Changing habits to meet changing society

My dd1 buys virtually everything 2nd had - her own clothes, furniture, etc. Charity shops, Gumtree, FreeCycle, etc. She finds some fantastic bargains - really good quality stuff.

Virtually all her children’s clothes are hand me downs from friends, and she passes theirs on likewise. Recently passed on a lot of Gds’s clothes and toys, inc. a bike, to a little Ukrainian boy who’s moved in down the road.

Having said that, she did get a bit annoyed with me recently, when I wanted to buy a specific new item for a Gdd’s birthday - one she’d specifically asked for.
Sorry, dd, but for a birthday, 2nd hand just isn’t quite the same as a brand new one in a box with all the bits.

Miss Adventure - great post you made me cry with laughter!!! A cheerful start to the day.

Galaxy

I think the thought of people not travelling to other countries quite frightening to be honest. I think there would be some interesting unintended consequences to that.

Yes, I'm inclined to agree. Gaining no firsthand knowledge of other cultures leads to people like my brother who has never been abroad and still thinks pasta (for example) is "foreign muck". Talk about narrow-minded and thoroughly bigoted. And yes, of course he voted for Brexit - his actual words were, "They need us more than we need them." I didn't know where to start with that one!

MissA, in good ol Sarf London we often have people on the buses who smell of - how can I put this- ‘different’ smoke - I sometimes consider livening things up by sitting next to them to see if I can get a second hand high!?

MissAdventure ??

Personal change helps but it's the big changes that governments could enforce that would make the real difference and I'm not convinced our politicians with their short focus on getting re-elected will ever do much.

Hetty58

I'd already made drastic changes, many years ago. The difference I've noticed is that my friends and family no longer laugh and joke about my frugal, planet friendly - and miserly habits!

merlotgran, only the rich and reckless have their heating on.

Not totally true about only the rich and reckless have the heating on. I have very bad arthritis in my hands feet and knees and if I get cold, I can barely move. Sitting with a blanket around me is not enough so my heating it set at a minimum of 18 degrees and if it dips below that it comes on. Once I have put on an extra layer, if I still feel cold and my arthritis is hurting, then I turn the heating on as other wise I would be unable to sleep because of the pain.

I will have to try to find other ways of economising once my fixed term energy package ends, probably by reducing my food and petrol bills.

There are lots of people like me who need to have the heating on based on the weather rather than the time of year - especially those of us living in more northern areas.

Well, they'd probably got all smelly and excited about the match.

Really? It’s worse on the late afternoon buses when people are coming home from work, but I often smell BO on passengers.

I caught a bus a couple of weeks ago that was full of football fans - about 80% of the passengers - and it was beyond whiffy. I was pleased to get off.

I've never smelled anything other than cigarettes in others, and I've used buses for the whole of my life.

As a public transport user, I really wish that more people would take a daily bath or shower?

I would struggle without my tumble dryer. I live in a dip and my washing rarely dries on the line

I think it's bordering on obsessive when people are so concerned about others bathing habits.

Bathing/showering. This has become an obsession in the modern world. 50+ years ago, showers in homes were not that common and people bathed less frequently.

I really don't think stepping into the shower once a day which is I think what most people - or many - do, can really be called an "obsession".

Of course people bathed less often, they didn't have the resources to do anything else. And they quite often stank too because of it.

My grandmother had no running water and drew it from the communal pump in a galvanized bucket. I carried her walking stick - which she used as a weapon to whack the rats that congregated and scurried around the slimy pool of mud, grass and water at the base.

Now we have efficient systems delivering water into our houses and the ability to have a shower in about 4/5 minutes. So to equate using this facility with an obsession just boggles my mind.

If you feel clean and fresh enough then don't shower. But those with differing needs and lifestyles will continue to do it and not feel that they are indulging a fetish.

People didn't wash often in the past because they simply couldn't. There was no virtue in the necessity.

