Tuesday, March 11, 2008

sick of it.

being in a cast sucked. for the first little while it was nice to be able to walk again, but the charm quickly wore off. last week i said 'FUCK THIS SHIT!!!*', got out some scissors, and spent five hours removing my cast.


*it is interesting to note that the euphemistic version of 'fuck this shit' is 'have sex with this poop'.

Sunday, March 9, 2008

the quest continues

1. my clothes must be made with ethical fibres (organically grown & processed)
2. they must be sweatshop-free
3. i must be able to afford them

with rules like that it's no wonder i almost never buy new clothes. but after hours of researching i've found affordable socks, affordable bras and affordable shirts (also here). also shorts and undies, but i think i've mentioned those before. the american apparel and dharma stuff i got for a lot less by participating in co-ops, but even without the discount the prices are pretty decent.

i was researching the environmental ethics of fabric and i learned a few things:

  • it takes 1/3 of a pound of chemicals to grow enough cotton to make one t-shirt.
  • cotton uses about 2.4% of the world's arable land but 23% of the world's insecticides and more than 10% of all pesticides
  • processing raw cotton into fabric uses even more chemicals per pound than growing it.
  • most bamboo fabric is made using a process that makes cotton processing look like child's play. yes, it's very renewable and grown without pesticides and fertilizers, but turning it into fabric... educate yourself.
i could go on and on.

after doing all this research i've decided to eschew bamboo fabric until more eco-friendly processing methods are adopted (they already exist, but they're more labour intensive and so not used) so my clothing must be organic cotton, hemp, or a blend of the two. (learn about cotton here and hemp here)