That's Fit

Just pulled some prescription numbing cream out of my medicine cabinet. It expired in July 2006 -- way back when I was still receiving treatment for cancer and couldn't bear the thought of a needle piercing the skin on top of my implanted port without my Lidocaine cream generously coating the entire area. It was a lifesaver, that cream. But it's been almost two years since I've needed it, two years since it was apparently even effective. Do I really need to keep it around, then? Why, of course not. And that's why I'm about to trash it.

Do you have your own stash of old and outdated medication. If so, you should wade through it and ditch what you no longer need. Don't flush what you've got, though, unless the drug packaging specifically instructs you to do so. And don't just toss your meds in the trash can. These actions can harm the environment and your drinking water.

What should I do with my old cream then? And what should you do with your leftover stock of drugs? Here's what the Office of National Drug Control Policy says you should do. This article offers several options too. You might also look into services provided by your city or county. The City of Cleveland just hosted a medication round-up in May. And the City of San Francisco is urging its residents to safely store old drugs until drop-off sites for expired goods are established.

Tell us: What do you do?

Did you know that Americans throw away an average of 25% of the produce they buy? A half a pound every day. That's a lot of money going down the drain, not to mention all the wasted nutrients, vitamins, antioxidants and the strain on the environment. Plus how are you supposed to motivate yourself to eat more fresh fruits and veggies when they're all smelly and sludgy in the bottom of your fridge?

The biggest reasons people toss so much produce are, thankfully, pretty easy to remedy: it happens because we're either storing it wrong or because we're buying too much at once and can't eat it fast enough. So make a better grocery list and only buy what you're going to be able to eat in the next few days, and learn how to keep it so it stays fresh as long as possible. For storage tips check out this article on Vegetarian Times -- it's chock full of awesome advice.

My grandma always had a compost pile. We grandkids never knew exactly why she went to all the work of gathering a bunch of trash and dumping it in a bin in her backyard. She had her reasons, though, and while we didn't grasp them way back when, we understand her intentions now.

Successful gardening -- my grandma loved gardening -- starts with feeding with soil. The best way to nourish the soil comes from an unlikely but nutrient-rich source -- the home and yard.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reports that food scraps and yard trimmings account for about 25 percent of all the waste generated in the United States. Composting cuts down on this percentage. Just reuse and recycle the garbage you create right at home and you'll benefit the planet. And your garden too.

Here's how you can get started.

• Start in the Spring.
  
  

• Find some scraps and find a place to put them. Make a big pile in an out-of-the-way outdoor spot or buy bins to contain your compost and protect it from the elements.
  
  

• Grab a pitchfork or shovel so you can turn your pile and incorporate oxygen.
  
  

• Gather fruit and vegetable scraps, coffee grounds, tea bags, eggshells, shredded white paper, newspaper (nothing shiny, just newsprint), torn-up toilet paper, paper towel tubes, and plant and yard trimmings.
  
  

• Do not use meat, oil, and dairy products. They won't break down properly, will smell badly, and will attract pests. Avoid weeds too. They will only produce more weeds.
  
  

• Go heavier on "brown" materials -- leaves, straw, wood -- than the "green" items from your kitchen.
  
  

• Compost should be kept as moist as a wrung-out sponge.
  
  

• Compost is finished when it smells good, looks good, and feels like dark, rich, crumbly earth. Your original ingredients should be unrecognizable. If you do nothing but add scraps to your pile, it may take up to one year before you realize your final product. If you actively work your pile -- turning it, monitoring your green/brown ratio, checking on moisture -- then it could take as little as one month.
  
  

• When ready, sprinkle your compost on the soil surface. Then start planting.
  
  

• If your compost begins to stink, bury your kitchen scraps in the material from the yard.

Did you know that Americans send about 96 billion pounds worth of food to landfills every year? We produce an enormous amount of food per year, yet we still manage to waste about one quarter of it. Not only is this a blatant slap in the face to the thousands of people who go hungry every night, but it is also an economic burden to society on the whole, for we spend close to $1 billion a year to dispose of this food.

