The Morrison Family

I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with my mailbox. The love part comes when there’s a squarish orange or red envelope inside packed with varying flavors of electronic entertainment. (Netflix and Gamefly!) More likely, there will be a community coupon mailer, some bill statements (all of which are paid online) and generally a metric ton of pre-approved credit card applications. This country is supposed to be in the midst of a credit “crunch” where people will are having problems securing lines of credit, but I guess that doesn’t apply to to credit card offers. Granted, we have pretty good credit, but this is getting a bit ridiculous.

I don’t care so much about the fact that credit card companies earn their money on the massive fees generated by consumers making late payments, or that interest rates are pushing the upper 20% boundary for most offers. If you want more on that an angle, check out the movie Maxed Out; although I warn you, it might be depressing to realize how much debt the average American has piled on. That aside, this particular rant is focused on the sheer volume of material that enters my mailbox, passes through my hands, into a shredder and is dumped directly into my recycling bin.

This might be common knowledge to the general public, but it finally caught my eye on a recent offer. There’s a toll free number, (888)-567-8688, that you can call to ”Opt-Out” of receiving these mailbox cloggers for the next 5 years, very similar to the “Do Not Call” registration to protect you from telemarketers.  It’s a completely automated process took around 5 minutes to complete, but it will probably save around 50+ lbs. of paper material needing to be recycled in our household this year.

I’ve never been accused of being especially eco-centric, but I’m starting to like the idea that some of the things that annoy me tend to annoy the planet too. Selfishly motivated good deeds still qualify as “good”, right?

What’s my next target? The yellow pages and ads-only-inserts.. Seriously, when was the last time you used the yellow pages? (WIth the caveat of being “satisfied” with the results of whoever you called?)

Just as I thought….