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| Sean McCabe |
My biggest problem in the whole world right now is the county (and soon-to-be state) -wide ban on “single use” bags in stores.
Which maybe says more about how soft my life is than about how terrible it is to have to remember to bring my own bags every time I go shopping.
As I sit here trying to type this up, I realize that it’s completely counter to how I usually roll for this to be so disruptive for me. I’m all about reusing things and minimizing waste. But don’t they have anything better to do and this is totally driving me nuts.
I do the majority of my grocery shopping at Costco and Trader Joe’s, and neither of those stores offer plastic bags anyway. But I also shop at Target and Party City and shoe stores and whatnot and it didn’t used to be AGAINST THE LAW for them to give me a bag.
It makes me want to do all my shopping on Amazon just to avoid the hassle. The problem there is that the milk on Amazon is a little to fancy for my taste.
The reviewers seem to like it though. We should probably just get a cow.
are being shipped, which is great. BUT *I* haven’t seen it yet. My publisher assures me that they plan to send me some copies just as soon as they possibly get around to it. :o|Vendor Problems
and I will have a table. I’m not all that familiar with conventions (or vending), but in my mind vendor tables look like this:
We are a devoted Lego family. But I have a HUGE problem with the Lego Friends “girl Lego” sets.
The Lego Friends figures are basically just tiny Bratz dolls, totally lame in comparison with the iconic Lego Minifigures.
I remember when girls could play with all the Legos, not just the pink ones.
The little girl from this 1981 Lego ad is now a doctor, practicing medicine in Seattle.
You can read more here:
The Little Girl from the 1981 LEGO Ad is All Grown Up, and She’s Got Something to Say
But we ALL loved the Ladies Skeleton.
I was so excited to follow Noelle Pikus Pace’s Olympic story, and see the way she balances her family life with her personal goals.
Her races were one of the highlights of our family Olympics-watching so far.
- It’s my favorite thing in here.
- Wow, I really have a lot of these.
- I’ve been looking for those.
- Huh. THAT shouldn’t be in there.
The fine print (which I’m keeping big so you can read it): NO CHEATING. No early tidying. No funny planted stuff. God is watching you.
Hope to see you there. happy weekend everyone!
#1–Multnomah County in Oregon (AKA home of Portlandia) is the same way with plastic bags. Joke's on them, though, because I live in Clackamas County, where we tastefully festoon our huge gas-guzzling trucks in plastic bags just to make the people in Multnomah County indignant.
#2– 🙂
#4–I can't even imagine a page view number that big in relation to anything I write. My computer might short circuit. Way to go!
#7–Is it a problem that I don't even have a purse? I have a backpack which masquerades as a diaper bag which masquerades as a purse. I will still clean it out though.
That is not a problem!
ooh – love the purse idea! It's kind of like when you play that game at bridal showers where you get more points for having weird or uncommon things in there…like a rock (which, actually, I may well have in my purse right now, since my son is always asking me to hold onto them for him…)
I can't imagine not being given bags at stores anymore! We primarily do our grocery shopping at Aldi, so I'm used to bringing re-useable bags for that. But we rely on the free plastic ones from stores as bathroom trash liners, dirty diaper holders, and – most importantly – scooping the cat litter!
Oh yeah. Somehow I left that out. They are not single use for us! We reuse every one.
Dang it, dang it, dang it! I just emptied out my purse tonight! Why oh why am I not good at telling the future?!
I just got your book today! Will Amazon review it this weekend and blog review it next week. 🙂
#1
How do people pick up their dog's poop when they go for a walk, if they don't have an ample supply of left over plastic bags?
Serious question.
Yeah…I want to know that too. PLEASE tell me that the state of California is not insisting on re-usable pooper scooper bags.
And what about stinky diapers?
Very few "remade" toys are as good as the original. Why, oh why did Lego have to go down that trail?
I'm so glad I live in the midwest, where bringing your own bags is encouraged, but it's understand that sometimes, you just need a plastic bag.
