another!

Entry for March 29, 2008
Well it's another dreary day here in Ohio. The sun is shining bright and yet its only about 35. I was hoping for some warmer weather to help dry things out, but it doesnt look good. We had heavy rain Thursday night and slight drizzle through Friday morning. Just what we needed, grrrr. Three weekends ago, we got the most snow this part of the state has seen in years, the total over the weekend was just under 24", then of course, being Ohio, it got warm, started to melt, then rained for a few days. With all of the moisture from that weekend, and what we got this week, the ground here is just waterlogged. Our driveway is exactly 100 yards downhill from the road to the garage. The garden is on the left side of the garage and takes most of the run-off. Unfortunately, the leech bed is also in that area, so when we get really heavy rain or spring run-off, it tends to flood a bit. It doesn't overflow or anything, but it gets to where it needs a couple of days to catch up. With all of this water, and the ground in the garden being so fertile, its pretty much just a swamp for a few weeks. I think sometime in April, I am going to bury a couple 55 gallon drums with holes to act as a collector, and run a 4" drain pipe from that to the ditch which is about 50 yards away. Hopefully this will at least help with the water issue. I'll make some kind of control on the drain part, so when its fairly dry, the water can stay in the drums to be used for garden watering.
Today I am going to seriously start on household wastes. We already use small plastic tubs for kitchen scraps to go on the compost pile, and all recyclables go in a seperate bin to go to the street. Luckliy our trash company operates a free recycle service. What I want to do today, is make another bin in the house for all paper products. I started this small scale, but want to take it full circle starting this week. Any paper products, (junk mail, newspapers, used paper towels, etc...), will go in this bin, then be shredded and also put into the compost pile/bin. My goal is to take our trash that goes to the street to an absolute minimum. For now we'll use an electric paper shredder that we got for free,or simply tear everything into small pieces, but I want to somehow design one that I can just attach to the drum and hand crank.
Sometimes I question myself why we are doing everything that we are. Are we trying to be more self sufficient? Are we trying to save money? Are we trying to eat better and live healthier lives? There are many reasons why we do but we do, but I have to stop and face the facts. I have slowly turned into an enviornmentalist. I never saw myself as being one of "those" people, but I am. I am realizing with every little thing we do at home that we are making less of an impact on the enviornment. I never thought of it this way until we were having one of our evening discussions a few months ago. I caught myself saying things like "if we recycle and compost more, thats less we are sending to the landfill", and "I want to get a push-cultivator and not use the roto-tiller"... then it hit me like a brick, i AM one of those people. And ya know what? I like it.