28 January 2007


Taking a bit of inspiration from Ms Rustygrass' wrist cuffs, the fact that I got an interchangeable watchband watch for Christmas but with ugly leather bands, and the scrap ends of a pair of non-Carhartt work pants, we have a new watch! I'm not sure this satisfies my need for a "professional looking" watch that covers up the tattoo, but I'm fairly happy with it.

The next question is, why do I keep making things out of turquoise, green, and brown? Wierd.

25 January 2007

Oh, the conundrums...

So, here's the question of the day: the NY Times says that by wearing cotton clothes that have to be washed more often, I'm actually doing more damage to the environment than if I were to wear only synthetics but just half-assedly wash them. It turns out that the environmental impact (e.g. energy used) of repeated washings is way greater than that of producing a synthetic garment.

But here's the thing - I bike a lot and I wear Tom's Natural deodorant. The deodorant choice is mostly out of a desire to not (maybe) give myself breast cancer or Alzheimers. The biking is part health, part gasoline, part finding-parking-in-my-neighborhood-blows. Valid, no? But my selfish desires to avoid cancer (sometimes) and not troll for parking means most of my clothing needs to be washed fairly frequently. Add to that the need for field clothes, office clothes, and gym clothes, and let's just say I do a good deal of laundry. And frankly, synthetic or natural, it all gets pretty funky pretty quick. It's one thing to think you might smell a bit ripe, it's another repel the general public.

So what do I do? I'd already accepted that by biking I might actually hurt the planet, but maybe if I switch to aluminium-based antiperspirant that'll offset the biking, I can wash my clothes less, die earlier, and thus balance out? Or just wear synthetics and throw them away? Or maybe hemp? Is hemp the answer?