The first day of March. Although we are not quite through it, the English winter of 2022/2023 has been pretty mild and bearable. There has also been very little rain to speak of and as a consequence our vegetable plot is proving quite easy to dig over. In some past years each spadeful of soil has been heavy because of water-logging. Our soil has a high clay content and tends to retain water easily but this year it seems quite light and friable - easy to break up.
In the next week or so I plan to open up a couple of our compost bins in order to enrich the earth where our vegetables grow. We are quite fervent about composting and save just about everything that can be composted from potato peelings to the contents of our vacuum cleaner.
A few years back I was horrified to discover that most teabags are made from a fine plastic mesh and not biodegradable paper as I had naively imagined. For years I had been putting used teabags in our compost bins. Thereafter we would empty the contents of old teabags into our compost bins and resign the empty plastic mesh bags to our household waste bin that is collected by the local council every two weeks.
However, two years ago the Sainsburys supermarket chain dispensed with plastic mesh in their "Red Label" brand teabags and so we switched to them. It's nice to put these new paper bags into our compost knowing that they will rot down easily in the bins without having to consider the plastic issue. By the way, I also wonder how much micro-plastic residue I must have ingested over the years through drinking gallons of tea effectively filtered through plastic mesh bags. Teabag manufacturers kept that one very quiet indeed probably realising that openness and full disclosure would affect sales.
British people drink a lot more tea than North Americans. We average two to three mugs a day so the number of teabags we use is significant in most households.
Frances is heading down to London early tomorrow morning and her husband Stew is off to France for four days on a stag-do adventure that will involve skiing and snowboarding in The Alps. Consequently, Little Miss Phoebe is currently asleep at our house. She will be in the same cot tomorrow night too. It is both a privilege and a joy to be hands-on grandparents like this and you may not believe this but we love her more than tea.
So Phoebe is asleep in your honour's Sheffield residence.
ReplyDeleteAs Cary Grant used to say to his daughter in her cot... Sweet dreams.
She woke at 1.30am and sat bolt upright telling me that she had had a poo (shit). She hadn't and then it took over an hour to get her back to sleep. I am knackered now (very fatigued).
DeleteHas the little girl's sleeping pattern been broken with her parents being away and would that explain her anxiety dream ?
DeletePhoebe is so young and adjustment is difficult. She will come out fine.
I should not have believed her when she said she had done a poo! A good glug of milk and she would have probably gone straight back down. Silly me!
DeleteA good glug of milk. It takes me back.
DeleteWhen Lady Thatcher died my mother said of her :
*She even took the children's school milk away, imagine doing that !*
My mother was 96 then and died the following year.
The 1945 Labour Government introduced free milk in schools, as you know.
Mrs Thatcher as Education Secretary abolished the free milk.
In Tory Britain today many children are under nourished.
I believe you do drink more tea than us (except we do drink a lot of iced tea in the South) but we probably have you beat on coffee consumption. I put coffee grounds in my new compost pile now! :)
ReplyDeleteEnjoy your time with darling Phoebe.
You are right. Americans do drink more coffee and more "soda" too. Many younger British people are beginning to follow that trend.
DeleteThat is scary knowledge. I must go and check my teabags. I got rid of the coffee machine because of the pods (you can get recyclable and reusable ones but too dear and too much like hard work). I suppose I could by loose leaf tea and make it the old fashioned way. Probably cheaper. *sigh* when did every day life get so difficult?
ReplyDeleteEnjoy the wee one. It is such a special time.
Yes. Check your tea bags out. They probably use fine plastic mesh.
DeleteWell, I didn't know this about tea bags. I wonder what they're made of here? I drink about as much tea as coffee. I like strong tea.
ReplyDeleteA Canadian scientific study showed that where plastic mesh and a plastic glue sealant have been used in tea bags, "One cup from a single tea bag could contain 11.6 billion microplastic and 3.1 billion nanoplastic particles."
Deletethat's enough to make a guy quit drinking tea.
DeleteI didn't know about the plastic mesh. Now I need to check my teas.
ReplyDeleteTea bag companies have been brilliant about concealment. It's profit that matters.
DeleteI remember you writing about the teabag switch, and I agree - manufacturers and sellers of tea in bags should have never gone on for so long selling those plastic mesh bags (often made even worse by using a metal clip on them, too). Everything in the production and sales of food and drink seems to be regulated down to a T (pun intended), so how come this was never addressed by, say, an EU regulation?
ReplyDeletePhoebe will have a great mini holiday at Pudding Towers!
Good point about EU regulation. They appear to have ignored this issue for decades.
DeleteThe way forward is loose leaf tea. It gives you time for a little contemplation while it brews. BTW Thank you for your daily blog. I do so enjoy reading it even though I’ve never commented before.
ReplyDeleteAs the bishop said to the actress, thank you for revealing yourself Charmaine!
DeleteWe have had a very mild winter and very little wind. My veg plot is up and ready and already garlic and onions are growing. Have you considered raised beds to help the drainage?
ReplyDeleteRaised beds would almost certainly assist vegetable gardening but I simply can't be bothered with all that. Too much work and cost involved.
