No Recipe Exchange this week — blame Bixby — so here’s a discussion-sparker from the NYTimes on “Efficiency in the Kitchen to Reduce Food Waste“:
SEATTLE — The nation’s first citywide composting program based largely on shame began here in January.
City sanitation workers who find garbage cans filled with aging lettuce, leftover pizza or even the box it came in are slapping on bright red tags to inform the offending household (and, presumably, the whole neighborhood) that the city’s new composting law has been violated.
San Francisco may have been the first city to make its citizens compost food, but Seattle is the first to punish people with a fine if they don’t. In a country that loses about 31 percent of its food to waste, policies like Seattle’s are driven by environmental, social and economic pressure.
But mandated composting reflects a deeper shift in the mood of the nation’s cooks, one in which wasting food is unfashionable. Running an efficient kitchen — where bruised fruit is blended into smoothies, carrot tops are pulsed into pesto, and a juicy pork shoulder can move seamlessly from Sunday supper to Monday’s carnitas to a rich pot of broth for the freezer — is becoming as satisfying as the food itself…
Wasting less in the kitchen is just smart economics, said Dana Gunders, a project scientist for the Natural Resources Defense Council whose book, “Waste-Free Kitchen Handbook,” comes out in May.
Eating better may cost more, she said, but an efficient cook can make up the difference. “We are so price sensitive in the store, and 10 cents will swing us one way or other,” she said. “But in the kitchen we throw out so much money without even thinking about price.”
Reducing food waste is moving so quickly into the cultural mainstream that it ranked ninth among the top 20 food trends on the National Restaurant Association’s annual “What’s Hot in 2015” list, based on a survey of almost 1,300 chefs.
Imperfect fruits and vegetables are being promoted by grocery stores and organizations like endfoodwaste.org, whose social media campaign includes a stream of misshapen produce photographs on its Twitter feed, @UglyFruitAndVeg…
As someone with a lifelong dependence on prepared foods (our cats once rejected my mother’s carefully prepared Thanksgiving turkey, and they loved Spaghetti-Os), I have a peasant cynicism about government messaging that conflates household consumption with industrial inefficiencies. Between single-portion packaging and our bioactive food-scrap recycling units (aka, the dogs) we don’t actually generate much “food waste” here, except when one or the other of us gets overenthusiastic about how much farmers-market bounty we can eat after one of our too-rare seasonal excursions. But I know there’s plenty of useful tips for reducing food waste that don’t rely on “Pressure-cook your kale ribs to substitute for asparagus, and use skate bones for a tasty dipping sauce!” hipsterism.
So… What are your favorite tips for reducing food waste / recycling leftovers / using less-than-optimal ingredients?
Corner Stone
What?
beth
Don’t people in Seattle use trash bags? How do the garbage workers know what’s in the trash? I’m confused by that sentence.
max
But I know there’s plenty of useful tips for reducing food waste that don’t rely on “Pressure-cook your kale ribs to substitute for asparagus, and use skate bones for a tasty dipping sauce!” hipsterism.
Have lots of people to feed and cook a lot. Also, pasta and rice keep.
I tend to erratic excessive loss of aged veggies. But it all goes in my compost pile. Everything else gets used.
max
[‘I am not sure what they’re talking about with it being expensive to eat. Generally I always found you could get out the grocery store a lot cheaper with fresh veggies and meat if you skipped the packaged stuff. The problem being the need to cook it all.’]
Baud
I only eat gruel.
Iowa Old Lady
We throw out almost no food, I think because I plan every menu shop from that list. But I’d have trouble knowing what to do with a pizza box.
max
Incidentally:
Composting pizza? ‘s got meat on it doesn’t it?
max
[‘Not supposed to compost meat last I heard.’]
Jacks mom
I’m gonna get a puppy to help with that.
/snark
max
@Iowa Old Lady: But I’d have trouble knowing what to do with a pizza box.
Cardboard can be composted. Or recycled.
max
[‘If you have neither, then yeah, a pizza box is hard.’]
jeffreyw
Burritos
raven
Aw grubs again, grumble grumble.
kc
Mandatory composting law? Shit. I’d be in big trouble.
Or not. Though there’d be some really obese raccoons around my house.
kc
@beth:
Really . . . do they pay workers to sift through people’s garbage? “Found a moldy bread hellt! I’m writing this one up.”
kc
Thank Jesus for garbage disposals. Or have the left coast leftoons banned those too?
