STUFF, The Secret Lives of Everyday Things

STUFF, The Secret Lives of Everyday Things by John C Ryan and Alan Thein Durning

This book is small, (80 or so page,) easy to read, and is basically an over-sized pamphlet  that is geared towards environmentalism.  It is published by the Northwest Environment Watch.The point of the book is to get people to consider the impact that their personal consumerism has on the planet.

Now, I am no environmentalist...I mean, I believe in being responsible a steward... thinking and acting in such a way as to make good use of things and not be wasteful with water, electricity, ect. I put litter in it's place,I turn off the water between the moments of brushing my teeth and rinsing my brush, but I am not religious about it to the point that I worship earth, know what I mean? I did however enjoy learning more about where stuff comes from and what goes into it's production.

Coffee, newspaper, t-shirt, shoes, Bike and shoes, computers, hamburgers, fries and coke a cola... didn't you always want to know how consumption of these products affects the environment?  Didn't you want to know how many beans you used in the morning for your coffee?  These guys go through a typical day and address some of the products that might touch your or my life and examine where the come from, and what kinds of things need to happen for the millions of people who use such things  to go about an "ordinary day."  The point is that consuming too much stuff can be bad for us.

For example, did you know that (this book was published in 1997) Americans drink more soda than water?  This book says that the world drinks 70 million gallons of soda everyday.  They point out that it takes a factory to carbonate the water....and then of course the main ingredient is usually high fructose corn syrup.. the second largest use for corn, after feeding cattle.  They say the caffiene in the drink is a by-product of extracting the caffeine from coffee. (YUK)

Then there's the can.. which has to be mined...processed with all kind of chemicals, some very caustic and dangerous...smelted and all the electricity that Bonniville power had to use to run the smelting plant.  It is made in to an ingot, more power is used to process the ingot and turn it into a high tech can and then once the drink is consumed the can may or may not get recycled... 40 billion are thrown into landfills and 60% are recycled.

In addition to recycling you cans, they recommend that people use refillable bottles instead of the aluminum can, citing that recycling uses only five percent of the energy it takes to mine new materials for a can.  More importantly, they recommend drinking water instead of sugar laden soda.  Good advice if you think about it, and this book will make you think about it everything from what you wear to what you buy and eat, even what you drive.

They even say, "friends don't let friends drive sport utility vehicles."

Really?  

There is a lot of politics going on within the pages of this book, but I still thought it was interesting to delve into the details of how we get what we get and what goes into it' production.  No doubt things could be written in another light besides help save the world... just the same, I wonder what the world would be like if more people drank water instead of soda.

I am into recycling, so if you want to read this book, I can pass it on to you... just let me know before it goes of to the resale shop.  If you are just slightly interested, you can read an excerpt on the internet at their web page.  I thought it was interesting.