barefoot earlier

"I'm not kissing your nose: I might get horrid flakey bits in my mouth."

A gets stressed in the supermarket when I make decisions based on packaging. I often do:

• shiny-paper wrapped butter not marge in a plastic tub
• single fruit and veg with no plastic trays
• matches not lighters
• Washing powder in cardboard not liquid in plastic bottles
• Posh squash in glass

But now I've set the one bag challenge I will be unbearable. I think it's absurd that a 3 person household puts out 2 bin bags a week despite composting veg waste and recycling cans, glass and paper so I'm on a mission to cut it to 1 bag a week. Possible? We'll see.

I hate unnecessary plastic waste. All time get-me-to-screaming-point hates:

• Pump action toothpaste tubes. How difficult is squeezing!?
• The demise of washing liquid refills even from 'green' companies like Ecover
• Individually cellophane wrapped fruit portions for packed lunches
• Disposable loo brushes
  

Top of the list: milk in plastic bottles. Before I cared about food being organic, I bought expensive organic milk just because it came in cartons. Then manufacturors decided that we are incapable of opening cardboard cartons and organic milk started to come in cartons with plastic tops and bottoms and/or plastic opening devices.

Why?!

The particular brand I'm thinking of open at the top. They have a small loop of plastic you pull to do this. The small loop of plastic is fractionally too small for your finger to easily fit and then frequently snaps, leaving you to have to cut the flap out with a knife. This is not easier!!

And then, before this becomes a rant about carton opening, I'll stop. Though this was a sobering realisation. People are employed specifically to design these things.

Resolution for June: organise milk delivery in glass.

Or not.

In fact, I'm unclear now about whether 'hawking' is the right word at all (Americans say 'hocking')... but I should go back to the beginning of the story.

Two weeks ago, after getting off a flight I developed a strange headache behind my eyes. It wasn't a migraine: I was acquainted with that nauseating, one-sided horror as a teenager. It felt more like cold water had gone up my nose and was moving around, under pressure.

4 days, much sleep, a missed work day, many useless Ibuprofen caplets and some degree of despair later, the headache started to clear.

Then worse. The mucus. I can see the point of this normally; it sweeps away all nasties down the nose and leaves them in tissues. BUT instead, it just dripped down my throat and nothing would reroute it.

That's where we get back to greenies. Nothing disgusts me as much as that 'hccchhhhrrrhhhcccrr' noise that is needed to spit out throat-snot. I'm almost not joking when I say that I had a loft conversion to be out of ear shot of M's ritual morning hawk. It made my stomach turn.

I think I was traumatised as a child. The year that my 2nd year class was in the 'Scout Hut' there was a day when the boys covered the porch ceiling in greenies that dripped down for the rest of the day.

So there I was, fourth or fifth day with a throat full of mucus, when it dawned on me that I'd have to try and get it out. How!? First attempt - feel like being sick. Second attempt - am sick. Give up. I suppose it was comic, if you weren't me.

Bizarrely, I was delighted to get a huge NORMAL cold this weekend: everything started coming out through my nose again.

Was that too much information?

Strange diet, composting worms. Onions are too acidic for them but old jumpers are quite acceptable. Our new can'o'worms is a revelation. Not only do 1000+ wigglers turn scraps into compost, but it's made from recycled plastic and the only packaging it came in, a round cardboard disc, goes in the bin and gets eaten up by the inhabitants. It makes me feel truly righteous. More fun to feed than the compost bin too.

Liverpool won the cup. I never thought I'd write THAT in a blog, but it was p-r-e-t-t-y tight and the wobbly from side to side goalie did some good glovework. Didn't someone come up with some research lately that said you were more likely to win if you were in red? You have to like that song, too, You'll never walk alone. Gerry of the Pacemakers is in Ireland tonight, watching that on telly in snatched moments. Or so Radio 4 told me this morning when we were reunited.

Meanwhile, we had a fire and red wine in the garden. Nothing like popping sparks to push the day out.

Wake up. Confused. Dizzy Gillespie is on the Today programme. Must have died. Obituary's going on a bit. Ah, Andy's forgotten to tune back to Radio 4. Where is it then? Funny, the red line that shows the frequency doesn't show any more. That's annoying. That's the end of the stations and I haven't found it. It's always before you get to Radio 1. Must have missed it. No, I'm back at the other end now. Still Dizzy Gillespie. This is never an obituary... Is it the weekend!? No. Better check with another radio. I'll make tea in the kitchen and check. Dizzy even when I can see the frequency is correct. Something's happening. Wonder what.

As you can see, this was not a high quality waking up experience. More elongated but equally disorienting as waking up after a quick, deep nap the other evening thinking it was the morning (being clothed was confusing).

A rather enjoyed the BBC strike but I had a private little snipe at them.

Then learned about the building of Terminal 5 at Heathrow airport. Fascinating, acually and far less need to shout than while listening to pedant Humphreys. I also learned that Dizzy Gillespie has been dead for some time.