h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I reckon if they put the workings of an easy to programme vcr into an impossible to open milk carton, and the unruly milk into an all too accessable vcr body,(after sealing up a few holes of course), they could solve two problems in one go ( kids who could get their own snacks and a vcr that does'nt need scraping out when adults want to watch those educational tapes, that nobody ever seems to own, but seem to exist in an itinerant library of their own......er, but I digress).Anyhow, that's what I think..I think. I'll let you know?

The humble milk carton or not
To you and me it may seem just another annoying replacement for perfectly satisfactory mode of milk transportation (the milk bottle).
But no, really the cardboard carton is a cunningly conceived subjugation plot, by keeping the masses talking about the bloody design floor in milk purveying container, governments and corporations carry on doing what the f*%k they like.

As doorstep deliveries in the UK are under threat from an EU directive stating that milk must be packaged in cartons (apparently the bureaucrats say cartons are more ecologically sound), I hate the things even more! Apart from always sqirting over me when I try to open one, the milk always dribbles over the surface before going into the mug.

On the ecology front, the milk bottles are reused up to 40 times and are delivered by electrically powered vehicles, in towns and cities. Although some rural areas have theirs delivered by diesel engined floats due to the distance and inclines on the rounds.

In one area an enterprising milkman has set up his own recycling service by collecting empty wine and beer bottles on his morning rounds.

I don't know why any of you have so much trouble opening milk cartons. I've used them since I was little and have never had any problems. Maybe it is the ineptitude of the people who previously posted here or maybe the milk cartons in Canada are just that much better and easier to open than the milk cartons there.

I've never even seen a milk bottle in use and cannot really comment on that point.

Well, they have gotten better here. I think they have made the paper thicker so it doesn´t rip so easily. But the cartons are still just thrown in the bin and end up on a landfill. How ecological.

I am just accident prone and as I prefer my milk in bottles, don't get much practice in opening cartons!

At least the supermarkets now put milk into plastic bottles with caps, which makes life a whole lot easier.

The doorstep delivery service is still widely available in the UK and the rattle of milk bottles heralds the dawn as much as the birds do. Long may it continue.

You haven't mentioned one obvious advantage the milk bottle had over the carton: you could see if the milk was ok, thus preventing the accidental pouring of foul-smelling lumpy cheese mixture into your tea

I was sorry to see that the carton doesn't replace the cow, because there is a theory that the belching of cows is a major cause of the destruction of the ozone layer. Seems they hawk up all this methane. I have actually read this more than once. Plus you can't put pictures of lost and abducted kids on the side of a cow - you can, but how many would see them? Of course if the kids are lost in a cow pasture....

I didn't think it was the belching that caused the problem, but what little I know about cows was learnt from Jame Herriot.

James even

It`s not just cows that "belch" ,think of the humans too!!
It was said on a recent documentary on the Discovery channel that on average humans *ahem* "break wind" 15 times a day!!,and we aint just talking about blokes here,women too.Now divide that figure by the estimated population of this now methane saturated planet,which is roughly 6 billion strong and that makes for a lot gas! Can you imagine if we found a way to harness this "fart power",it would be and end to all our fuel needs.
Another case of politicians and scientists aiming to shunt the blame from us to the poor cows

Clearly, in harnessing this gaseous energy, a milk bottle would be far more efficient than a carton. If such a novel usage of milk bottles were accepted world-wide, then the milk bottle would definitely beat the carton on the ecological front. The only barrier to this is psychological- can we really bring ourselves to fart into milk bottles? There's nothing wrong with this practice, and it can, if done right, be highly enjoyable- I know, I've been there. And anyway, people very quickly overcame the practical barrier of actually opening a milk carton, so why not this? Bring back the bottle, get easy access to your milk and save then planet all at once.

Even worse. To exacerbate the problem, the king of "beers" or so they say (Budweiser, not from Budweis) is the top selling beer (or beer-like liquid) in the world. All this has ever produced in my body is a craving for real beer, lack of any mind altering effects and severe expulsion of gas from my intestinal tract. If the most consumed beer-like substance is this, perhaps replacing it with the real thing would alleviate concerns about global warming etc. and leave the poor cows alone to munch rainforests and get turned into mass market beef-like hamburgers sold by the biggest hamburger food substitute chain. Suprisingly this food chain has not got together with the "king of beers" to pollute the world with fake food and drink substitutes at the same establishments yet.

Here in NZ, we had milk cartons wished on us in 1989, and American designed ones at that! A few people have tried to get bottledmilk going again - but NZers are nothing if not apathetic! The Govt at the time was deeply friendly with business, which is why we now have cartons - someone saw many $$$ coming their way, if the law against selling milk in anything other than hygienic re-usable bottle was repealed - and it was!

I once had a nasty experience with a milk carton.






I don't want to talk about it.

Oh, do please, tell us about it...