TIDBITS: Dawn Blaisdell of Lewis Run passed along a couple of things she thought our readers would find interesting.

Dawn writes, “Have you ever thought, How long does it take to decompose of an item that you throw out and don’t recycle? Here is what I read from my favorite magazine”:

• paper towels, 2-4 weeks

• banana peels, 3-4 weeks

• paper bags, 1 month

• newspaper, 1 ½ months

• apple cores, 2 months

• cardboard, 2 months

• cotton gloves, 3 months

• orange peels, 6 months

• plywood, 1-3 years

• milk cartons, 5 years

• cigarette butts, 10-12 years

• leather shoes, 25-40 years

• tin cans, 50 years

• rubber boot soles, 50-80 years

• plastic containers, 50-80 years

• Aluminum cans, 200-500 years

• plastic bottles, 450 years

• disposable diapers, 550 years

• monofilament fishing line, 600 years

• plastic bags, 200-1,000 years

• wool socks, 1-5 years

“Reduce, Reuse, Recycle,” Dawn advises.

We imagine these timeframes are how long it takes for these items to decompose in nature, while stuff piled up in landfills would take much longer to break down.

“Some of these years are way beyond our years, so I guess the next generation was to report in and pass on the report.”

This next tidbit is a little lighter:

“While I was visiting my daughters in Taylorsville, N.C., for a month, I came across this on one of the sites,” Dawn writes. “Right to the point.”

“Welcome to the 21st Century”

• our phone — wireless

• cooking — fireless

• cars — keyless

• food — fatless

• tires — tubeless

• dresses — sleeveless

• youth — jobless

• leaders — shameless

• relationships — meaningless

• attitudes — fearless

• babies — fatherless

• feelings — valueless

• children — mannerless

“Everything is becoming less but still our hopes are endless. In fact, I’m speechless!”