Sustainable household - that's the systematic Karel's way

Karel is pretty sharp. And also systematic. Karel simply likes to think analytically, which a sustainable household deserves. Especially at the beginning. Just no hasty or perhaps extremist solutions.

 

 

Last updated: May 17, 2023

Rummaging through trash? Not yet!

After coming home from work, the day after watching the documentary Gulf Stream, Karel set about analyzing waste and drawing conclusions. One would expect him to come to the kitchen, dump the contents of the bin on the floor and record what appears most often.

That wouldn't be a completely wrong approach, but Karel decided to think everything through properly. Somehow it seemed to him that focusing only on the trash bin might be too easy a solution. And as he knew from his engineering practice, seemingly easy solutions usually didn't work.

Instead of rummaging through the bin, Karel made himself green tea and sat down at the table. He put his phone in do-not-disturb mode, turned on music and listened to the song Maria by AlicebanD. Right from the start he heard: "...I have the power in my hands I have the thought, and it makes sense..."

Unnecessary things

That snapped him out of his brief daydream. He took a sheet of A4 paper, printed on one side with an invoice. He glanced over it briefly and chuckled: "New bike computer for the bike. I never mounted it... who knows where it even is."

He bought it when the old odometer still worked but was wired. None of his colleagues at work had a wired mileage counter on their bikes anymore. So he ordered a wireless one, but it didn't come with batteries. So he put it aside for a while. One evening when he was buying beer and chips at a convenience store, he noticed that the young Vietnamese guy also sold CR 2025 button batteries, which he needed exactly. He bought them, and while drinking beer he started setting units and time on the counter's display until he got to entering the wheel circumference. He went through the manual but couldn't find the table of common dimensions. He remembered that hassle with reading the wheel circumference and disgustedly put the counter away. This time for good.

Sustainable household: how is it possible to think about it?

"So... how to approach this sustainable household?" he looked at the blank page when he turned over the invoice. He took a pencil and drew a human figure. It wasn't a particularly sophisticated drawing. To capture legs, arms and torso, he made do with five lines and an ellipse for the head. Since the fish rots from the head, Karel also started with the head. He thought for a moment before making the first line leading from where the figure should have hair: mindset, attention.

The next line led from the mouth. He wrote next to it: what do we eat? From the simple question he made two more lines and wrote next to each: food preparation and shopping.

He circled the whole figure and started writing more and more words next to several quickly drawn lines, making more lines from them. Finally, around the little figure there was:

• Housing needs,
• fitness,
• clothing,
• hygiene.

The last line he directed to the center of the body with a simple note: excretion.

And since excretion is somehow where it ends for a person, we'll end today's article too.

Karel's tips:

1. Did you notice that Karel uses the back sides of invoices for scribbling and breaking down thoughts and ideas? Similarly, you can use mostly non-recyclable receipts. They're great for daily mind maps or task lists, which you can gleefully crumple up at the end of the day after scribbling on them.
2. What things could you get rid of? What's been lying at the bottom of your drawer for years? You can donate, for example, on nevyhazujto (don't throw it away). For selling, I prefer aukro. I haven't written an article about that yet, which I probably should. 🤔