I think plastic is evil, but wondrous. It doesn’t break, it’s cheap, light-weight and can be fashioned into most anything. Think what you may of the stuff, if you have yourself a look around this America, it’s everywhere. I’ve spent the better part of a year trying to rid myself of the stuff, but everywhere I look, there it is again. Until I decided to do battle with plastic, I never noticed just how pervasive it had become. The marketing tag “Plastic makes it possible” has been taken to the extreme and it seems that plastic is the only material that makes anything possible…my last car was made of plastic. All this from a material that never completely breaks down, is difficult to recycle and cites petroleum and natural gas as the primary sources of its key ingredients. Obviously, the great benefits of using plastic outweigh the downside to most people. I’ve come to the conclusion that I’ve done the best that I can as a consumer and now it’s up to the manufacturers to stop using petroleum plastic. For example, when I shop at my local co-op and I buy a loaf of the yummiest sourdough bread ever, it comes in a plastic bag. The co-op is a locally owned, eco-conscious type of business and even they package a lot of their product in plastic. I expect soon to see businesses like this begin to take on the plastics challenge. While in Seattle, I’ve noticed two occasions where companies are beginning to adopt a greener plastic. Teva flip-flops hang on plastic hangers wherever they are sold. The plastic they use for this is now a plastic made from starch. We were at a folk festival yesterday and Brown Cow yogurt was handing out samples using plastic spoons made from starch. Hopefully in a few years time this will be the norm instead of the exception.