Pogonip
@Iowa Old Lady: The dog will eat it.
JPL
@kc: I’m on the east coast but have a septic. Septic systems make you aware about waste. I compost everything but meat.
Baud
Can someone explain this to me? What are the benefits of this policy other than more compost?
Pogonip
@kc: “The Smiths are throwing away banana peels AGAIN? Those scofflaws! Write ’em up, boys!”
“Hey, do we ticket people for used diapers?”. “No, we just leave them on their doorstep.”
kc
@JPL:
Well, that makes sense.
I would think composting would be kind of a pain for people in apartments, condos, etc.
KG
What are leftovers?
My waste usually comes in the form of buying something and letting it sit in the fridge too long. I make the mistake of buying something like spinach at the farmers market than other stuff at the store when I go for proteins. Something always gets lost.
Botsplainer
@Corner Stone:
Say “what” again, Brett…
Now what does Marcellus Wallace look like?
Iowa Old Lady
@Baud: I’ve heard reports about food waste recently, and a big percentage of it is in the production and delivery system. I’m not sure how much the average home produces.
I mean, are still worrying about the starving children in China when we fail to clean our plates?
JPL
@kc: true.. When you don’t have a garbage disposal, though, you try different things. Most apts. have disposals.
raven
I made a big compost drum out of a plastic 55 gallon drum. I drilled a 1/2 inch hole in the bottom and top, ran a pipe through it and bolted the pipe onto two metal saw horses. I cut a 1ft square, hinged it and put two handles on it so I can turn it. Works pretty good.
Corner Stone
@Botsplainer: What?
vickie feminist
We stayed with friends in Seattle over the holidays. Chicken bones went into the composting bin along with the wilted lettuce and plate leavings. The dirty paper napkins along with the food contaminated pizza box went into paper recycling (I think–I remember being appalled at the changes in the paper recycling.)
Seattle has extremely little garbage dump land available so they have been very aggressive about recycling for a long time.
I don’t think any city employee is sorting homeowners trash–but they do get mad about the amount a person is tossing and NOT recycling.
Pogonip
@KG: In our 2-person household we lose stuff that is only available in the large economy size when we can’t eat it fast enough. Around here, at least, smaller packaging would help more than composting. Not that I have anything against composting, but it’s not feasible for most apartment dwellers.
Baud
Can you compost a person?
Hypothetically…
raven
stickler
@max: Here in Portland, OR (and I’d guess it’s the same with Seattle), the food waste goes to a specialty facility that uses heat in the composting process, and meat is acceptable. Probably no way to force people to do it otherwise. Your food scraps go in the yard-waste bin and they take it on garbage day.
Here in Portland, they also only collect garbage every OTHER week; yard waste and recycling is weekly. Kind of sucks when you can’t remember if this week is garbage week or not. Really sucks when you have a baby in diapers, which have to fester for two weeks before collection. But otherwise it seems to be working pretty well.
Iowa Old Lady
@Pogonip: Being forced to buy huge portion sizes frustrates me too. I wind up sorting through the apples looking for small ones.
Baud
@Iowa Old Lady:
Right. Production and delivery waste are understandable. This, less so.
Elmo
Chickens. They eat EVERYTHING.
JPL
@Pogonip: I live alone and have blanched vegies and froze them before the compost date. I then use them for stir fry.
Roger Moore
I think the biggest one is to schedule enough times when you’re going to eat leftovers that they don’t go bad waiting to be eaten. The old George Carlin routine about leftovers making you feel good twice, once when you put them in the refrigerator (“I feel good. I’m saving food.”) and once when you throw them away (“I feel good. I’m saving my life.”) is very apropos. You can say something similar about food that goes bad before it ever gets cooked; don’t buy more of anything than you’ll eat before it spoils.
Steeplejack
I frequently kick myself for letting food go to waste—Exhibit A is a lonely sweet potato sitting on the kitchen counter that I didn’t use at Thanksgiving—but, man, I don’t think I come anywhere near 31% waste. And that’s speaking as a person who lives alone and occasionally struggles to cook for just one without ending up with a lot of leftovers. (Recent advances in my stir-frying research look promising.)
Corner Stone
@Steeplejack:
It can be tough. I pay more a lot of the time because I ask the meat dept/butcher to cut down a package size of something because I know there’s no way I am going to finish it.