I enjoy the idea of slopestyle, but when I watched it all I could do is yell at the screen for the guys to get some clothes that fit! They might perform better if their pants weren't falling down around their knees.
Congrats on achieving your blog goals.
Have fun at the conference!
The lego thing – I totally agree. If any future daughter wants to play with dinosaurs or trains she'll play with regular old dinosaurs and trains, not special "girl" dinosaurs and trains (just like I did). Same goes for legos.
Thinking about the contents of my purse, Tuesday might read a little like a confession of a boarder!
*hoarder
No 3 – I keep checking back at Amazon to see if they'll put up an "inside preview" of your book. Do you think they will?? My oldest is making his first penance month so we've been on the hunt for good resources!
No. 5 – Don't even get me started… it drives me nuts how many toys have "pink" alternatives. Since when were girls unable to enjoy red, blue, and yellow toys???? It's a shameless money-making ploy. "It's not enough to have ONE set of Legos (or whatever). Now you need to have TWO (one in PINK) so that your daughter has her own. We may even put princesses and ponies on it to make it MORE *gag* appealing!" (This also ensures that if you buy the pink one first and THEN have a boy, you'll be uncomfortable enough letting him use it that you'll actually go out to buy the ORIGINAL version…) Ok, I'll stop now.
No. 7 – My mom used to call her mom purse a "duffle purse" due to the size and variety of contents therein. In my purse I'd be more likely to find a half-eaten crayon and a lollipop that I would eat on the spot 🙂
I'm not sure, I'll ask. I also wish they'd put in in some categories so I wasn't #18,000 on the best selling list of "all the books on Amazon"
I think I'll have my 2014 blogging goal be to have Kendra link to me. 😉
I have been thinking a lot about #5. As an engineering professor and a mother of two daughters, I care about encouraging creative building-type play in young girls. Over the last few years I have been noticing two things.
One, my younger daughter really, really likes pink, and she prefers dolls that seem like girls to ones that don't. But she also takes taking things apart, seeing how they work, building things, etc. So from that standpoint, I'm perfectly happy to have the pink and girly legos for her because they really fit her interests. I don't love the vapid quality of the Lego Friends line, but at the same time I doubt my daughter would be interested in the video-game or comic based Lego kits for older kids (boys?) either. So just the bricks are fine, and it's great that you can get a whole set in her favorite colors and with characters that she thinks are cute and fun.
The second thing is that I have noticed that the girls in my freshman engineering class who are most likely to leave engineering before I see them again as juniors/seniors are the ones who are the girliest. The ones with adorable faces who like to socialize with their friends, who care about their hair, who giggle, etc. The literature suggests that a major factor in the so-called "leaky pipeline" of women in engineering is "culture" – women not feeling like they fit in with the vibe (or sometimes that the vibe is openly hostile to them, although I think and hope the latter is becoming less frequent). So now I can see the possible long-term benefit of having science and engineering type toys that are not EXCLUSIVELY gender neutral. Because, it's okay to be in engineering and be really girly. Like: Do you like pink stuff, and shopping, and clothes? You can still be an engineer.
These are good points. And really, the friends line IS more interesting to my daughter than regular Legos. But I just hate that the girl version just seems dumbed down. But you're right, we do want women to be able to be feminine AND still be able to pursue traditionally male careers. As a pilot I definitely felt pressure from other female pilots to be more masculine.
I agree. My 5 year old daughter loves the Friends line. She plays with other Lego sets, but when she made out her Christmas list, it only included the Friends sets. And I know that many of the sets do seemed "dumbed down" but I LOVE Olivia's laboratory (http://shop.lego.com/en-US/Olivia-s-Invention-Workshop-3933)! Sooooo cool!