How can we do our part in helping to fix this problem? Here are a few good ideas:

• Donate leftover food to local food banks, shelters, and community service organizations
• Participate in a co-op buying program to support local farmers
• Refrigerate or freeze foods that can safely be stored until a later date
• Compost food waste
• Make sure that your refrigerator temperature setting is not too high, which can cause early decomposition
• Plan meals by food's 'use by' date to reduce waste
• Only purchase perishable foods that you are certain you will soon consume

For years, I had the same fitness routine: I would head to the gym with my friends, and we'd do our usual routine of exercises while chatting and reading magazines. After a while, we noticed we hadn't really shaped up much. What gives? We wondered. It's pretty obvious now though -- we were wasting time, putting too much effort into gossiping than working out. For us, it was more about being social than getting fit. Now I work out alone (except when I join a group class) and I'm much more productive that way.

If you're finding your workouts easy and painless, chances are you're not doing much good for yourself. And really, if you're not there to work out to the best of your ability, why bother paying for the gym membership and wasting all that time there? But, if your goal is to get fit, here are some things to avoid:

There will be a shortage of toys this coming holiday season due to underestimated demand and the whole toy recall thing -- you know, because of the lead paint and toxic plastic used in the production of some children's play things. "Say it isn't so," you might be saying. Me? I say this is the best news I've heard in a while.

I'm always looking for excuses to not buy toys. We already have a house full and in my opinion, they are a grand waste of money. Most toys, with the exception of imagination-builders like blocks, puzzles, and games, have a shelf life of a few hours for my two guys. I can't begin to list off all the trinkets we've brought home that ended up swiftly stuffed into some toy bin without a second thought. So yes, I like that the toys shelves may be a little bare this year. "See kids, no toys, sorry."

Now don't think I'm a Grinchy old mom or anything. I love presenting my kids with gifts that make them happy, and Christmas is one of my favorite times of the year. Learning about this trouble with toys just gives me more motivation to be creative, to purchase items for my kids that have a little more staying power and really matter in the long run. I'm thinking physical fitness here. Just imagine the possibilities.

Sometimes I over-shop. I buy too many bananas, a loaf of bread my family never finishes, even ground turkey meat that sits in the fridge beyond it's expiration date. Sadly, these foods end up tossed in the trash. What a waste.

As first reported by Kristin Darguzas on ParentDish, American families trash, on average, 14% of the food they buy, mostly because it spoils. Never fear, though. According to this article, there are six measures we can take for storing our food for lasting freshness. Now these are some tips I can use. How about you?

• Refrigerate fruits and vegetables separately. Some fruits emit a gas that speeds the ripening of veggies.

Thanks to Al Gore, we're all getting a little more aware of CO2 emissions and global warming. But here's another threat to our earth, and it comes from the garbage dump: Methane. Methane is produced by landfills, that place where most of your garbage is probably going. And methane in the atmosphere traps more heat than CO2 -- by a lot.

If we all took steps to reduce the amount of garbage our family produces -- by recycling, re-using, composting and buying products with environmentally-friendly packaging -- I think it would be a major step towards making this earth livable for future generations. Don't you agree?

Via Fitsugar.

As do many people, I hate wasting food. So, although it's a poor excuse for overeating, the fact there's "just a little left in the pan and it won't really keep" is one of my most common pitfalls when it comes to portion control. Portion sizes in this country are out of control, there's no doubt about that, and could it be that one contributing reason is people's aversion to wasting food? It's a small reason probably, but I bet it's part of it.

Not to downplay the challenges of cooking for a large family, but having extra food sitting around isn't usually one of them. But for single people, or even some couples, it's another story altogether. Most recipes don't make just 1 or 2 servings, and most foods in the store don't come packaged in smaller more convenient amounts, or if they do they're much more expensive and hardly make sense.