Forever: tools for living

S ome warriors may want to use discarded plastic water bottles, boots from the second hand store and so on.

Personally I don’t see the investment, the right use of this word, in ‘forever’ tools for living as a contradiction. Just like the new pencil set, sharpener, pencil case and eraser/rubber at the start of the new year at school, though not completely neccessary a new set of tools does I think help stay to the task in hand.

It is said that capitalism is efficient; it’s not. It is efficient at producing inefficient things.

The machinery used to make plastic water bottles by the million is well designed, energy efficient, made from quality materials and intended to do its job for many years. The bottles it produces are none of these.

As we have seen over the last 20 years or so, western capitalism is having to export its production, mainly to the Far East, lower the prices and the life of products to keep us supplied with what we ‘want’. Many producers of fine products are gone, others have switched to Far East production and weakened standards.

You will of course ask that any products which are ordered from overseas are delivered by surface not airmail.

Please take this list as an example - you, wherever you live, will have local favourites, local resources. The intent is to return to high quality tools designed with thought and produced with tradition.

Supporting those producers still left who have pride in their products is only a good thing.

Tools for living which work and last

Tiffin Tins

Tiffin is an old English word for light meal that was carried to India during the Colonial period. It has become the common term for lunch.

Similiar tins are commonly used to send lunch to workers in cities in India every day.

Office workers in Mumbai leave early in the morning for work and their lunch follows them sometime later in the morning. In the middle of the morning the worker's wife packs his lunch, each 'bowl' containing a different dish. Rice will surely be in one container, dahl in a second. Other compartments may contain curd, pickle, parathas, vegetables, whatever makes up lunch for the day.

Each day some of the 4,000 to 5,000 dabawallahs pick up about 175,000 tiffin boxes at private homes, take them to the train station where they are packed into crates. When the trains reach the city other dabawallahs retrieve the boxes from the train and deliver them to their owners. Later in the day the empty tiffin boxes are retrieved from the offices and make the return trip home, often arriving before the worker.

The tops of the boxes are marked with special color codes which tell the often illiterate dabawallahs where the boxes live and work. The typical error rate is only once in around 8 million deliveries.

Western Civilization has made an improvement......

....in fact many

Zipka Lamps

Yes, batteries, but wait. This little beauty, made in France, is so efficient one set of (rechargeable) batteries will last for two months if used an hour a day. It's almost waterproof (I've dropped one into the stream and it still worked underwater) and the clever head strap means you can also attach it to a tent pole, bike handlebars or a bottle So if you have need for a light for work or play or emergencies this is the one.

Petzl 'Zipka' lamps

Classic Sigg bottles

Made in Switzerland (though some non classic insulated versions are I think now being made in China) these last forever (see picture of my 20 year old) and can then be fully recycled (except for the cap washer). If you are addicted to carrying a bottle of water around with you, this is the one to replace the plastic stupidity. So instead of getting through say 300 bottles a year times 20 years this bottle will save the waste of 6000 throwaway bottles.

They also make fuel bottles and even have insulated containers to accept their regular bottles.

Sigg Bottles from Switzerland

Sigg USA

The US versions, as expected, are full of bright colours and 'designer' patterns, but if this is what it takes for you to give up plastic, then so be it.

Sigg Bottles for the US

Serious and sustainable clothing from Slioch

'Ventile' is a 100% cotton fabric developed during the Second World War. When wet it swells to keep out water. You know of course that 'Goretex' has an effective life of about 3 years and is made of plastic (oil based) and will not work (breath) in moist salt water conditions. It is also a 'noisy' fabric.

Slioch Clothing is a tiny factory in the remote West Coast of Scotland. They produce custom made outdoor clothing. Clients include the local mountain rescue teams. Custom clothing means made to measure - you really do send them your measurements and get a custom made rain jacket. Expect to pay about double or triple what you would for a piece of plastic made in a sweatshop. Expect it to last about ten times longer.

Ventile clothing from Slioch

Walking Boots

A fine pair of leather walking boots with 'Vibram' soles will last for many years. Some people buying cheap and nasty sweatshop boots report buying a pair each year. This can't go on.

The 'Vibram' outsoles are screwed into the sole, and can be replaced several times.

To cut corners many makers (more probably importers.....) are using copies of 'Vibram' outsoles - the tread looks the part but they can't be replaced.