DeleteThe mesh in tea bags is plastic? I am flabbergasted. I never imagined it was not some kind of fine fabric. That is bad. Heaps of plastic has just been banned here; straws, chopsticks for takeaway, cotton bud stems to name a few. Maybe plastic tea bags should be on the list.
ReplyDeleteHow lovely for the grands to look after Phoebe for a few days.
The plastic mesh in tea bags doesn't look like plastic. It looks like paper. Authorities have known about it for years but have chosen to turn a blind eye - jgnoring health and environmental issues connected with them.
DeletePG Tips also have biodegradeable bags!
ReplyDeleteYes - but I am not a chimp!
DeletePlastic teabags? I've never heard of such a thing. That's terrible. I hope your veggie patches do well this year.
ReplyDeleteSorry to be the bearer of bad news River. Australian consumer authorities should have alerted you long ago.
DeleteI don't drink tea.
DeleteFor several years I used loose tea leaves in a pot but it gets more difficult to buy. I would buy in bulk from Twinings in Ireland. There is so much we ingest from products now that I don't think it really matters.
ReplyDelete"One cup from a single tea bag could contain 11.6 billion microplastic and 3.1 billion nanoplastic particles" concluded one study. What about fertility? What about mental health? What about the future and generations that will occupy that future?
DeleteNot a tea drinker, apart from the very occasional herbal infusion, so no real worries about the tea bags. We sometimes have little idea of what manufacturers really put into their products - or package their products in. Information labels are printed in such tiny type and odd colours that it would take all day to check the content of all the food we buy.
ReplyDeleteEnjoy your time with little Phoebe - these moments are so precious.
"Herbal infusion"? Does that mean drugs?
DeleteNo, it means chamomile, sage, mint and so on. Available in loose leaf style.
DeleteI've just Googled my tea. The tea I drink uses a plastic mesh bag. I'm so annoyed... I think I'll write the company. I'm switching immediately! (I've been composting those bags for years as well.)
ReplyDeleteNobody told us. Regarding composting I felt like a fool - adding plastic to my soil each year! But how was I supposed to know any different?
DeleteMore than Tea, is very high praise.
ReplyDeleteIt's like an American saying ... more than Fox News.
DeleteI think two of our grandsons may be coming to spend the night this weekend. I think that a lot of the joy for me comes in how much they want to come and stay. It's such a huge adventure for them.
ReplyDeletePlastic teabags. But WHY? That's just so wrong.
Most mass-produced tea bags involve fine plastic mesh and plastic-based adhesive. It was and probably still is cheaper and easier for manufacturers to do it that way and keep quiet about it.
DeleteI don't drink tea. When I was little, my Mom would give me tea to sip when I was sick so I never really liked it. I drink water and seltzer water. I'm boring that way.
ReplyDeleteEnjoy your time with your sweet Phoebe!
Boring but wise Ellen but in Flint, Michigan drinking water would be different.
DeleteI'm guessing if someone could total up all the pollutants we ingest during our lifetimes and put them in a clear glass container on display, we would be horrified.
ReplyDeleteI already am horrified. The effects may accumulate like lung disease in coal miners.
DeleteOh, the joy you must feel wrapping your arms about a granddaughter!!! My daughter and SIL had to go to England the middle of January and they had five great days in a row, weather wise. Cold but sunny with not much rain at all. Beautiful! In our house, we steep tea in a teapot. Well, that is for the Bear. Me? I grind and brew fresh coffee of a morning. Just one of the thousand little ways that we are different! Enjoy your time with the little girl.
ReplyDeleteShe is quite literally a "bundle of joy" Donna. I took her to the park today and she lay in a basket like swing commanding me to keep on pushing.
DeleteI learned the same thing about my teabags and still feel guilt about all the teabags I put into the compost. I do wonder how much microplastics are affecting our health. In China, a young man of 19 was the youngest person to be diagnosed with Alzheimers.
ReplyDeleteHave a wonderful visit with Phoebe. Jack is back with us, making us laugh.
Sometimes I would dig over the vegetable patch and spot the remains of old tea bags - surprised to see that they had not yet rotted down even though they had been in the compost bin for over a year.
DeleteSwedes in general tend to drink more coffee than tea. Myself I only drink tea and no coffee, though. But I nearly always buy loose leaf teas, so don't have to worry much about teabags...
ReplyDeleteIn England we have all got so used to the quick convenience of tea bags.
DeleteIt horrified us that the plastic filter mesh from the spout of electric kettles gradually disintegrates. Hoover bags are full of plastic microfibre.
ReplyDeleteWhen profit is king, businesses seem careless.
DeleteI had no idea some teabags contained plastic. Like you, I would have thought they were all biodegradable. Makes you wonder what else contains plastic!
ReplyDeleteAt the beginning of the school year we were all given a teabag in our staff mailbox to have a "nice cuppa" to celebrate the beginning of the school year. Today I came across that same teabag, unused, in my desk. I just don't drink tea! I should give it to someone.
If it is made with plastic mesh you should give it to the Russians upstairs.
Delete