Cor blimey what a lot of drivel from you all -
1. Peeing on jelly fish stings is correct, it removes the stinging and alleviates the swelling - often you will need a man to pee on it if you are a woman.
2. in other threads I have been telling you all how to water your gardens using shower water from a bath - syphoning it out via the hosepipe into a water butt, and any other things like buckets to ensure you have water on non shower days - although if you have a teenager in the house it will be either all or nothing...
3. CLAY - if you have problems with soil holding water add some clay to it, here we live on clay and have no wretched option - we go from swamp to cracks in less than 24 hours......
4. Hanging baskets - line them with lots of newspaper (and no it doesn;t matter WHAT newspaper) it holds water bettter than moss, and ensures you do not lose as much water out of the basket.
5. Cars - cars only need washing when you have been by the sea (salt air) or in the winter when salt has been applied on the roads. There is no need to wash your car every week - it merely means you have a very boring life (or like my neighbour a nagging wife).
6. Compost as much as you can, add newspaper in small quantities, the worms like it (tea bags can go in as can coffee gounds - although the grounds are useful against slugs)
7. water the composter with any water - from the bath, washing bowl whatever, there is very little problem I have found as I do this all the time.
8. DO NOT USE A PRE RINSE on a dishwasher - it is a ridiculous feature and with todays tablets, liquids etc there is no nedd of a pre-rinse.
9. we never flush a pee away until the end of the day. if it's other , then flush. newer tanks don;t all cope with bricks or hippo's in the tank, it merely causes the cister to over fill - so, lower the ball-cock (NO RUDE NOTES PLEASE ) and then the cistern will only fill half way - a magical non costing you way to reduce your water loss.
10. shower - but put a time limit on it - if in a bath put in the plug and remove the water by syphoning (or if you are cruel get the kids to empty it bucket by bucket to the garden)
11. If you have a shower with no plug, then get a large cat litter tray or similar and stand in it, it catches most of what you wash in and then you can take it to the garden.
12. water from taps is ok to drink if you can tolerate all the chemicals, I personally filter mine, we keep water bottles in the freezer (and have done for as many years as I can remember) for lunches, days out etc to have cold water all day long.
13. If you don;t filter, but don't like the chemicals, pour out a jug of water from the tap, and let it stand for a couple of hours in the fridge - this removes (via evaporation) most of the chemicals - keep the jug topped up and you will always have nice water.
14. if you have a water feature in your garden that does not contain fish, then rather than top it up with water from the tap - use the bath water - it keeps the algae down, and (this is funny) it smells nice when you get the whiff of the fountain!
15. Get a meter - it doesn't cost to install, and it may save you over £200 a year - that was the 1st years difference when I moved from un-metered to metered.
16. keep your freezer full - if you can't afford to fill a chest freezer use boxes stuffed with paper, it cost's less when it's full thant when it is only ½full.
17. Make sure everyone knows about the fridge door - it only closes when you shut it.... ditto the freezer!
18. Use power saving lights (providing you can cope with the slight strobe they produce)
19. turn off tv etc at the mains, ditto computers etc...
20. recycle as much as you can - most smaller communities get money back for the recycled products which can then be put to spreading cost of compost bins and water butts....
I think that covers what we do here..... am going to bed now - as I'm tired, and there is no need for using lights so less electricity!!!
