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Monday, May 14, 2012

IF IT LOOKS LIKE GARBAGE, SMELLS LIKE GARBAGE .....

IF IT LOOKS LIKE GARBAGE,
SMELLS LIKE GARBAGE,
AND TASTES LIKE .....
garbage  ....... it must be garbage!
What is one person's  garbage,
is another person's
Black Gold!
HUH?  you might ask.
Let me explain for Facebook Friends who never saw my blog............October 29, 2013

I love bananas!

Uh oh!
When my banana holder is empty
it's worse than being out of
milk, or bread, or eggs, or coffee or red onions, or t.p. ..... well,
maybe not t.p..
I have a banana every morning even before coffee
or washing my face
or putting on lipstick. (family joke about me and lipstick)
Those banana peels add up.
I consume anywhere from 300 to 350 bananas a year.
Banana peels are like leather. It takes more pressure to
cut up a banana peel than a similar small piece of cardboard.
But then.... my knives are pretty dull.

Banana peels have to be disposed of.
Where my daughter Jill lives they have recycling bins
under the cabinets in the kitchen.
#1 bin - plastic only
#2 bin - cans, tin, metal
#3 bin - hmmmm, I can't remember what's in bin #3.
And then there's paper products and
garbage: banana peels, etc. and etc.
to be disposed of.
Garbage service takes care of that system amazingly well.
However,
when one doesn't have garbage service
except for a
Suburu Forrester that makes a trip to the dumps
every couple of months,
 sorting, storage,  and disposal of food waste is of the utmost consideration.

So I devised a useful and easy system for me to take care of.
Burn only paper (allowed in the county during certain months) or bring to refuse center along with cardboard, batteries, appliances, etc.,
a garbage can ..... BIG garbage can for non-burnable, such as
plastic, cans, aluminum, non-recyclable bottles, glass,
and
a large plastic bin for food scraps, (except meat waste)
lawn clippings, garden debris, leaves and
BANANA PEELS! This bin held all my "green" waste since last fall.
I began my compost bin at the end of last summer
and had my sons, Dean and Neal, locate it in my carport.
Within one week I can fill a large Tupperware container that is located in one side of the double sink in the kitchen, and its full of
garbage ... smelly, slimy, yucky
garbage.  (Sorry Mr. Tupperware!)
Yeppy, that's garbage.

In the picture it looks like some kind of exotic flower arrangement.
But upon closer scrutiny ...... the nose knows!


You can recognize the coffee grounds, red onion skins, banana peels, apple cores, geranium leaves, and that gob of orange stuff just a bit off center in the picture ... anybody's guess. (it was in the frig and
a whole new civilization was developing within the glass jar).
My daughter has a sign on her frig.:
If it can get out of the frig on it's own ...
let it go!      (or something like that)

The container for my kitchen scraps is a large, rectangle
Tupperware container with a tight fitting lid. 
It takes almost a week to fill it up.
Then out goes the contents into the compost bin.
REMEMBER THIS PICTURE!
 Oh yeah .... and egg shells, and kale stalks and salad dregs,
and other unrecognizable food debris.

Last winter was not very severe ....
not much snow build-up.
But temperatures were low enough
to freeze the contents of the compost bin.
The bin contained layers of products that
break down over time: food waste, house plant's dead leaves, lawn debris,
some horse manure my neighbor's horses kindly
leave scattered about. Usually I could get a pitch fork
and stir/rotate the "cooking" compost. But not when it had turned into a giant garbage-cicle.

Winter 2011-2012

Today, May 14, 2012 is the day!
The day I take the next step in composting because my
compost bin is nearly full to the top!
Does it smell, people ask.
Nope, only when it's in the Tupperware container in the sink. Once it gets stirred into the compost there's no smell.

Necessary tools in this next stage:
shovel

2 wheelbarrels and sifting screen
see the fine dirt in the lower wheelbarrel,
clumpy in the top one .....
and heavy duty rubber gloves.



One big shovel full of compost,
scattered onto the screen on the large wheelbarrel,
sifted and forced through the screen wearing rubber gloves
 and carefully watching for
little pink wiggly worms .....

I found 10 of the little
fellas that had hitchhiked into the compost bin
from the manure or dirt I'd added over the winter.

I left a layer of the "dirt" about 5 inches deep in the compost bin to facilitate the "cooking process" for my next bin of "Black Gold."
And here it is! Dirt! I thought only God could make dirt!
It smells like it was just turned over in your garden ... the soft, sweet smell of garden dirt...made out of banana peels, red onions, veggie waste, a little manure and
worms eating their way through the waste.

It all turned into DIRT!!!!
I dumped everything that didn't go through the screen into the smaller wheelbarrel -
rocks, a few recognizable egg shells and top ends of banana peels, lots of wood chips from the garden where I scooped up the horses "offerings", and the waste I'd added within the past couple of weeks.
Everything else turned into
dirt!

From this garbage ......

TO DIRT!

Amazing! Not that it's never been done before ...
gardeners have tapped into this "dirty" little secret for years.
But I DID IT!
I facilitated the metamorphis of my banana peels
into
dirt!.
Well, what do you know about that!
And believe me,
if the Little Old Widder Woman can do it
so can you.




















ONE HAND CLAPPING

ONE HAND CLAPPING
That's silly!
How can one hand clap?
Or without two hands on a clock,
how could you tell time
or catch a fish .....
   or safely steer a "baby motorcycle"  ....

or carry bunches of  logs to stoke up a wood stove ?
 

You could pet a dog with only one hand ....... but they prefer two
One hand folded over someone else's is warm and comforting



But God gave each of us two hands.
Two is a good number for hands, and eyes, and ears and feet.
Because if you lose one hand,
or eye,
or ear or foot -
which can tragically happen -
there's always a spare.

You can give a high five with only one hand,
 pinch a cheek,
or salute a soldier of higher rank.

But to raise a flag in times of war,

 or build a memorial bench and plaque for a loved one lost,


or light a small flame to keep memories alive,

it takes two brothers


four .......

and sisters more

to keep our families
strong.

Have a peaceful, safe Memorial Day
and hug your spouses and children,
grandchildren, friends and parents
and keep the memories alive of those we've lost.