Category: happy

Is your Toothbrush Killing our Future Generations?

fatveganfrogLeave a comment

There is no perfect toothbrush, but some choices are better than others. Plastic toothbrushes take over 400 years to decompose… They end up in landfills and release toxic chemicals into the air resulting in harsh damage to the environment. In addition to getting washed away into the ocean, the toothbrush is endangering marine life and contaminating our food. 

After seeing this piece of art made by an African artist, it was really eye-opening. Africa has a huge trash pollution issue, along with the rest of the world… This art piece is a commentary on plastic pollution. 

Knowing that every plastic toothbrush impacts the environment and that one billion plastic toothbrushes are thrown away every year in the United States alone, creating 50 million pounds of waste- what can we do?

Bamboo Toothbrushes: bamboo is biodegradable. (bristles are not biodegradable) 

If bamboo toothbrushes end up in the trash, they aren’t significantly more environmentally friendly than plastic… but if you compost the handles of bamboo toothbrushes by first remove the nylon bristles with pliers then composting the handles… it makes a huge difference. Plus it is really beneficial for our environment. 

Then there are the toothbrushes that are recycled and/or recyclable:  Some options I love:

Bogobrush (bogobrush.com) 

Bogobrush is a Company that makes its brushes from compostable bioplastic using leftover plant material from American farms.

Or consider (preserve.eco) Toothbrushes made from recycled yogurt containers which are easily accessible online or in local stores Ojai: Being in Westridge and Rainbow Bridge. Also if you mail your old toothbrushes, not only will they be recycled into new products, but you will also receive a coupon for their online store. 

After using these types of recycled toothbrushes another option to help continue supporting the recycling market is by sending them to organizations such as Gimme 5 drop-off/mail-in program. Whole Foods And other companies have Gimme 5 bins located in their stores. You can just look up ones near you. 

Note: *Buying recycled stuff when we need to buy new products is the smartest move.*

So now you know the best eco friendly toothbrushes on the market: what do we do with our old ones?

Three months of brushing your teeth is not worth 400 years in the landfills. So an option would be to reuse your toothbrush in different ways until you switch to an eco-friendly toothbrush: 

You could easily label your toothbrushes for their different uses around the house: Here are a few options:

-Cleaning Household Items

-Remove dirt from shoes/Soccer cleats!

-Fingernail brushing

-Deep clean your desk/Clean beauty supplies

-Spot-treat stains on clothes

-Clean Your Hairbrush out 

-Brush Your Eyebrows

These are just some out of hundreds of household uses…

Best of luck on your zero-waste journey! It can be difficult sometimes but if you put in the effort, it’s well worth it. In the meantime, I wish you fresh breath and zero cavities.

Conflicted

mypetlobster1Leave a comment

happy birthday

I wish I could say it to you, but we are on a strictly no communication basis.

The only thing we share now is our existence and hatred towards each other.

It’s sad… my greatest love turned into my strongest hate.

happy birthday, you’re an adult now.

I hope you move far far away and buy a house of your own thousands of miles away from here,

but I hope you’ll be happy.

I still wear the necklace you got me for my birthday. People tell me I should get rid of it, and I probably should, but I can’t because its the last piece of you I have left, and, as much as I want to, I can’t bring myself to let you go.

I want you gone but I want you happy,

I want you to feel awful for what you did, but I want you to come back to me.

I want to hate you, but I want you to love me…

because I love you still.

So happy birthday, thank you for the memories, the laughs, the smiles, and thank you for the love we shared.

I hope one day it will overcome the hatred we share.

Photo credit: seansi.org

Youth

mypetlobster1Leave a comment

Back then, war was a card game, race issues were about who ran the fastest, and protection meant wearing knee pads,

and a timeout was the worst punishment we knew.

Back then, our parents were our heroes, the safest place was in mom’s arms, and the highest place on earth was dad’s shoulders.

Back then, we shared toys, not boys. Back then we said “thank you” more than “I’m sorry,” “yes” more than “no,” and “I love you” instead of “I hate you.”

Back then, guys played sports, not girls,

back then, we looked forward to every day instead of dreading it,

back then, we were scared of the dark, not the world,

and back then we couldn’t wait to grow up.

Photo Credit: Pinterest

Soul Knight

unicornowner1 Comment

Sometimes, it is good to waste some time on endless video games.

They can be a stress-free comfort zone, a place to escape far away from reality.

The game I’ve been playing recently is called “Soul knight.” it is a Run-and-Gun shooter game, and it allows multiple players under the same wifi connection to play together.

It takes up 10-30 minutes to finish one single game. Each game has 3 levels of the dungeon, each level has 5 small sub levels, and the deeper of the dungeon means more difficult to complete. By the end of each level, there is a boss which is a more powerful and aggressive monster you need to beat.