Iowa Old Lady
@Roger Moore: For 10 years, I lived in the town where I worked during the week. On weekends at home, I cooked batches of stuff like chili, pastas, meat loaf, whatever, and I froze leftovers in individual size plastic containers. We called it freezer food and it’s what my husband and I both ate during the week. I still do it just from habit. It’s nice sometimes for each of us to pick out some leftover we want and microwave it.
Gex
Just have the sentence that mentions the use of single serving packaging as a means of reducing waste bouncing around my head.
TaMara (BHF)
My beautiful Shelby (harlequin Dane) used to love to dig. I finally trained her to only dig in the compost pile. Quickest composting ever. All that digging turned quickly to beautiful, rich soil.
Sorry for the lack of recipes this week. I’m applying to a climate leadership program and am struggling with writing my bio for the application. I’ll do better next week.
I’d ask for requests, but afraid of what you jokers would post during a composting thread.
Baud
@Gex:
To be fair, she does say “food waste” in quotes.
Dan B
Seattle ships its garbage by rail 200 miles to east central Oregon. It’s expensive. Many people put their food waste in the garbage when it could be composted in facilities under contract with the city. I don’t remember the percentage of garbage that’s food but it seems like the figure was 30% and the cost to taxpayers was in the multiple millions per year. Seattle’s on an isthmus and bounded by the Cascade mountains only 30 miles from downtown so land is limited.
Meat and paper that’s been dirtied with food compost fine in the facilities due to shredding and keeping the heat of the compost high, something that’s difficult for a home compost to accomplish. The news regularly features stories about trash and compost sorting issues, and solutions, for restaurants and apartments. There are challenges but it’s slowly getting better.
NotMax
Airdrop the leftovers over N. Korea?
Roger Moore
@Iowa Old Lady:
Exactly. You can’t treat leftovers like an afterthought, or you’ll eat them like they’re an afterthought. You have to plan your menu to include leftovers, or they’ll never get eaten.
Gex
@Baud: No I see that she’s talking about that and the statement is true, that will reduce food waste. I just don’t see that as being preferable.
And this isn’t really a judgment on the packaging either, as I am now single and I will allow myself single serving packaged items at times. It’s more that I am pretty sure that it is better to compost food than throw out packaging, but you also never know with how modern ag actually works. Overall, I suppose the properties of plastic make it such that it is the hands down winner in the “which is worse to throw out” competition.
ETA: This may also mean that our modern contrarian “You may think this but really that” media has destroyed my mind.
RSA
While I appreciate the movement to reduce waste, I have nothing but snark for this article.
Right, the mood of the nation’s cooks, tens of millions of people, is sensitive to what’s fashionable in the kitchen.
And how are we to learn how to become efficient? That takes time and effort that a lot of people don’t have.
Randy P
@max: Out of curiosity, I checked out the composting law. Here’s the brochure for Seattle:
seattle.gov/council/bagshaw/attachments/compost%20requirement%20QA.pdf
They really do mean NO food in the garbage. In our neighborhood, you’re not supposed to recycle food-contaminated paper or cardboard (although, true confessions, I do put pizza boxes in the recycling, since the wax paper has kept it mostly uncontaminated). Seattle still wants that kept out of the recycling but you’re supposed to put it in the composting.
I compost at home, but the guidelines say no meat, no bread, no dairy. Supposedly those attract rats. I guess Seattle’s composting plant must have ways to discourage the rats.
Incidentally, there are ways to compost in apartments, especially if you have a fire escape. You can use waste paper for the “brown matter” which is supposed to be mixed with the food waste. But the issue I always wondered about was, what do you do with the compost when it’s done, if you don’t have a yard?
kindness
We have a compost bin out in the back, two dogs & two cats. Any food wastes we don’t put there our area has a lawn/yard waste composting bin a little bigger than our trash bin. We recycle all our metals, glass & most paper & plastic via the local recycle places. The green bin is usually fuller than the garbage bin. What I don’t get is the dogs love eating the grass out on walks but won’t touch the stuff in the back yard. Murphy’s Law.
Saw a piece over at LG&M earlier this week on smoked brisket. Wanted to do one this weekend but decided next weekend is better (payday). Love my smoker, it makes it so easy.
TOP123
I used to live in Seoul, Korea, in an urban area of around 20MM, and composting food waste was required. There were collection bags you were supposed to buy, the white ones covered in instructions in Korean that was way beyond my reading level for trash, and the yellow ones covered in instructions in Korean that was way beyond my reading level for food waste. I once had a neighbour I didn’t even now cast some serious shade at me for some sort of mistake I’d made in separating my trash.
