Crunchy, not Crusty

My sister would say that I've been living in Seattle too long. While I certainly don't disagree with her, for completely different reasons, I definitely have changed in the five years we have been here. (Don't get me wrong. I do love living here.)

One of those many changes include how I take care of myself, personal hygiene-wise. Now, I have not become a non-shaving, skirt wearing, non-bathing, dreadlocked hippy. In fact, none of those descriptions would apply to me, except for skirt wearing and only on Sundays. But I have stopped using shampoo and conditioner.

Now, before you get up and move as far from me as possible, I promise you my hair is clean. Very clean and probably the healthiest it's been in years. It is even coming in a little wavy, something that I've never used to describe my hair, except on the odd day with 99% humidity. It's growing out now, but I even had that lovely halo of new hair growing in for a while. You know, the one that makes your hair look frizzy no matter what you do? It is finally getting long enough that it isn't as bad, but that means my hair will be thicker, and I need it!

So, when did I start this rather crunchy habit? Well, I first read about it in September '09, thought seriously about it in November '09, and did something about it in December '09. That's been more than six months of being shampoo free. And I love it.

Why do I love it? Well, my hair has responded very well to it. But it is more than that. It is also very "green", which also appeals to me, for reasons I'm not sure of. The final reason, and perhaps my favorite, is cost. It is SO CHEAP. A tablespoon of baking soda lasts me about two weeks. A tablespoon of baking soda costs three cents (if you pay a dollar a box). Add a couple pennies for the water and suddenly you are paying 10 cents or less a month to wash your hair. Compare that to the $3 a bottle (at least) I was spending before. The apple cider vinegar rinse is more expensive, but still probably only ends up being 20-30 cents a month. You do the math.

Unfortunately, I don't have a good picture of my hair to show off. But really, who wants to see a close up of my hair anyway. Just trust me; it looks great.

One Man's Junk

Let me tell you the story of our water pitcher.

Once upon a time, Hubby and I got married. With said marriage came gifts, for which we were very grateful. And one of those gifts was a lovely Brita water pitcher, making it possible for us to drink the water in Utah. Oh, we loved that pitcher. So much, in fact, that we carefully packed it up, sent it in a trailer to Oregon, and picked it up on our way to our new home.

Somewhere in this process, however, the unthinkable happened: the pitcher cracked. Being the frugal (cheap or miserly also works) person that I am, I could not bring myself to purchase a new pitcher and instead took epoxy to the outside of the crack.

Though the epoxy wasn't exactly food safe, the pitcher worked just fine and we tried to be careful to keep the water line below the crack.

Now, after three something years of living with the crack, we have finally moved on. We now have a new pitcher!

But wait, you might say, I thought you were miserly, I mean cheap, I mean frugal! How could you possibly convince yourself to purchase a new pitcher when the old still worked just fine? Well, I have one word for you:

Freecycle

Oh be still my miserly, cheap, frugal heart! And I thought Craig's List was amazing. Here is the description from their website:

Welcome! The Freecycle Network™ is made up of 4,763 groups with 6,854,000 members across the globe. It's a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (& getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It's all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills. Each local group is moderated by a local volunteer (them's good people). Membership is free. To sign up, find your community by entering it into the search box above or by clicking on “Browse Groups” above the search box. Have fun!

Have fun, indeed. Once I discovered Freecycle, I was able to start getting rid of perfectly good stuff lying around our house that just couldn't be given to a thrift store and that I just couldn't throw away, like a partially used bottle of perfume. And through Freecycle, I was able to get a relatively new Brita pitcher (complete with three unused, still-in-the-wrapper filters) for free. And yes, keeping usable things out of the landfill is a great bonus.

Now, should I post my cracked pitcher on Freecycle? After all, it does still work...