The Sunday Paper

I just finished separating the Sunday San Francisco Chronicle into two piles of equal height. The sections I read, and the other stuff, what I will not read. In the ‘will not read pile’ are mostly ad booklets for various advertisers. In France, the Sunday papers are a tenth of the size of their American counterparts. As far as I know, French newspapers are still making money. My question to the American newspapers is this: why do you need to use so much paper? why do you need to have so many sections? why do advertisers need to take so much space? can’t you start working with advertisers to reduce all that waste of paper? I know we live in the land of ‘bigger is better’, but in this case, bigger is clearly worse. And I am a passive accomplice, as long as I keep on subscribing to the stuff.

 

To-do-list: 1) stop subscribing to paper version of newspaper; 2) even better, start public dialog on issue, boycott.

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Junk Mail

Today, in my mailbox: 1) Cabelas Deer Hunting catalog, a remnant of my days as a performance artist, when I was looking for a camouflage outfit; 2) Garnet Hill clothing and home decor catalog, addressed to my husband’s ex, and still coming to our house; 3) Van Dyke’s taxidermy catalog, from the times when I was making sculptures. Today is a light day. Usually, we get a lot more junk mail. With Green Dimes, there is really no reason why I should tolerate such wastage any longer.

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Two Papers

I have had this talk with Prad, about our papers. Two, every morning. The San Francisco Chronicle, for the local news, and the New York Times, which I simply could not do without. Do I feel guilty about all those papers piling up in the recycling bin? You bet. I forgot the statistics, about how many new trees and energy it takes to print one copy of the daily paper. But I know it really adds up. Still, I so much enjoy our papers’ morning routine, the going outside to pick up the papers, taking out the plastic sleeves, unfolding the papers, sorting out my favorite sections, the ones I will read while eating breakfast. I could switch to an online subscription, just like my friend Dominique, or maybe limit myself to one paper. I could, but I am not going to. Even Prad, Mr Green by excellence is not willing to give up that one.

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