This is the game you have always wanted in your subconscious. Explore the dungeon, collect crazy weapons, dodge bullets and shoot ‘em all up! Extremely easy and intuitive control; super smooth and enjoyable gameplay, mixed with rogue-like elements.

photo credit: levelwinner.com

a tandem bicycle hits the ground twice as hard

icaruswithwarmwingsLeave a comment

A heart

Is a pendulum

Passing time.

I’ll be fine.

My eyes tear bloody holes:

Holes in her face.

Holes in her heart.

Holes in all the wrong places.

For no fucking reason they do,

For no fucking reason do the superman-style lasers of

Feelings

Drip from these unfeeling sockets and soil the layered newspapers that line my skull.

And for someone that thinks they know everything

The frown on her face is a hole in my universe.

And for someone who wants her to be everything

When she is not

It tears down the walls.

These paper mache walls,

Like a pre-kindergarten volcano,

Stolen from the porch before the vinegar could ever hit the baking soda.

Who would take a volcano?

She took the volcano.

And I don’t know how or why, or what I could do about it, even if I knew

How?

Or Why?

But I do know that, 

For some reason,

I and She exist somehow in tandem,

Somehow in unison;

Like a two person bike,

I am falling fast towards the ground

Hoping that somehow by sheer force of will

I can overcome gravity for the two of us.

And I could right this bike.

Even as the rubber runs away from me,

As the sound shoots through my ears:

That great pendulum’s brawny swing stops the movement,

Stops the fall of our bike,

Stops the air that supports us.

And it leaves my heaving chest

Pounding in her dry cold breath

As the only thing that supports this bike

Stopped in space and time.

Photo via Amazon.com

optimistic and curious

unicornownerLeave a comment

I am optimistic and curious

I wonder how this world works

I hear raindrops dancing on the roof

I see the lightning hiding behind mountains

I taste the sky covered with dark clouds

I smell the wild wind blowing over

I want to fly under the sunshine

I am optimistic and curious

I pretend we have good weather today

I believe tomorrow will be better

I feel unicorns do exist

I touch the clouds with my fingers

I worry I can’t do it alone

I cry for my melted ice cream

I laugh when others cry for their melted ice cream

I am optimistic and curious

I understand sometimes life can be hard

I say everything will be fine

I dream that peace will be around us all the time

I try thinking about nothing

I hope I can change the world once upon a time

I am optimistic and curious

photo credit: miro.medium.com

I Want to Believe

mypetlobster1Leave a comment

dear world, dear life, dear faith,

tell me your secrets,

fill me in on your knowledge,

and cast me away with your limitless being.

dear god,

whoever or whatever you may be,

listen to my problems, answer my prayers, make right all the wrong,

and give me hope.

oh please

give me hope that you can fix the evil in this dark world we live in.

oh god…

I want to belive in you,

I envy and pity those who do,

because, how great would it be to live

and believe that someone in the sky will make everything okay,

to believe that you are protected by one overarching being,

to blame your stupid mistakes on the ideology that

“everything happens for a reason, it’s god’s will,”

to not fear death because heaven awaits the good…

How great, how easy, how amazing would that be,

but how naive do you have to be to believe.

dear self, dear time, dear life

i’m afraid

my being is all in my hands.