Wow, I wouldn't even know what to do with myself if THAT many people read a post of mine. Did you have a party??? I love the purse idea, and I'm in if I can remember 🙂
Those sound like some great life goal problems to have!! 🙂
I'm scared…but looking forward to linking up for the purse dump. We also loved Women's skeleton and loved following Pikus-Pace's story. Love her! And way to go on hitting those blog goals–I've just recently found you and loving what I see so far!
The plastic bag thing reminds me of how when we were visiting my mom's family in Finland, we always looked like dumb foreigners because we'd go shopping without bringing our own bags (and thus face the dilemma that you describe). I prefer the way that my local Target rewards me with 5 cents off for every bag I bring!
re#1: I thought about this awhile ago, and I'm thinking about how I'd love to be obnoxious, but unfortunately, it would affect the wrong people. Basically, I'd have the cashier restock my cart, and ask for helping hands for someone to stock my car. Of course, I'd have to get it all back in to the house, and like I said, I'd only be punishing the innocent and forever become known as "that lady."
#7: awesome. I'm in!
Target was already effectively charging you by offering discounts to those who bring reusable bags. Funny how psychology works, huh? But at least you've got all those kids to help you carry stuff to the parking lot, ha!
It's true, but I prefer the carrot to the stick! I'm so conflicted on the whole thing. I am a stuff and especially packaging minimalist, but it seems somehow unAmerican to force it like this.
We went to Seattle this past fall and man was that bag thing really, really annoying. I don't know why but every time I went to the store I wanted to scream you have the dumbest laws in this state, you legalize really, really bad things for the soul but I have to pay for a grocery bag!??!?!? UGH. Sorry this is coming your way. :Rant over:
You just need to move to San Diego as we still have plastic and paper bags for free
Nanacamille
Ooh I love a good purse dump!
Congratulations on all your big blogging achievements! Looks like you've got to think of some equally great goals for every 2 months for the rest of the year 😉
In NorCal a lot of the "better" grocery stores (like Whole Foods & the local stores) sell ChicoBags. These are TOTALLY the answer to the "bring your own bag" issue, because they squnch into small rolls (maybe 1.5" x 3") and you can easily fit several into your purse. I keep 3 in my purse at all times, with some backups in the car. They're also very sturdy (made of parachute cloth or something similar) – much more so than plastic bags – so you don't need to worry about them ripping open if the contents are too heavy.
My parents live in San Jose which has a plastic bag ban. The way they deal is they keep all the reusable grocery bags in the car so they have them every time they go shopping. It drives me crazy though because I actually *use* the plastic bags for stuff!
Hi Kendra! First time comment-er here. Anyways, I found this really cool site while looking for a brainy-educational gift for my niece. It fosters girls to be engineer, constructors, and build things, etc. but I do agree with you that the original legos are better. http://www.goldieblox.com/
Yes, the plastic bag ban is annoying. Even though I have the reusable bags in my car….I STILL forget to bring them INTO the grocery store until I am paying for my groceries. By the way, looks like we are neighbors! My hubs and I live in Granada Hills. We have not attended mass at the SF mission yet but attend mass at St. John the Baptist de la Salle.
That IS cool, I'm glad to know it exists.
We are really close! If you ever come by the Old Mission for 10:30 Mass, please say hi! (except next week I'll be at Behold).
No plastic bags?? What would I use for dirty diapers?
We almost moved up our shopping day this week when we ran out of "trash bags".
I found your blog via your book, which we got last week. I have two girls preparing for first penance and fhc, we are enjoying it very much. Just on Friday, the q&a gave my daughter and I an opportunity for wonderful, fruitful conversation!
As the mother of four daughters, I will have go say we are mega fans of Lego friends. My daughters would have had zero interest in Lego without them, and interestingly, they appreciate the little animals much more than the girls. Now that we have a son, I imagine more gender neutral and boy-centric (which, let's face it, most of the sets are- we are frequent visitors to the Lego store) will show up, and they will like them equally. They play with Lego's every day because we have these sets and I LOVE that! 🙂
I think I'll join the purse dump tomorrow! Sounds fun.