Don't mess with the old folks
>
> The Green Thing
>
> At the cash register of the store, the young cashier suggested to the
> older woman that she should bring her own shopping bags because plastic bags
> weren't good for the environment.
>
> The woman apologized and explained, "We didn't have this green thing back
> in my earlier days."
>
> The cashier responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not
> care enough to save our environment for future generations. You didn't have
> the green thing."
>
> She was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing in its day.
>
> Back then, we returned milk bottles, soft drink bottles and beer bottles
> to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and
> sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they
> really were recycling. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a
> new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away
> the whole razor just because the blade got dull.
>
> We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator in every shop and
> office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a
> 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.
>
> Back then, we washed the baby's nappies because we didn't have the
> throw-away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine
> burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in
> our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters,
> not always brand-new clothing.
>
> But that young lady is right. We didn't have the green thing back in our
> day.
>
> Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every
> room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief, not a screen the
> size of the Melbourne Cricket Ground. In the kitchen, we blended and
> stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.
> When we packaged a fragile item to send in the post, we used wrapped up old
> newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. Back then,
> we didn't fire up an engine and burn petrol just to cut the lawn. We used a
> push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need
> to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.
>
> We drank water from a tap when we were thirsty instead of demanding a
> plastic bottle flown in from another country. We accepted that a lot of food was
> seasonal and didn't expect that to be trucked in or flown thousands of air
> miles. We actually cooked food that didn't come out of a packet, tin or
> plastic wrap and we could even wash our own vegetables and chop our own salad.
>
>
> Back then, city people took the tram or a bus, and kids rode their bikes
> to school or walked instead of turning their mothers into a 24-hour taxi
> service. We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets
> to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to
> receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000 miles out in space in order to
> find the nearest pizza joint.
>
> But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks
> were just because we didn't have the green thing back then?
>
> Please forward this on to another selfish old person who needs a lesson in
> conservation from a smart-ass young person.
>
> Remember:
>
> Don't make old people mad. We don't like being old in the first place, so
> it doesn't take much to piss us off.
> .
>
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