@stickler: try compost bags full of kimchi and seafood scraps in summer time. ^_^
wasabi gasp
Wasting food in Seattle will soon be literally throwing it down the toilet.
Francis
This a complex issue that I looked into a little bit a few years back. The short answer is that estimates of calories thrown away run as high as 40%. Waste occurs at every level, but unsurprisingly the bulk of the losses are at the field and first-tier retailers. Field waste mostly isn’t too bad environmentally; the plants just get plowed under. Supermarket, hotel and restaurant waste can actually be quite large. We consumers expect only the most perfect unblemished produce, and food’s so cheap that supermarkets can throw a lot away and still make money (it’s actually priced in). That waste, unfortunately, largely gets landfilled. And the leachate off this stuff can be nasty, full of both aerobic and anaerobic bacteria.
I’ve read that more and more cities are building MRFs (material re-use facilities) to try to divert the bulky and easily reusable waste out of MSW (municipal solid waste). But that is mostly construction debris that can be burned or pulverized and recyclables like metals. Last I checked, by the time organics are in the MSW stream, it’s too gross and expensive to try to compost it. Composting is only cost-effective at the individual residence.
However, since i haven’t looked at this issue for at least four years, all of this could be wrong.
raven
@TOP123: Honey buckets when I was there!
Heliopause
1. Eat out less, prepare your own food more.
2. Pay for stuff with cash as much as possible, avoid electronic/”easy pay” methods. If you can physically see the money flying out of your pocket you’ll be less likely to waste it.
jibeaux
Freezing is the best tool I’ve found, blanching first if need be. Soups are good, too. And having a husband who honestly, truly, loves leftovers. It makes him so happy that they’re no effort for him. Oh, honey. You didn’t put any effort into the original meal either. But I don’t complain, because I don’t really like eating the same thing twice in a row.
TOP123
@raven: don’t get me started on the toilet paper thing…
Pogonip
@Baud: Ask Jimmy Hoffa.
Gin & Tonic
I’ve been thinking of getting one of those vacuum-sealing machines like this. Anyone have any recommendations?
Violet
Try the green cone for breaking down food, including meat and bones.
Anne Laurie
@stickler:
In our little industrial dumpster on the opposite coast, the 50,000-person municipality has three separate contracts for the ‘waste stream’ — weekly trash pickup, biweekly (paper/plastic) recycling, and monthly ‘yard waste’ pickup from April through November (with an extra round in early January for Xmas trees). At the end of the year, the city sends every household a folder with the new year’s pickup calendar & the various definitions of what qualifies for each stream. Since our memory isn’t reliable about which week is ‘ours’, that folder gets mounted on the refrigerator for future reference!
This is the first year they haven’t exempted pizza boxes, for some reason (‘milk & juice cartons & juice boxes’ were always accepted). Since pizza-delivery reception was an important criteria when we bought this place, now we have to retrain ourselves to put the flattened pizza boxes in the recycling bin, not the trash…
Violet
@Roger Moore: Sunday night tends to be leftovers day in my household. I’m tired, don’t feel like cooking. There’s always something left over. Go look in the fridge, find it, heat it in the microwave. Easy.
I frequently make extra of things like salmon so I can eat on it throughout the week for lunch or maybe a quick dinner. Extra potatoes–fry them up. I grow a lot of vegetables throughout the year so those are often available.
Little Boots
good lord.
opiejeanne
@kc: we have a disposal but we use it very rarely because we are on a septic system. Our daughter lives in Seattle and they are on sewers but she doesn’t use her disposal very often because the plumbing and the sewers are so old.
I think we have a communication problem here. In King county we put our garbage ( food scraps and paper products that have food on them) in the yard waste bin. Paper trash goes into the can marked garbage. Recyclables including paper that has no food on it goes in the recycling bin.
Violet
Japan has very strict trash, recycling and composting laws. Here’s just one article on them. People have been evicted from apartments for failing to comply with the rubbish laws.
opiejeanne
@Baud: less stuff going into the dump.
Anne Laurie
@Gex:
I nuke the contents of the red box (which saves energy, since I’m not heating up the oven), eat the food part, give any leftovers to the dogs, recycle the cardboard box & the plastic ‘dish’. All that goes in the trash is the sheet of cellophane sealant.
