Straws Suck!

[Kied]

Ordered a Maker's on the rocks the other night and the moran gave it to me with a straw. WTF am I going to stir here, buddy?

[powdork]

Funny thing. I work at a country club. We have a fine dining restaurant and a sports bar/19th hole restaurant. I've worked both. Everyone in both restaurants get water. In fine dining, noone wants a straw. At the 19th hole, everyone wants one in their water. Many of the servers simply take them by default. Several of us won't and try to stop the others. If you want a fucking straw buy a fucking drink. Straws cost money and end up everywhere. If you want to be a pretentious twit just go all out and order the herbal tea.

[Timberridge]

Funny thing. I work at a country club. We have a fine dining restaurant and a sports bar/19th hole restaurant. I've worked both. Everyone in both restaurants get water. In fine dining, noone wants a straw. At the 19th hole, everyone wants one in their water. Many of the servers simply take them by default. Several of us won't and try to stop the others. If you want a fucking straw buy a fucking drink. Straws cost money and end up everywhere. If you want to be a pretentious twit just go all out and order the herbal tea.

If its a private club, the bond should cover the yearly cost of straws.

[SB]

Damn you Archimedes!

[KQ]

Lady I know claims she doesn't want to stain her pearly whites with coffee. So she carries a glass straw in her purse. Or she's a crack addict.

That is indeed what dentists recommend you do - save your teeth from cosmetic discoloration, screw the planet!

I can remember going to restaurants as a kid and getting paper straws - now those sucked!

[powdork]

yes, paper straws suck (unless they're filled with sugar). but paper wrapped straws mean strawterpillars

[splat]

Hemp.

[strawjack]

https://www.instagram.com/p/BEO4BomO...=zorro_del_mar

http://www.aardvarkstraws.com/

Straws do suck.

[Mazderati]

The UK Will Soon Ban Plastic Straws & Other Single-Use Plastics & It’s A Huge Eco-Friendly Step

According to Forbes, UK Prime Minister Theresa May announced a proposal to ban plastic straws and other single-use plastics during a meeting with Commonwealth nations in April 2018. The ban on plastic drinking straws comes as part of the country's larger plan to decrease (and, hopefully, eliminate) plastic waste in the coming decades. As soon as early 2019, plastic straws and other items like Q-tips could be a thing of the past in the United Kingdom. Since Forbes notes that there are an estimated 8.5 billion straws thrown away annually in the UK alone (and, of course, you can't recycle them), this is a pretty big deal.

Lady I know claims she doesn't want to stain her pearly whites with coffee. So she carries a glass straw in her purse. Or she's a crack addict.

Been using glass straws at home for a few years. They go right in the dishwasher so they're easy enough. Keeping track of a glass road straw to use with my 128 ounce McDonald's Coke that comes in a plastic cup isn't exciting but I think I can make it work.

[billyk]

The straws and cups at our company cafeteria are compostable. Yes, still wasteful, but I don’t feel like I’m killing any sea turtles.

[Dantheman]

The straws and cups at our company cafeteria are compostable. Yes, still wasteful, but I don’t feel like I’m killing any sea turtles.

Unfortunately, compostable plastics really only break down in commercial composting facilities where they are held at temps above 50* C for extended periods of time.

https://www.theguardian.com/environm...-waste-problem
https://www.european-bioplastics.org...marine-litter/

[digitaldeath]

Unfortunately, compostable plastics really only break down in commercial composting facilities where they are held at temps above 50* C for extended periods of time.

https://www.theguardian.com/environm...-waste-problem
https://www.european-bioplastics.org...marine-litter/

paper straws? heard they used to be a thing

what about corn starch straws?

no straws, just cups?

[Timberridge]

paper straws? heard they used to be a thing

what about corn starch straws?

no straws, just cups?

You may be onto something. $130 bamboo ski poles are all the rage at places like DV, what about natural straw straws? Perfect for sailor chicks.

[grskier]

Unfortunately, compostable plastics really only break down in commercial composting facilities where they are held at temps above 50* C for extended periods of time.

https://www.theguardian.com/environm...-waste-problem
https://www.european-bioplastics.org...marine-litter/

This is true. Our landfill has a pretty good compost program which is continuously growing.

I do love that from time to time, this place has splashes of being ahead of the green curve.

[splat]

Did A Train make the spot? Did I miss it somewhere in the thread? (which I haven't totally read)

[billyk]

Unfortunately, compostable plastics really only break down in commercial composting facilities where they are held at temps above 50* C for extended periods of time.

https://www.theguardian.com/environm...-waste-problem
https://www.european-bioplastics.org...marine-litter/

Supposedly our company is tied into a composting program. I haven’t checked up on the details to assure myself that it all isn’t just going into the landfill, but I’d be surprised if that was the case. We have a bunch of greenies around here.