I’ve just spent a few minutes tearing up an old flannelette sheet into squares for cleaning cloths. It was bought originally for my niece’s cot. She is now 51yo. It’s been on the cots of my own four babies and some of the GC, been used as an under sheet on beds and as a dust sheet but now it’s almost of pension age, it’s being repurposed yet again.

There is a balance to be aimed for. Fewer holidays, fewer disposable items, but as JEccles says we should be able to enjoy our last years.
It's easy for me to give up cruises. Never been on one. Easy to give up meat- not eaten it for 30 years but I love to soak in a hot bath, and so on.

Reusable shopping bags
Vegetarian diet and no cows milk
Unplug everything i can
Very rarely buy new clothes
Recycle
Cut down on heating
Most of my furniture is vintage mid century 2nd hand

Use tumble all thru winter ( hate wet washing round house)
Love to holiday abroad so won't be cutting down on flights
Shower every day..sometimes twice

MissAdventure

I boil myself in a bucket with some pieces of old cloth, then throw in some lentils to turn it into a nutritious soup when I've finished.

????

I completely agree with you Jennifer Eccles. Some of us have struggled in the past with stressful jobs and demanding family lives. Now we’re older and have more leisure time ( if we’re retired) we should be able to take holidays and go on trips if health and finances permit. Otherwise we’ll be living in a different type of lockdown go what remains of our lives.

Really though, is it right that people should be made to feel guilty if they have foreign holidays, breaks in this country or enjoy a run down to the coast for the day?
I think not, but judging from some comments on here, even something as basic as a daily shower is in danger of being frowned upon.
Like I said earlier, we all want to do our bit, but at our stage of life we should feel free to enjoy the time we have left by doing things which make us happy, even if that does include, horror of horrors, flying or going on cruises.

Miss A ? ?.

I’ve been doing most of what had been mentioned for a long time. We recycle as much as possible and are economical in our use of appliances. It’s difficult to completely avoid food waste as we lead quite an unpredictable life and would never stay at home so we can use up something that isn’t going to last much longer. We’re sticking to daily baths and showers and are still watering the garden. No point in having a nice garden if you can’t keep it looking good!

I heard a radio programme recently that said the figures banded about for electricity consumption if devices are left on standby are all grossly over estimated and the actual cost is much lower than those generally used.

I have tried to locate the programme, but cannot, but this link has some intersting figures that perhaps justify my query about the cost of stand by www.daftlogic.com/information-appliance-power-consumption.htm

ok, hard hat on ! as MNers would say.
i don't consider any of this.
i try to survive with spending as little as possible, esp as my income has dropped to less than £50 a week since being sanctioned for not reporting something soon enough 3 years ago.
i do drive but only every 15-18 days, 7 miles there and back to get to Lidl. apart from the petrol, if i went every week, i would spend more. don't have a freezer, so am limited in what i can buy.
but i consider myself fortunate; i am not hungry through lack of food, only incompetence in organising sometimes. i have just heard a working man crying on the radio, he is literally hungry often, goes 48 hours with nothing to eat. followed by a cabin crew woman, widowed, who steals food from the aircraft which is going to be thrown away.
if she is discovered not only will she be sacked but they insist on prosecution and urge imprisonment, as being a breach of trust in a safety critical role.
she has £2 a day to feed herself after paying bills.

MerylStreep we haven’t lived off grid but we have lived in developing world countries and that certainly makes you look twice at what you consume. We often didn’t have power or water - it’s amazing what can be done with just a bucket of water and how you can mitigate periods of no electricity.

You learn how to produce decent meals with limited, locally produced, ingredients. Imported foods were available but no way was I going to pay the equivalent of £20 for an iceberg lettuce or a punnet of strawberries. Local salad leaves were fine and no one is going to die if you don’t have strawberries.

I also learnt from local people how it is perfectly possible to keep good standards of hygiene with just one cleaning product. A bar of old-fashioned green or pink soap can be used as soap for washing oneself and as shampoo, grated to make laundry flakes and dissolved to make a liquid for washing up.