You can argue plenty about the waste of energy at the production end, but my shameful yuppie-chow meals aren’t bulking up the local landfill, at least!
opiejeanne
@Pogonip: the compost goes into a bag that is biodegradable and put that into the bin for yard waste. The city picks it up and does the composting. You don’t have to compost anything, you’re just separating it from the other trash.
opiejeanne
@Baud: they did on Bones.
PurpleGirl
It is cheaper for me to order/buy a hamburger from either the deli/grill or the pasta place next door. When I buy the chopped beef, I often end up throwing some of it away.
Craig
Okay, seriously: GET SOME CHICKENS. I’ve been astonished at how owning chickens has changed our behavior with respect to food “scraps.” Truckloads that might have gone in the trash or down the disposal go to feed the birds now. And the eggs! Nothing tastes like an egg fresh from the backyard. We hardly ever order eggs when we eat out now: they don’t taste like anything. Anyway, we were talking about garbage, and I’ve really learned a lot about how people managed in The Olden Times without weekly curbside pickup–a flock of birds and maybe a pig in the backyard was an important part of the loop.
Violet
One thing my household does every so often, usually heading into hurricane season, is to eat down the stuff in the freezer. It’s not a bad way to save money because if you’re having an “eat out of the freezer week” you don’t spend much. Plus you make sure you don’t let things “disappear” in the freezer only to be discovered a disconcerting number of years later when you’re not sure if they’re safe to eat.
Persia
I like to make broth from veggie peelings, stuff that’s wilted and ready to go too far. I throw it all in the freezer until I have enough. Throw it all in the crock-pot, cook for a day or so with some salt and whatever spices sound appealing, strain it with cheesecloth, freeze in bags. Then I feel cheap and environmentally friendly.
I’ve been trying to do more meals where the leftovers can be ‘transformed’ cause the kid isn’t much on leftovers.
Little Boots
no omnes? no more steeplejack?
at least, annie.
Mike in NC
I seriously doubt if things have changed, but when I was on active duty in the Navy there was basically no such thing as leftovers. Any food that wasn’t consumed at a meal onboard ship was discarded within 24 hours. If the entire military operated that way, it represented billions of dollars wasted each year.
Violet
@Persia: Roast chicken is good for that. You eat it fresh out of the oven the first night. It’s easy to carve bits off to have chicken sandwiches, put on top of a salad, use it for chicken enchiladas or tacos, or make more of an effort and and make chicken stroganoff or toss into a stir fry . Then boil down the carcass for a nice chicken soup. What broth you don’t use for the soup you can freeze for another time.
Mike J
Even if you do have food you have to throw out, it never goes in the garbage, it goes in the yard waste bin, which is compostables. And of course many of us have our own compost piles too.
Duh.
PurpleGirl
@JPL: In NYC garbage disposal weren’t allowed for many years (sewage system unable to handle the waste). I believe they are now allowed. I’d love to have one.
Violet
@TaMara (BHF):
Maybe along the lines of the “reducing food waste” concept you could do a post on leftovers. Or, like I just posted above, how to get multiple meals out of one item–like the roast chicken.
Violet
The UK has made reducing food waste a high priority for meeting their environmental goals. Link. They work with WRAP to meet these goals.
Persia
@Violet: Yeah, I’ve been trying to do stuff with chicken. It’s the one protein the kid isn’t really into, which makes it harder.
BruceFromOhio
Buy and grow only what I can eat.
And learn how canning works.
ETA @Violet: This.
One pot, one fire, many meals.
Mike J
@max:
Here in Seattle, instructions are that they go in the yard waste wheelie bin,not garbage. My garbage wheelie bin is 20 gallons, my yard waste/compost bin is 60.
Mike J
@Baud:
Can? I don’t know. Typically you don’t put animal fats in your compost pile, but that’s mainly to keep from attracting rodents.
I think it would work better if you gave it the Fargo wood chipper treatment first.
Violet
@Persia: That’s a bummer. You can do the same with turkey but you end up with a lot more of it. I’ve done a similar thing with steak. Have the steak for dinner, then use it up by using it on top of a salad, making tacos, whatever. I also like making extra salmon. I find it’s easy to eat cold for lunch or use up in other ways.
max
@Randy P: In our neighborhood, you’re not supposed to recycle food-contaminated paper or cardboard (although, true confessions, I do put pizza boxes in the recycling, since the wax paper has kept it mostly uncontaminated).
