Category: Ethic

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Delectable Stationery Alert!

Behold:

A small book covered in a red fabric with quantities of stylized floral ornamentation in gold and silver. Next to it, a fountain pen in brown wood.

This delectable morsel of stationeryhood is a silk sari journal made by Love Calcutta Arts, a business which exists to provide women with the option of employment that isn’t the sex trade. A lot of LCA’s products involve what is popularly known as upcycling: turning old saris into kitchen trivets, quilted coverlets, or book upholstery.

The sari-covered journals come in two sizes (small: 11cm x 13.5cm x 40 leaves; large: 15cm x 18.5cm x 60 leaves) and a range of colour groups: red, green, purple, orange, black, and pink. And because they aren’t mass-produced in a factory, but instead made by carefully trained craftswomen in a workshop, they are all different.

My one (let’s be honest: my first one) is Small and Red.

A small fabric-covered book sitting slightly open on its open edge. The near part of the spine appears red, but the further part and the covers appear to be a mix of green tones.

OR IS IT??

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How to Live Without TV (a Past Post)

This post was originally published over five years ago, but it echoes a book I am currently reading (or possibly the book echoes the post – they were published in the same year). In Digital Minimalism, Cal Newport writes, “you’re more likely to succeed in reducing the role of digital tools in your life if you cultivate high-quality alternatives to the easy distraction they provide. For many people, their compulsive phone use papers over a void created by a lack of a well-developed leisure life.”
Oof.
I feel Past Me provided some good advice here for Present Me on how to not get sucked into the small screen. So, bearing in mind that we’re not just talking about TV here, how do you live without TV?

  1. Remove TV from house; delete all TV-related tabs, apps etc.
  2. Ta-da! You are living without TV.
black and white drawing of a TV dumped in a rubbish bin


Except what we really want to know is not how to live without TV, but how to thrive without TV. (Side note: if English was a more sensible language, that would have rhymed and been an all-around more catchy sentence.)

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12 Days of Christmas Giving

There are a large number of posts and articles circulating at this time of year, with gift guides for this, that, and the other person in your life. This is not one of those posts. Today we look at a different kind of giving: giving to those who actually need it.

Some traditions say the 12 Days of Christmas are those from the 25th of December to the 5th of January; others say the 26th of December to the 6th of January – aka Epiphany or Twelfth Night. You can choose either, or you can pretend to be a baker and have your “12” Days run from the 25th to the 6th.

Since this coming Sunday marks the beginning of Advent, the fast that leads up to the feast of Christmas, this post could be construed as a little premature. But it never hurts to have time to mull over things. These days the “fast” of Advent seems to be more about the speed of the frenziedly busy days whizzing by, rather than abstaining from something.

(You’ve probably heard of the tradition of giving something up for Lent; perhaps we could consider choosing the least life-giving/most soul-destroying part of the December hustle and bustle and announce to the world that we have given it up for Advent.)

A post-it note stuck to a rough wall. In the glowing light it reads "To Do: Christmas"

But back to the 12 Days of Christmas Giving. The idea is that for each day, one chooses a charity to make a donation to. You might have favourite charities all lined up, or you might want to choose a number of charities working in an area you are passionate about. Or – and this is my personal favourite – you could actually choose Christmas-themed charities.

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