Photo via Pinterest 

Itchy

icaruswithwarmwingsLeave a comment

I have a bad case of itchy foot

The itchy foot runs through my leg

When I itch the itch it numbs my toes

Through my foot it goes

And all the way into my calf

It feels like the beginning of poison oak

The sweltering alergic reaction

That has plagued me since days old

I feel the familiar itch

The friendly ooze

The glorious disgusting hot irritated mess that is poison oak

But not quite

It’s just one singular bulb

One little plague bubonic

A tiny little boil

A reminder of bare feet in mosquito territory

A reminder like a cracked phone screen

Or a scar on your arm

Something you see everyday

A reminder of something you forgot

Like her face in my camera roll

Like looking back at just how perfect it has been

Because so often I took photos when things were good

When I wasn’t staring at a blank google doc

An image stamped in my skull

When it was incredible

Or when it was supremely funny

Or when it hurt like a mountain insurmountable

And when I scroll back and see these myrtle memories

For an instant I feel that excitement that takes me back

That yearning for days old

But not for a million dollars

Not for an ounce of that love that I felt

Would I miss a second of the now

It’s weird

But I scratched the itch

And honestly it doesn’t itch anymore

Lost In Translation

slimjimsilversLeave a comment
Being someone who considers themselves a second language speaker, I have always found that my native-language of Mandarin (although no longer as good as my English), holds a few words or phrases that I realized couldn’t translate into English. I say this not because there weren’t words for them in the English dictionary, because there were plenty, but because of the meaning that is lost in translating them into another language.
Mandarin has roots that trace back 3,000 years to the origin of the Chinese language, more recently becoming the common language of China over 700 years ago. Because of this, over the centuries, Chinese characters have gone from simply representing ideas or objects, to imbedding themselves into the deeper meaning of these ideas, becoming symbolic of what they represented.
I really don’t know if that would make sense to anyone who doesn’t have a non-English language where they can find an example of this. But essentially, what I’m trying to say, is as time as progressed, these words have solidified themselves as the sole-identifier for these ideas, meaning that the word in itself evokes instant imagery and clarity on whatever is being conveyed, it is the ultimate adjective, noun, verb, it requires no follow up, the word is a definition in itself just from the emotions it lets off.
Below I have jotted down a few that I’ve heard over the past several weeks that I don’t believe could ever be translated into another language and hold the same significance that it does in Mandarin.
香- xiang, like very good taste, smell, just feels right on the palate
哎哟，你做的饭好香啊
aīyō，nǐzuò dèfànhǎoxiāng a!
Oh my, this food that you made is so savory!
(Personally when I use this word, it evokes an image of that scene from Ratatouille when Remi takes a bite of the cheese and strawberry together and colors begin to swirl together on screen as he’s just in ecstasy. Just to give an example of what I mean by evocative)
情 qing, like very caring of, adoring, affection, lovey-dovey
转盼多情
Zhuǎn pàn duōqíng
a loving (or soulful) glance
辛苦- xin ku, working very hard, deserving of praise, worked to exhaustion, withstanding bitter hardships
路上辛苦了。
Lùshang xīnkǔ le.
You must have had a tiring journey.
脑海- nao hai, mind, same symbolic connotation as a heart that just doesn’t exist in English
你存在我深深的脑海里。
nǐ cúnzaì wǒ shēnshēn dè nǎohǎi lí
You exist, deep in my mind
存- cun, to exist, to protect it, cherish, withstand the test of time
爱长存。
aì chángcún.
Love will last forever
轻- qing, weightless, gentle, worry-free, relaxing
她走路脚步轻。
Tā zǒulù jiǎobù qīng.
She walks with a light, carefree step.
Source: AsiaSociety.org

3 Modern Rules Of Veganism:

fatveganfrogLeave a comment

Some think going vegan is a daunting task, but following these “rules” I’m about to give you and will make the decision to embark on this journey of veganism so much easier. 

Rule 1- Find your reason

In this modern day society, before you go vegan, the most important thing you can do is pick and understand your reasons why. If you just go vegan to go vegan, chances are it won’t last. An example is going vegan for your health and then understanding why and how you are going to set this goal. Watch documentaries, youtube videos, and read studies that motivate you to continue with this health journey.

Rule 2- substitution

Something many newbie vegans do first when they go vegan is eliminate foods (obviously), but then feel like there is nothing they can eat and soon quit. When I went vegan back in the day, there were not many options.  I had to get really creative with the dishes that I prepared to ensure I got the proper nutritional intake. Nowadays in this non-stop, growing vegan society, you can find almost anything vegan. So the number one tip I can give is following this rule- Find or make your favorite foods vegan and food cravings won’t be an issue. An example would be if you have eggs everyday for breakfast and go vegan… try a substitute of vegan tofu egg scramble, or instead of cow’s milk in your cereal, add oak milk. If you drastically switch to eating salad for every meal your body scientifically will soon want to binge and you will most likely go straight back to your previous diet. But with substitution, your mind will barely notice a difference and you will consume the food that will start to make you feel better physically and emotionally.

3rd Rule- Joining the Community

Something important that I cannot stress enough is finding like minded people. Most don’t realize when going vegan the loneliness you can actually feel. You feel like all you want to do is share your success with veganism or the suffering you are avoiding being vegan… but you in return receive hate. A lot of the time if you have no support it’s a hard task to maintain a healthy vegan lifestyle. An easy way to find support is through social media, following vegan influencers, activists, meme accounts, recipes, and all other things vegan… another way to reach out to more people is by going to local vegan events, such as: street fairs, marches, restaurants and anything else your community offers. 

Overall veganism isn’t just about our own health, but mainly about reducing our carbon footprint. Again, recognizing our own health, but most importantly the health of our planet, it’s about making different choices and moving in a different direction and ultimately coming together as a community. Veganism is a crucial lifestyle for our planet’s wellbeing with the state it is in right now. Veganism is different for everyone and these “rules” may help you in the right direction of a new beginning! Take the first step, follow the rules, and you will be the perfect vegan in no time! Good luck!

photo credit: Pinterest.com