The only even merely adequate pizza around here is uh, Papa John’s so we haven’t had pizza in a few years now. The pizza box thing never came up. In practice we have no guidelines for paper, and no city composting, so the meat goes in the garbage, and pizza boxes would just go in my compost pile. (My compost pile is grass clippings, pulled up garden plants, leaves and whatever veggie waste I throw in there, which isn’t much by volume.) Recycling is the normal stuff.
max
[‘We are, of course, total fucking hippies for around here.’]
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: No, you feed people to pigs. Didn’t you see Snatch?
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
finally.
Little Boots
@Little Boots:
actually you get marshall, because of your whole thing:
youtube.com/watch?v=MUL68ZeclcA
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: More in keeping with the theme of the thread.
Mike J
In re Ferguson
thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/234936-holder-prepared-to-dismantle-ferguson-police-department
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
why are you this person?
and why can only I see this?
am I magic?
Violet
@Little Boots: When you said Marshall I figured you meant something like this.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike J:
It probably is necessary.
Omnes Omnibus
@Violet: A far better choice.
Mike J
@Omnes Omnibus: I was hoping our local judge would weigh in on the judge in Ferguson being a prosecutor in two nearby towns and also keeping his law practice open.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike J: I haven’t had the heart to read any of it yet.
Persia
@Violet: Turkey breast works but I do know that it’s some kind of eldrich abomination. Salmon’s a good idea, though.
Violet
@Mike J: How’s your dad doing?
GregB
Speaking of food and waste.
I came across this business in my neck of the woods.
Mr. Fox Composting.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
fine, not horrible.
now you. go.
PurpleGirl
@Omnes Omnibus: There’s a Criminal Minds where that is what the villans do.
Mike J
@Violet: Home, finally. In fact, cleared to go out of town next week. Endocrine guy was doubtful on the hypothyroid hypothesis, cardio guy doubtful on drug interaction. So nobody has a good guess as to what would cause extreme hypotension (mom told me today that at one point when he crashed there was no pulse), Unbelievably, once they stabilized him every test showed him as perfectly healthy. Echo cardiogram, cardio enzymes, every single thing was fine.
In short, no idea, but happy he seems fine.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: Marshall. With a little Martika.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: No, Go Now.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
seriously, why I love Omnes, something I thought I’d hate, and yet … not so much.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
and now billin, oh damn, can i admit to loving moody blues?
Mike J
@Little Boots: I think Marshall may be in part responsible for my hearing.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: Some Philly Soul.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Omnes Omnibus: Philly? Well, from Soul Train
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
not that I don’t love omnes, but … kinda better.
Steeplejack (tablet)
Mos Def, “Umi Says.”
Omnes Omnibus
@BillinGlendaleCA: Muscle Shoals?
BillinGlendaleCA
Something a bit more somber, same time period.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: If you prefer the comfort of the familiar….
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
generally, what?
ruemara
I found this and was thinking of planning the most epic pig out after I hit San Diego and if I can survive eating like my trainer wants me to. buzzfeed.com/ninamohan/delicious-junk-foods-you-can-only-find-in-san-diego#.oyNJkPlLLD
But now all I can think is YUCK!
Nutella, plantains on a burger. Gross. I’ll be fine with Trader Joe’s salad and chicken breasts.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
nice again.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: I was listening to this on my walk yesterday. I was feeling pretty sly.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack (tablet): Cool.
@Little Boots: You know exactly what I mean.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
okay, you are pissed. what is with you?
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
like what you are doing. but, okay, not sure I’m supposed to.
Steeplejack (tablet)
I am going out and may be some time. Night-night
Little Boots
@Steeplejack (tablet):
well,will miss you.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: Not pissed at all in either sense of the word. BillinGlendaleCA is posting music in your exact comfort zone; I am not.
ETA: What have I done to deserve this?
Violet
@Mike J: Glad he’s doing better. Sorry they can’t figure out what’s wrong. That’s pretty scary. I had a family member have extreme hypotension as a result of medication–but only when he flew on a plane. Seriously. He took it daily, but when he flew his blood pressure would drop precipitously. He stopped taking the medication and never had that problem again. Hadn’t had the problem when flying before he started taking the medication. Really weird. Not a known side effect but happened enough that we finally figure out it was the medication.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack (tablet): Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do and, honestly, don’t do many things that I would do. Remember, no glove, no love.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: But we’re just Ordinary People.
That was playing on my walk tonight.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
okay.
I still like what you post. I like that you keep making it more interesting.
