Lemming Tracks: STOP THE WASTE!!! RECYCLE EARTH'S PRECIOUS LINT!!!!

HOW ABOUT THAT ALL-CAP TITLE?!!! AND THE EXCLAMATION MARKS!!!!!

Doesn't that make this post look, like, you know: relevant?

Oh, and, uh, real sincere?

Let's face it: a few folks are a tad intense about Saving the Gay and Lesbian Codependent Whales, or whatever the crise de la journée is.

Earth Day #40

I live on Earth, and have a personal stake in the planet's management. But I've learned a few things since 1970. Including how to take a deep breath and give assertions a second look.

Which is why I'm celebrating Earth Day 2010 by discussing lint. Is the Lemming making fun of Earth Day, or waging a one-critter campaign to awaken America to the value of lint? That's something even I'm not sure about.

Posts about Earth Day, people, and lint:

• "Earth Day, 2010 - or - We Won: Deal With It"
  (April 22, 2010)
• "Auburn, New York; Eminent Domain; Earth Day - and Lint"
  (April 21, 2010)
• "Lemming Tracks: Ah, For the Solar-Powered Days of Yesteryear"
  (April 20, 2010)
  • My one lint-free Earth Day #40 post
• "Lemming Tracks: Observations by an Opportunistic Omnivore"
  (April 20, 2010)
• "Save Earth! Recycle Lint!"
  (April 20, 2010)
• "Need Something to Worry About? How About Lint Fires?"
  (April 19, 2010)
• "Recycle Lint and Save Earth!"
  (April 17, 2010)
• "Why is Everybody Down on Lint?"
  (April 14, 2010)

Lint: The Undervalued, Misunderstood Sustainable Resource

Come, gather round, and let us meditate upon lint.

No, really.

The stuff that builds up in dryer filters, gathers in pockets, and occasionally catches fire: lint.

(I know: Everybody doesn't use clothes dryers. The family I grew up in didn't. Times change.)

Technology's Stepchild: Lint

Although Americans don't have to wash organic fertilizer off their clean, dry clothes very often these days, we do deal with a lot more lint than our ancestors did.

If we're smart, we clean the dryer's lint filters and exhaust vents regularly. If we're not, sometimes we experience the excitement of trying to evacuate a building that's on fire.

Odds are pretty good that you've tossed dryer lint in the trash.

What waste! Oh, the agony!

But wait! All hope is not lost! Yes! You can recycle lint!

Which is why I've been celebrating this year's Earth Day by discussing lint. Mostly, how it can be recycled, instead of thrown away.

Even better, it's sustainable!

Other related posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: Whales, Business, and Hating Japan"
  (April 19, 2010)
• "Food, Agriculture, Technology, and City Folks"
  Drifting at the Edge of Time and Space (October 2, 2009)
• "Emotions, the Frontal Cortex, The War on Terror, Anarchists, and the Illuminati"
  Another War-on-Terror Blog (December 23, 2008)
  Particularly
  • Emotion Trumping Reason: Not Limited to the War on Terror
• "Doomsday Seed Vault in Svalbard, or Don't Worry: There's Always Something to Worry About"
  (June 5, 2008)
• "Starvation, Poverty, and Perceptions"
  Another War-on-Terror Blog (July 18, 2007)
  • Norman Borlaug and the green revolution

More:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture "

Recycle Lint and Save Earth!

A few days ago, I admitted that I hadn't found much on the subject of what you can do with lint. Today, that changed:

"Ten uses for dryer lint
essortment (2002)

"Dryer lint is one of those things that we all have but none of us knows what to do with. It seems a shame to throw away those perfectly clean bits of fiber. Believe it or not there are actually many things you can do with dryer lint besides tossing it into the garbage can. When saving dryer lint it is best to keep it in a fireproof container such as glass or metal because dryer lint is very flammable...."

What follows is a short discussion of 10 uses for dryer lint:

1. Packing material
2. Making cloth
3. Nesting material for birds
4. Modeling clay substitute
5. Kindling
6. Compost
7. Craft projects
8. Mulch
   • Insulation for plants
9. Draft stopper
10. Making paper

There's a sentence or two about each use of lint, telling how to use the dryer lint: including a recipe for lint/flour/water 'modeling clay.' How well, or even whether, it would work is more than I know.

Still, looks like a pretty good article on making use of lint.

Or, if you're worked up about Earth Day (April 22, 2010: 40th anniversary), try this slogan on for size: Save Earth One Handful of Lint at a Time!