Walking boots from Zamberlan Vibram Europe in Italian and English Vibram US, with list of makers using their outsoles

Le Creuset cookware, lasts forever

Not only do these last a lifetime, they also save energy when cooking.

I don't have a calculation for the savings in energy, but a setting of about three quarters instead of full on the burner knob will still give a full boil.

Used in conjunction with a steamer, you have a highly effective way of cooking to last a lifetime.

Le Creuset cookware

Filson bags - canvas, leather and love

Ahh. Renewable cotton and leather, blended with a little, well cast, selection of metal fittings these bags have been produced since 1897. They make not only the traditional style of field bags, but have kept up with the times; the illustration is that of a padded briefcase designed to accept a laptop computer.

Filson bags

G Feller - belts, bags and backpacks

A great example of a small specialist maker. They make field bags and accessories especially for geologists, but have recently expanded the range to include a beautiful backpack, and even a leather cover for Moleskine notebooks. Their belts are described as 'likely last a lifetime'.

They will also make items to order.

G Feller casemakers

Hot water bottles

Everything old is new again....Not only from a sustainable source (the rubber tree) but also a perfect way of replacing a night's heating of the house with just one kettle of boiling water. A hot water bottle just puts the heat where it's needed and no where else.

If you do heat your house at night (personally I can't sleep with drying heat - the gentle warming of a dwindling wood stove is the exception) try this simple and very inexpensive alternative.

Steamers

If you do use more than one pan of boiling or simmering water to cook with, then a steamer just about halves the fuel used preparing each meal. Look for one where the steamer insert really does fit well inside the pan, and make the pan one made of heavy enough metal so that a boil can be maintained with less energy.

Campagnolo

The Italian maker of jewellery like bicycle parts which still come apart into replaceable and repairable pieces.

Every washer, bolt, cog and casting is available seperately. Tired of the ' you'll need a whole new...' nonsense? Campagnolo is about twice as expensive as Shimano, many times more expensive than the cheap and nasty no name brands. I am still using 20 year old parts, and all are working perfectly.

Campagnolo

Words we need to guard

Plain English Campaign; just that. Weasel Words, an Australian site to fight gobbledygook

There are whole sites (not to mention real dictionaries) devoted to promoting clear language and plain English. This can't match those.

Language is central to any communication, receiving information, passing on ideas and if we allow it to either be hijacked by 'spin' or neglected into disuse then we are truly lost.

So just a few more prominent, important or simply annoying cases of abusage and usage, actually of course, that should be usage and abusage.........

They are in no particular order, certainly not in annoyance or confusion caused.

• Negatively impact - what's wrong with 'harm'?

• Any word distanced from its modifier. Grappling with what is really meant shouldn't be this hard. A local community program is called the 'Immigrant Loan Program'. I want to call and ask to borrow two Latvians for the weekend. An agency working with young people advertised for a 'Youth Prevention Worker'; giving men the snip? Shooting anyone under 16? A recent poster promoted a 'Giant Tool Sale' - twenty foot hammers? Sometimes an additional 'of' or 'for' or 'with' is necessary to avoid such foggy phrases.

• Sleep deprived - tired

• Road map - another U.S. presidential speech writer suceeds in adding a fuzzy phrase to commonly used English. How is 'road map' different from good old 'plan'?

• The word 'community' added to any gathering to denote something in common, and adding disgracefull 'political correctness' to groupings which don't deserve it. The 'world community' condems Darfur and other such nonsense.

• 'Members' added to the word community (see above). A recent example: 'Members of the skateboarding community' - nothing wrong with just skateboarders or probably 'some skateboarders' I think......

• Regime change - overthrow, revolution, destabilizing a government which you don't approve of, military interference.

• Options - usually means alternatives, but 'options' avoids making a decision.

• Choices - (see above) usually means a choice, one alternative but offers an avoidance of having to make a decision. If I offer you tea or coffee you have a choice, not two choices.

• Top priority - another example (see 'Options' and 'Choices') of an inability to make a decision and be decisive. 'One of our top proirities...'. Priority is linked with prior, meaning before. The correct question is what is our priority not what are our priorities.

• A number of... - some, 12, at least twenty, several, many, are all accurate and more precise. 'A number of ' usually hides weak research or poor journalism.

Site credits and sources

Stephen Hill, currently in Vancouver, BC, Canada, can be reached at: info (at) mobilizingmouse.com