Ken
@Randy P:
Isn’t Seattle digging some kind of big pit connecting to an underground storage system? They could fill it with compost, if it can’t be used for anything else.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike J: I missed the stuff about your dad. I am glad he is doing better. Hopefully, it was just a weird anomaly.
@Little Boots: See my edit.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
love it.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
you are in a mood though.
but you get to be in a mood.
Omnes Omnibus
Quiz: Smalltown Boy and Fight the Power
What do these disparate songs have in common?
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@Mike J:
This may be TMI, but was he peeing when it happened? Because that’s an actual thing called micturition syncope:
mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/vasovagal-syncope/expert-answers/micturition-syncope/faq-20058084
It happened to my friend’s husband, which is why I’ve heard of it.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@Omnes Omnibus:
For some reason, my local grocery stores currently have “Smalltown Boy” playing on heavy rotation. Not sure why, but I swear I hear it at least once every time I buy groceries.
Lectriclady
@Elmo: but don’t give them avocados, they are toxic to birds.
Violet
@Omnes Omnibus: They’re both from the 80’s?
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne (tablet): It’s a thirty year old song. Any of the real (I would image) angst of a gay teen in a small town can now be safely ignored by corporate culture.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: Kids, be careful of the demon Alcohol.
Omnes Omnibus
@Violet: No. Dig deeper.
Mike J
@Mnemosyne (tablet): He was actually at the clerk’s desk, checking out from his appointment with his cardiologist. Told my mom he felt funny, then couldn’t speak, couldn’t be guided to walk, but they got him to sit in an office chair and wheeled him back into the treatment room.
Omnes Omnibus
Dear god, this was in the right column on the YouTube page for the Percy Sledge tune I posted. It’s damn near perfect late 1st gen ska/early reggae.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
Hey!
youtube.com/watch?v=2-eclUz-RYI
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: I’ll go Bobbie Gentry on you if you push me.
PurpleGirl
@ruemara: The triple pork sandwich sounded very good — bacon, pulled pork, and a pork loin/chop (?) — for the person who loves pork. I also liked the Russian torte. The rest of the combinations didn’t do anything for my appetite and some were down-right gross.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
I will push you.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: Fine.
Mike J
@Mnemosyne (tablet):
I remember being freaked out when I heard The Replacements Achin’ to Be in the grocery. Still haven’t heard Gary’s got a Boner.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: You won’t push me: I’ll go with a whiter shade of pale.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike J: Marketing people don’t understand lyrics.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
well damn, pullin out the stops.
okay.
Violet
@Omnes Omnibus: Love. Love, love, love that.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: I ain’t even got started. Our state passed a Right to Work law today. I am willing to almost anything to distract myself from that fact. Seriously, violent rage bubbling under the surface… Delving into music is my salvation.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
and that was classy and awesome and omnes, but
oh, damn, how I love this song. people mock, but damn, the ceiling flew away.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
I know, the fuck is wrong with this state?
Little Boots
@Little Boots:
we need to take back this goddamn state, but I do not know how.
Mike J
@Omnes Omnibus:
The opposite of that may be the last song the Police did that was even vaguely ska influenced. I always wondered how many drum heads Copeland went through recording that song because he has them tuned so tight. All of the drums are just sharp little “pop”s that have to be mic’ed really close to get anything out of them. Perfect for that song though. Most noticable through the e-o’s.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Omnes Omnibus: So you look like this?
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
umm.
Little Boots
everyone’s in a damn mood tonight.
Omnes Omnibus
\: @Violet: It’s almost perfect, isn’t it?
@Little Boots: That song is almost perfect as well, isn’t it?
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
true, but you are in a damn mood, too.
Mike J
@Little Boots:
Win the lege in 2020 and be in charge of redistricting.
Little Boots
@Mike J:
that would be delightful
Violet
@Omnes Omnibus: Yeah. Just love it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: I told you why. I am avoiding pure violent rage. Did you know that Wisconsin pioneered both unemployment insurance and worker’s compensation laws? And these fuckers are wrecking it?
Here is some ska. I am five fucking seconds from snapping. Please, let’s do music.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
I know. we were progressive once upon a time.
then we stopped.
Little Boots
can we do country?
youtube.com/watch?v=2-eclUz-RYI
BillinGlendaleCA
@Omnes Omnibus: A bit long, but it’s so 70’s. THANK YOU FALETTINME BE MICE ELF AGIN. It’s got the original Soul Train intro.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: NO.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
yes, dammit.
