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Help shape the future of Bluedot Living
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SIMPLE / SMART / SUSTAINABLE / STORIES
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SIMPLE / SMART / SUSTAINABLE / STORIES
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Friday, January 5, 2024
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We just love this photo of Torre Polizzi and Leslie Booher amid their harvest of drying kelp. Torre and Leslie run Sunken Seaweed, a California-based company dedicated to advancing seaweed aquaculture. “If the applications for seaweed seem endless,” writes Bluedot editor Jim Miller, “that’s because it seems they are. It’s used in food, nutritional supplements, and cosmetics, as fertilizer and fuel.” The World Bank has said that “seaweed farming can help support a world free of poverty on a livable planet.” Sounds pretty great to us. Read more here.
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DISPATCHES FROM ALL OVER
SUSTAINABLE LIVING ADVICE
ECO-FRIENDLY RECIPES
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DISPATCHES FROM ALL OVER · SUSTAINABLE LIVING ADVICE · ECO-FRIENDLY RECIPES
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“This is the world we can build. We can address climate change alongside other issues. It’s not going to cost you a ton of money. It might save you money. We’ll have cleaner air. We’ll have more energy security.”
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–Dr. Hanna Ritchie, in a New York Times interview ahead of her upcoming book, Not the End of the World. “For a long time I felt helplessness, that these problems were massive and unsolvable,” Ritchie says. “It’s important to counter those feelings. We need to go much faster, but there is a lot of progress to acknowledge and lessons to learn. What feels most productive to me is not to stare at the bad stuff and say, ‘This is bad,’ but to look and say: ‘This is positive stuff. How can I try to contribute to accelerating the good outpacing the bad?’”
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QUICK LINKS
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Skip scrolling! Here's what you'll find in this edition of the Bluedot Newsletter:
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The average faucet runs two gallons of water per minute. If you brush your teeth twice a day, this could mean four gallons of water down the drain. Turn off the tap while you brush your teeth to reduce wasting water. Read Room for Change: The Bathroom for more tips.
For more Bluedot Climate Quick Tips, click
here.
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THE BLUEDOT KITCHEN
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Prioritizing seasonal and local ingredients gives you sustainable eating at its very best. Tired of elaborate feasts, we’ve been content lately with soup and salad for dinner (even breakfast now and then). This Turmeric and Butternut Squash Soup from California recipe developer Nicole Litvack hits the spot. Pair it with this Winter Hoop House Veggie Salad from Martha’s Vineyard-based photographer Randi Baird.
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Are you embarking on a dry(ish) January? Did you know that non-alcoholic spirits have a history of medicinal use dating back
almost 400 years? According to Bluedot Living’s Good Libations columnist, Julia Cooper, “In 1651, physician John French published The Art of Distillation in which he detailed recipes for herbal remedies that were distilled using copper stills. These recipes entailed gathering locally sourced and intentionally harvested ingredients to properly harness the natural healing qualities of various herbs, barks, and peels.”
Contemporary non-alcoholic spirits company Seedlip is using
these same centuries-old practices today. Read more here (and find the recipe for the warm and wintry “Mr. Howard.”)
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Dear Dot: How Do I Get Rid of Leftover Paint?
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Dear Dot,
Dear Dot, Thanks for telling me about what to look for in eco-friendly paint. But how can I responsibly dispose of any leftover paint when I’m done?
–Frances
Dear Frances,
Alas, paint math is imperfect. No matter how carefully we calculate the amount of paint we’ll need for a project, there are often more than a few drops left in the can when we’re finished. And while it can be handy to hang onto a little bit of extra paint for touch ups (store leftover paint in its carefully sealed can and in a dark, dry place between 60°F and 80°F — no need to turn it upside down), there are times when paint is long past its “best before” date, and disposal is prudent.
Before I tell you how to dispose of any paint, eco-friendly or otherwise, let’s first make clear how not to dispose of paint: Do not pour it down a drain or dump it in a stream. Yes, I’ve heard stories.
