cook and store vegetables- what an enviable culture they have! It's in their blood and it's passed down from generation to generation. Wish our family had that in our blood!
6. WHY BUY an SUV??? They cost a ton, they weigh many tons, takes shitloads of gas to propel them through space, and they pollute like crazy!!! Current cheap gas makes them look affordable, buy that shallow line of reasoning ignores all that we must now pay attention to- our use of fuel, and the resulting pollution... and the planet that we leave to our offspring.

7. REPLACE all your non-LED light bulbs. JUST DO IT. yeah, it'll cost you but you will see an instant reduction in your electricity bill. I got mine down to 'bout $45/month but I have a small family, and I'm really conscious about turning lights off when I leave the room.

8. buy a wood burning fireplace insert... my gas bill per month is the same in January as it is in July... about $40/ month. The heat never goes on, the whole house is heated by that stove- yeah, it takes a little effort, and it's not fun for some, but my house is always at least 70f, and nobody died for the oil that is sold to me, and nobody had to produce, process, and deliver gas to my home. I go through about 6-7 cords per winter, and once the fire gets going, the stove has no visible emissions and burns more efficiently than high efficiency oil burners. Plus, if the wood I have gets into the ground, there is no pollution, like there is with oil!
​
I'm done typing for now but will put sample products up for people to try... but when election time rolls around again, ask yourself which elected officials seem to care about global warming... It is a valid concern for us as a species.
​