Violet
@Omnes Omnibus: Here you go.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: Not that for like the sixth time…
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
dammit, it’s needed.
perfect americana.
and sma to billin who is being a dick about the whole thing.
Mike J
@Omnes Omnibus: Music.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
but you’re not as pissy, which is nice.
Omnes Omnibus
@Violet: Better Jam.
Little Boots
fine. I’m entirely right, as always, but fine.
why are you so melancholy?
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike J: Thank you for soothing the the soul of the savage beast. For a bit.
Little Boots
and now, because you have mocked, you get harper valley.
youtube.com/watch?v=4ivUOnnstpg
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: No more Moody Blues for you bud.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
you are beyond mean.
Violet
@Omnes Omnibus: Link no work.
Little Boots
I miss steeplejack.
Omnes Omnibus
@Violet: Meh?
Little Boots
or this:
youtube.com/watch?v=9muzyOd4Lh8
Violet
@Omnes Omnibus: How about this.
Little Boots
@Violet:
now that is pretty nice.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: Still no Moody Blues for you, but I’m Tempted.
Omnes Omnibus
@Violet: Non-meh.
Violet
@Omnes Omnibus: Lyrics seem to fit your mood.
Mike J
@BillinGlendaleCA: If you’ve not seen it, watch the documentary Take Me I’m Yours.
Little Boots
because everyone has been in a mood tonight,
youtube.com/watch?v=sjCw3-YTffo
BillinGlendaleCA
Even though I’ve been called a dick(name’s bill), an uplifting song by the Moody BluesThe Voice.
Little Boots
@Little Boots:
please don’t be racist and oppose this.
BillinGlendaleCA
When the wife and went for a walk tonite, saw a bunch of choppers to the east, turns out that there was a hit & run. 4 year old girl hit so hard that she flew 20 feet into a parked car, killing her. Fuckers.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
damn, okay, damn
Little Boots
and I never called you a dick
Little Boots
plus this:
youtube.com/watch?v=t-iJ47in9YQ
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: This is true, you said I was being a dick.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
I did? sorry.
Little Boots
wait, i did not just call you mean, did I?
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: Apology accepted, Gemini Dream for ya.
Little Boots
everone’s asleep?
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
okay, not everybody.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
and no it is not. you apologize for all you did.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: For posting Moody Blues, I shall not. Don’t Bring Me Down.
Little Boots
@BillinGlendaleCA:
fine, nice, but why I love omnes.
steady.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: I’ve Had Enough.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Little Boots: Then again you could Just Gimme Some Truth.
Keith G
Wow, no new post in eight hours. Are the home brew servers of Balloon-Juice in fine fettle?
FarmerG
We need to eliminate all waste.
“I don’t produce a lot of food waste because I eat single serving packaged food” just means producing more packaging waste which is worse than biodegradable food waste.
raven
@Keith G: No shit!
BillinGlendaleCA
Wow, went away for 3 hours and no new post and 3 new comments.
JPL
Good Morning!
Joel
@Randy P: Cedar Grove composts at high heat, which means any rats attracted become part of the mix. It’s a smelly process and it sucks for nearby residents, but it beats a dump. The compost is good material, too. Four bucks a bag when I was last out there.
Baud
@JPL:
Hello!
Steeplejack
Let me achieve some seasonally appropriate closure on last night with Anne Murray.
It’s 10° here in Threadkill Lane this morning, but it’s supposed to get up into the 40s today and then steadily warmer over the next week, so maybe this dreadful winter is finally ending, at least here. Might see about digging the car out of the crusted ice and snow, depending on how much help the sun gives me. But I don’t really have to go anywhere.
Nothing much planned today. Need to check the program guide for El Rey. Promised the housecat we would watch her favorite kung fu trilogy: Shaolin Alley Cat, Nine Lives of Shaolin and Shaolin Boxes of Maru. Think it’s coming on sometime this weekend. Could be wrong.
ETA: This is what happens when a nighttime thread is allowed to fester into the daylight.
Hunter
I’ve been doing that for years. About the only food-type stuff that goes into my landfill bag is banana peels and chicken bones. Otherwise, that bag is wrappers and packages that aren’t recyclable.
Svensker
@stickler:
Same here in Toronto. Meat goes in the compost bin, which is collected weekly. We have very strong double anti-racoon technology on the compost bin (learned the hard way). Garbage is collected every two weeks, so we’re trained to throw away as little as possible, but to compost and recycle everything we can. It’s a slight pain at first, but you quickly get used to it.