Oil paint is considered hazardous waste by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and therefore should be disposed of only via a household hazardous waste (HHW) disposal facility. Some municipal curbside recycling programs will accept empty cans of paint. If it’s virtually empty, ensure that any dregs in the bottom are completely hardened. You can then either peel off the paint and recycle the can, or toss out the can and hardened paint with your garbage (unless you live in California, where any paint is banned from landfills). To harden paint, leave the lid off the can, and put it outside somewhere dry. Or purchase a paint hardener — available at home and hardware stores — which will speed up the process. Or add your clumping kitty litter to leftover paint, which will also turn the liquid into a solid.
If you’re not keen to mix up a batch of painted kitty litter, read on to find out how to just get rid of it. …
For more Dear Dot, click here.
To sign up for our Daily Dot newsletter, click here.
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BUY LESS/BUY BETTER: New Year, Fresh Space
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The Bluedot Marketplace includes affiliate links. If you purchase a product through one of our links, we may earn a commission, essentially a small digital finder’s fee.
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With the new year comes new plans, and a resolve to organize, streamline, and look good while we’re doing it. We’re looking for some furniture (and vowing to shop for gently used), upgrading some appliances (only the ones we can’t repair), and organizing our pantries so we can see what we’ve got (and thus, waste less.)
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1st Dibs Vintage Furniture
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Our Marketplace Editor scored her dining room table on 1stDibs, an online marketplace selling antique and modern furniture, jewelry, fashion, and art. The incredible solid cherry table can seat anywhere from six to 22 guests, and cost only $1,620.
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Shop now or read our review.
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OXO Housewares
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Simply not knowing what’s in your own home can be a huge source of food waste, so organizing your kitchen can be a great way to make your life a little greener. We recommend OXO’s POP food storage containers for the pantry and the glass Smart Seal Containers for the fridge.
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Shop now or read our review.
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AJ Madison Appliances
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At Bluedot, we almost always recommend repairing appliances over buying new. But, if you do need a replacement, we suggest looking for the blue and white Energy Star label. AJ Madison stocks many induction stoves and around a thousand Energy Star products.
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Shop now or read our review.
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The Social Hour
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Exciting EV news for 2024! Detroit has the first charging road for electric vehicles in the US. Tesla partners with Uber to offer discounts to drivers on select models. A couple drives a record breaking 17,000 miles from North Pole to South Pole in an electric vehicle.
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FOLLOW US
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The Keep-This-Handbook
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It’s almost the twelfth day of Christmas (or the Epiphany, or whatever your holiday bookend is), and many of us are putting away our festive stuff. But what about all those greeting cards? Jamie’s mother used to cut off the signed page, and turn the front page into a holiday postcard to be used again. These days, you can send used or new cards to St. Jude’s Ranch for Children, where the kids will perform the happy chore Fran Kageleiry once did (and even attach new backs to them). For more ways to avoid waste, check out Bluedot’s “How to Get Rid of (Almost) Anything” Guide.
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The Story Behind Bluedot
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“There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world,” astronomer Carl Sagan wrote in 1994’s Pale Blue Dot. “To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.” Sagan’s humbling words inspire us to deliver stories to you that reflect his and so many others’ work to cherish this blue dot. Please consider forwarding this newsletter to your friends and family to share and inspire real-world eco-actions we can take at home and in our communities.
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This photo is of us (Leslie in the bright green jacket, Jamie in the white hat) in Yellowstone National Park 15 years ago this month, where we snowshoed in sub-zero temps and escaped a fire in a snow vehicle. More on that another time. For now, enjoy one of our most popular stories, about Yellowstone’s efforts to address climate change.
Happy New Year; we’ll see you in two weeks.
–Jamie Kageleiry and Leslie Garrett
Editors
Write us at editor@bluedotliving.com
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Jamie Kageleiry, a longtime magazine and newspaper editor from Martha's Vineyard, says her favorite spot on earth is out on a kayak there, looking at birds.
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Leslie Garrett has been covering climate stories for close to two decades. She divides her time between London, Ontario, and Massachusetts. She’s still figuring out her favorite spot but it’s definitely near the
water.
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SIMPLE / SMART / SUSTAINABLE / STORIES
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SIMPLE / SMART / SUSTAINABLE / STORIES
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Read past issues of The Hub here.
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Bluedot Living® magazine and bluedotliving.com are published by Bluedot, Inc.
Find more simple, smart, sustainable stories at bluedotliving.com, our Martha's Vineyard
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