And like with corporate health and safety policies, regular people wake up from the latest environmental fad and realize it was a one dimensional issue after all.

What do I mean by that?

Look back to my brief harangue about how (in particular) New York banned plastic grocery bags, demanding we buy reusable ones or revert to paper bags--but we have to pay for those, and the first time I got one, the bag ruptured twice just in the process of picking it up.

Some of you are old enough to remember when plastic got popular, on the grounds that it was easier to recycle than brown bag paper.  Maybe the technology has changed and paper really is lower impact these days.

But in their push to ride the crest of this green trend, everyone failed or declined to consider other factors that should have gone into the calculus.

Maybe there aren't enough people like me who like using the bags as bathroom trash can liners to make a difference.  I'm skeptical of that, but to be fair all my data are anecdotal.

Back when the Chinese restaurants were open, orders were often placed in plastic bags even if they were first in a paper bag, because plastic is waterproof so if my mo shu leaked I wouldn't get stains on the passenger seat in my car.  Most people don't order enough at one time to fill up a cardboard box like is sometimes used, and those are bulky enough you'd need to have a catastrophic spill to soak all the way through before getting home, but the restaurant probably wouldn't have enough boxes to go around, anyway.

Anyway, fast forward to the pandemic and everybody suddenly realized that reusable bags can accrue germs when the sit on the floor of the car, or on the ground, or soak up spills.  That's not good for the home team.  Or for the immunocompromised team.  So now plastic bags are back on the menu.

I'm just going to leave it at that.  Next time, can we at least try to anticipate some unintended consequences first?