[old goat]

I haven't used a straw in years, maybe decades. They make sense if you're in the hospital, otherwise why do you need a straw.
On the subject of useless, feel good environmental stuff:

Truckee currently recycles in blue plastic bags and uses green plastic bags for yard waste. Now they are eliminating the green bags (mandatory) and blue bags (otional) and replacing with 90 gallon wheel cans that a truck picks up with an arm. The stated reason for doing this is to eliminate all the plastic bags from the landfill. Instead the landfill will be full of 90 gallon cans crushed by plows and snow. People who who don't have anyplace to put such a can can take their yard waste to the dump--producing an extra 15 pounds of carbon or so per trip. And how will they get their yard waste to the dump?--either in plastic bags or a gas guzzling pickup. (Or knowing my neighbors--they'll just say the hell with it and stop clearing defensible space.) At the council meeting where this was approved they packed the meeting with HS students from an environmental class who gave moving speeches about how great this is going to be for the environment.

On the subject of not thinking through ideas--defensible space. It's a good idea, sure. In my neighborhood there are a number of undeveloped lots, completely overgrown with brush and small trees, many next door to houses. Developed properties are required to maintain defensible space, undeveloped are not. What good is 100 feet of defensible space behind my house if 5 feet from my side property line there is an overgrown vacant lot?

Or another one--if you build on your property you are required to provide for proper drainage and erosion control to protect the watershed from sediment runoff.. This is good. But every winter and every big summer thunderstorms the massive culverts under 180 that drain the mountainside above us wash out, often multiple times, dumping sediment and rock onto properties--thousands of times more debris than the developed lots could ever produce, across Donner Pass Rd, and into Donner Lake. And no one requires Cal Trans to do anything about it.

The Town of Truckee is committed to using 100% renewable energy (their words, not mine). They passed a resolution. Problem is, the PUD, which is completely independent of the town, is responsible for the energy mix, not the town. The town may put in a few solar panels on the few properties in town it actually owns, although solar is of limited use in a place where roofs are covered with snow, often tons of snow, for months at a time. So an empty resolution, but that doesn't keep the town from trumpeting their "achievement".

Recycling a cardboard box doesn't make you an environmentalist.

[digitaldeath]

Unfortunately, compostable plastics really only break down in commercial composting facilities where they are held at temps above 50* C for extended periods of time.

https://www.theguardian.com/environm...-waste-problem
https://www.european-bioplastics.org...marine-litter/

wouldnt a home compost pile, if tall and big enough produce enough heat/energy to rise above 50 degrees?

[jono]

500 million is enough straws to equal 127 school buses of space.

Is that the as-new shipped volume or the crushed in a landfill volume? And more importantly, what is that in ranges?

Yes Andrew, I remember paper straws. They were weird, but they may have contained less poison.

[iceman]

wouldnt a home compost pile, if tall and big enough produce enough heat/energy to rise above 50 degrees?

Survey says...yes.

[riser4]

Glass straws and steel wool.

[iceman]

Straws blow too btw

[SkiBall]

Truckee currently recycles in blue plastic bags and uses green plastic bags for yard waste. Now they are eliminating the green bags (mandatory) and blue bags (otional) and replacing with 90 gallon wheel cans that a truck picks up with an arm. The stated reason for doing this is to eliminate all the plastic bags from the landfill. Instead the landfill will be full of 90 gallon cans crushed by plows and snow. People who who don't have anyplace to put such a can can take their yard waste to the dump--producing an extra 15 pounds of carbon or so per trip. And how will they get their yard waste to the dump?--either in plastic bags or a gas guzzling pickup. (Or knowing my neighbors--they'll just say the hell with it and stop clearing defensible space.) At the council meeting where this was approved they packed the meeting with HS students from an environmental class who gave moving speeches about how great this is going to be for the environment.
.

Do you not need to do bear-proof cans there? I am envisioning something similar to the BP cans we use that maybe would need the extra latching mech. But maybe need some kind of latch to keep stuff from blowing away (leaves n shit). Yeah it requires some space, but our garbage cans can be placed plow safe and I don't really have yard waste in the winter.

Straws blow too btw

Never quite got that. You don't really blow it, unless you are just talking about the money you blow.

[billyk]

Sure, straws are a waste. But call me decadent; I like them. It allows me to precisely control the temperature of the drink by controlling where the end of the straw is - next to the ice or more towards the bottom. Also, it avoids the problem of having the ice avalanche into your face and splashing red hibiscus tea all over your shirt causing a nasty stain. But mostly, probably takes me back to sucking on a nipple.

[old goat]

Do you not need to do bear-proof cans there? I am envisioning something similar to the BP cans we use that maybe would need the extra latching mech. But maybe need some kind of latch to keep stuff from blowing away (leaves n shit). Yeah it requires some space, but our garbage cans can be placed plow safe and I don't really have yard waste in the winter.

.

Garbage will still be in bags or 30 gal cans in bear boxes.
We get enough snow here to crush a can even without a plow. A lot of folks around here don't have garages or room in their garage to store cans . Some don't have driveways. The recycling can has to be within so many feet of the road for the truck to pick it up--squarely within range of the plows. Imagine the plow coming by and the spray from the plow knocking your recycling all over your driveway and now you can't use your snow blower either.