The Wild Ewt of the Plains of Canada ([personal profile] ewt) wrote2007-03-27 02:51 pm

Hmm.

Left hip not great today. I think I did something to it in the bath. Le sigh.

All my medications and some of my vitamins/supplements come in blister packs. This is starting to really bug me. I know they are more convenient for carrying around in coat pockets and so on, and I am grateful for that, but I can't help feeling upset about the waste created by the blister packs. I wonder if I can grill them and make them turn pretty colours or something; because they are metal and plastic and stuff and thing I can't put them in the ordinary recycling.

I know this is just a small thing, but it's a small thing that affects many, many people.

May re-post this to several hippie communities if I don't get enough ideas here. No time now.

[identity profile] duncanneko.livejournal.com 2007-03-27 01:56 pm (UTC)(link)
I have the same twinges of guilt, though at least I can occasionally get ibuprofen in glass bottles which are marginally more practical.

Empty blister packs make very good mixing palettes for model painting, but it's a fairly niche use...

[identity profile] vashti.livejournal.com 2007-03-27 02:08 pm (UTC)(link)
I've heard that you can use blister packs for making doll's furniture, but that's also niche and I can't think of anything else you could use them for.

Could you ask the pharmacist to dispense them in bottles, rather than blister packs? Or scrub off the foil and put the plastic in the recycling? (although that sounds like something you might not be able to do)

[identity profile] purpletigron.livejournal.com 2007-03-27 02:16 pm (UTC)(link)
It's v. annoying, yes! But they are so light, that even with the aluminium, I still class them as 'small stuff - not for sweating' ...

[identity profile] devvie.livejournal.com 2007-03-27 02:53 pm (UTC)(link)
I knew they were annoying, but not this bad:

http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=483983&category=OPINION&newsdate=5/20/2006

[identity profile] qadira.livejournal.com 2007-03-27 03:05 pm (UTC)(link)
whenever I think of stuff like that, my brain says "hmm, I wonder if that could become a windchime or mobile".

I have a small sack full of caps off beer/ale/etc bottles, and some day it will become something.

[identity profile] crankles.livejournal.com 2007-03-27 06:40 pm (UTC)(link)
Are they the kind that are just plain foil or are they covered with a paper coating, too? I wonder if you can recycle the plain foil backing.

[identity profile] sci.livejournal.com 2007-03-27 07:44 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm quite tempted to attempt construction of a Thermal Depolymerisation Unit for home use. Admitadly though, that'd just turn it into crude oil, minerals and other trace chemicals.