Vaguely-related posts:

• "Under-Appreciated Lint"
  Loonfoot Falls Chronicle-Gazette (April 16, 2010)
• "Why is Everybody Down on Lint?"
  (April 14, 2010)
• "Frail, Delicate Little Mother Nature?!"
  (December 20, 2009)

More:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

Why is Everybody Down on Lint?

"Lint Shavers and Brushes from SewTrue.com"
From D-Fuzz-It to Suede Brush.

I tried, in vain, to find a history of lint and its uses. That assemblage of lint removal devices and related products is fairly representative of what kept turning up in my research.

I understand why people don't always like to find lint where it accumulates: on your clothing, or in your navel. But why this obsession with removing lint?

This substance is everywhere. It pervades our society, rests in our pockets and gets caught in our clothes dryers.

Why, in this age of green practically-everything-else, has no one found a practical use for lint?

In an effort to open America's eyes to the vitality of lint, I suggest these practical ways of recycling this resource which so often is wasted - wasted, I tell you - and thrown out with the trash.

Before it's too late, start using recyclable, renewal, sustainable lint as a green substitute for:

• Paper towels
• Drink coasters
• Papier-mâché

And then there are down feathers: millions shed by careless, polluting ducks!

Oh, dear. The Lemming needs to take a break.

The Sentient Cities are Coming: But First, Park Benches With Attitude

"Sentient cities may answer back"
BBC (October 16, 2009)

"It may look like an ordinary rubbish bin, but don't let that fool you. Throw an aluminium can in here and you'd be none the wiser, but try chucking a plastic bottle away, and with an angry buzz it will throw it back out at you, fans whirring to rid itself of the wrong kind of rubbish.

"This is the 'smart trash can', part of the 'Toward the Sentient City' exhibition in New York, which explores how our lives might change when we can embed computers in anything and everything. ..."

Then there's the bench, that lets people know if they've sat on it too long. (I'm not making this up.)


(from BBC, used w/o permission)
"Among 'smart' technologies on show at the Sentient Cities exhibition was a bench that tips people off if they sit too long"

The BBC article's about "five projects commissioned for the exhibition by the Architectural League of New York." The others include Trash Track (MIT), Amphibious Architecture (New York and Columbia universities) and Natural Fuse (Usman Haque).

Judging from previous predictions of "The Future," I'd be moderately surprised if any of these projects foreshadowed exactly what cities will be like fifty to a hundred years from now.

The idea of trash cans that can tell who's trashing recyclables, and park benches with attitude, though, seem to be part of a trend that's driving 'privacy' advocates bonkers.

I live in a small town, and have lived in both rural and metropolitan areas. There's something to the joke about small towns: 'If you've forgotten what you've done today, ask someone: they'll know.'

It's not so much that small towns lack privacy - we've got lots of that. It's why we have shades on our windows. (But they've got to be down: FOXNews October 22, 2009.)

What smart trash cans and benches may do is remove another layer of the anonymity city folks have enjoyed for so long. Security cameras made it possible to tell who took extra newspapers from the vending machine, blew through the toll booth, or couldn't be bothered with a stop light.

Such oppression!

And now, They are likely to be watching to see who recycles and who doesn't.

Me? I'm hopelessly stodgy: so I'm not quite so worried about these new threats to 'privacy.'

And, I think the technology's pretty cool.

Save the Planet: Make Milk Jugs Into Lamps

"Milkit With DIY Milk Carton Lamps"
greenUPGRADER (August 18, 2008)

"Milkit is a creative way to turn milk bottles into kickin’ table lamps. The kit is sold by Play Design and was developed by Alexandru Adam and Steven Koch. The nature inspired graphics come with the kit along with the hardware (cords, sockets, fittings, etc). It’s up to you to provide the milk bottles, of most any size, and the elbow grease to stylize the light fixtures...."

The idea isn't as crazy as it sounds, and the lamps look pretty good.

This may not save the planet, but it'll give some people lighting fixtures that are off the 50th percentile.

Recycled Recycled Tealight Tree

"Recycled Metal Tree of Tealights"

Three photos. I don't think the sculptor used tin cans for the candle holders.

It's an attractive piece of art.

Just a Little Cabin in the Woods With a Fireplace, and a Swimming Pool, and a ...

"Olle Lundberg's Cabin" is a simple little affair, with at least two floors, a deck, a swimming pool, (I think I saw a hot tub, too), and a great view.

The photos are mostly of the cabin, but there are two of Olle's little boat on the bay, too.

Olle Lundberg is an architect, salvage junkie and Ikea designer.

Think Recycling is New? Think Again

Read "5 Kinds of Creative Recycled Architecture: Bottles, Cans and Other Unusual Building Materials" - and look at the date on one of the photos.