Even worse if you have cats. Now any box can be kept based on the excuse that the cats can use it. And the thing is, they will use them! It's just a balancing act of not having so many boxes you turn into a hoarder house.
this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2025
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me_irl
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You can combine many boxes into an elaborate cat castle. I am so sorry for sharing this. Cut holes in between the box-floors and build cardboard ramps with scraps. Again, I apologize. More scraps can be used for fortress walls along the top. You can build wonderful, elaborate monstrosities this way. Beware this dark magic, it may consume you and those cats around you. BEWARE.
Edit: Employ the handyman's secret weapon, duct tape, liberally to make a good bond between levels. Masking tape works in a pinch. Your kids might even help decorate with marker and/or construction paper. These are the darkest of arts, tread carefully through these waters.
One of my cats is a cardboard chomper. I've made elaborate box high-rises and eventually he will topple them like a beaver. I keep doing it.
Please stop peeking in through our windows
My dog loves if I put snacks inside Amazon boxes or toilet paper rolls, or any cardboard really. Treats inside and close it up. Poodle dog takes it into her spot and 10 minutes of tearing up the box to get to treats. ❤️
I had a spindrift box from Costco for 2 months because my kittens chose this box to survive.
It was their space ship until an unfortunate roomba incident …
I have "hoarder" in my blood, and every day is a struggle to just throw things away and fight the urge of "that might be useful one day".
And then you finally get the courage to throw it away only to have an exact application where it would have been useful a couple of weeks later.
I got a paper shredder for like $10 from the thrift store and it fucking eats cardboard boxes like nothing. I now look forward to getting boxes so I can shred them to fuel my compost pile.
Gonna need a brand/model #. All the ones I’ve tried break and jam really easily.
Royal 100x. Highly recommend.
I thought most cardboard boxes had some toxic chemicals on them. Edit: Turns out normal brown boxes can be composted as long as you remove tape and stickers.
Damn, good idea.
Reusing things that are reusable is definitely people don't do enough of these days. If a box / jar / container / bottle / bag / piece of paper can enjoy a second or third life then why not do it? Too many objects are treated as "disposable", "single use" and then they get tossed - sometimes for recycling but often straight into the general trash.
And when you finally have too much and decide to throw them out, something comes up the next day where you need boxes.
Happened to me recently. Family was visiting so we did some major cleaning around the house. I threw out a couple of perfectly useable moving boxes. Then when my brother arrived, he told us they were moving apartments in 2 weeks and were looking for boxes.
As someone who grew up poor, I have the hardest time tossing cardboard. I built so many cardboard and masking tape toys, including entire forts and landscapes for my hand me down (donated) action figures.
I didn't even grow up poor, but the price of boxes is way higher than I thought it was. Its hard to justify just throwing something away like that.
That’s actually a useful skill, and it’s good for the environment (and pocketbook/wallet) because you’re up-cycling something most people would just throw away.
I have hoarding tendencies due to a history of poverty. Not poor any more, at least not grindingly poor, but the trauma remains.
As a result, over the last two decades I have built up a rather brutally pragmatic system of “does it have long-term utility” style of purging and standardization that allows me to let go of a lot of junk.
For example, we have standardized on six different box configurations, starting with avocado boxes from Costco (the more square kind without the access dip on the one long side) as the physically largest ones, due to their high utility and frequent likelihood of being used. All other box styles get tossed unless we have an immediate use for it, whereupon it gets tossed into the recycling as soon as that use is over.
Is it perfect? No. But it’s effective and the simplicity lowers decision-based stress.
Recycling bin
That's the thing, for many of us there's no recycling bin for cardboard, plastic, glass, etc, it all goes into one big mixed public dump, like it was the goddamned 1980s and before.
There is one neighborhood operation that picks up the organic rinds and peels and eggshells for the compost. But they don't want any cardboard in there, napkins they don't mind.
There have been recycling campaigns, but they all seem to have petered out, then Covid put the nails in their coffin.
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Cardboard boxes are so expensive if you have to buy them for some reason, but free in a lot of scenarios, bulky to keep if you don’t need them and moisture sensitive, but you will need them again, but is it soon enough to be worth the inconvenience of storing them... It’s not trivial.
Luckily at work we get numerous cardboard boxes from servers.
Double walled and a solid conatruction to hold >25kg and a high compression strength.
Gotta love Lemmy for premium shitposts like this, where one gets actual, high-value advice on effective box upcycling in the exploding comments, along with a complimentary, self-conscious chuckle.
I wouldn’t call it a shitpost, is it? It’s just an accurate observation about adulthood to me.
The guy who told us he uses a second hand shredder to feed his boxes to the compost bin may actually be anti shit posting. Straight up taking shit's jobs.
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"I should save this box, I might return this Macaroni and cheese."
... I have about a dozen perfectly good boxes of products I've bought over the past year ... in case I have to return them
OK, OK, boxes from four-five years ago ... but who's counting, those are good boxes!
Or the packing materials, too, “because you know how much this shit costs at Home Depot?”
My best friend and I live on opposite sides of the US. We've been sending the same bubble wrap pieces back and forth to protect birthday and Xmas gifts for like a decade now lol
You’ve been sending each other your (platonic) love. The bubble wrap is just along for the ride— and it’s only ever seen the best of both of you.
Heck, that is the cutest way to think of it
Last time my wife and I moved, we spent a ridiculous amount of money on large boxes and totes and stuff for packing. After that, I definitely feel a bit of pain breaking down a large sturdy box for the recycling bin, but it's just not worth the storage space.
We do still keep boxes for high-dollar items that have special packaging like TVs and other electronics. Both in case we need to move them, and it generally bumps the resale price if you have original packaging.
Same goes for "good" plastic bags, like the ones made of thicker plastic with sturdy handles that you can use over and over again.
Even more important if you have a cat
Or that one weird looking piece of wood in the corner of the garage.
I'll need it one day! I swear!
It's organized! I've got my scrap wood, my project wood, my curing wood, my spare wood...
I prefer to organize it by the time of day. I've got my morning wood, my noon wood, my afternoon wood, my evening wood, and my night wood.
Dude. If your wood lasts for more than four hours you should seek medical attention.
Can you imagine the days of milk crates? I would have needed a separate shed. The jars in my house are already out of control.
I don't debate myself about keeping boxes, I debate my 4yr old .. I lose more often than I'd like to admit ..
Stay out of my second room closet. There are no "good boxes" tossed haphazardly in there. None at all.
I just moved house, and several boxes lost structural integrity during the move, but one that finally gave out, I've had for over 25 years. It was originally the box for a CRT computer monitor, and it was a very good box.
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If you get into tabletop gaming it makes it even worse. “Don’t throw that block of styrofoam away, that would make for great terrain!”
This, but I might need it for returns.
I just use them as a makeshift trash can (trash box?) for other cardboard stuff. That way it's never dirty enough to be unusable but I don't feel bad for throwing it out whenever it fills up because it was already used twice.
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