Wrapping it up

Week of November 16-20
It’s amazing how quickly these past few weeks have flown by! Of the three catagories that I selected for my lifestyle project, I’d have to say that garbage elimination was the hardest. A person truly doesn’t realize how much throw away in 1 day, until it is forbidden. I was not aware that most of what I eat is disposable. So many times I went to pop a bag of popcorn or toast a pop tart without realizing that, alas, I could not. Having completed this project, I am ashamed to say that I am going to continue throwing things away. However, now I will think twice before I dispose of something that could be reusable or check to see if it is recyclable. My second biggest challenge for this project was initiating some changes, ie recycling bins and the elimination of Styrofoam cups, in my workplace (Innerspace Cavern) . Recycling bins were badly needed next to all of the registers because of all the receipts and aluminum cans that get tossed out every day, and everyone knows that Styrofoam is just plain bad. I thought that, perhaps, there would be some extra bins in the warehouse that I could use for my project so that I would not have to go out and use up more resources, but unfortunately, there was not. I went out and bought 6 recycling bins: one for the gift shop, one for the ticket booth, two for the snack bar, and two for the office spaces behind closed doors. Then, I painted the bins green and labeled them “Paper Recycling” and one “Aluminum Recycling” so that everyone would know what they are. Every Sunday, when I work, I am going to take the recycling to a bin close by my house. I plan to continue this process as long as I work at Innerspace. It needs to be done, and no one else is going to do it. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get anything accomplished with the elimination of Styrofoam cups . The last phase of my project was water and electricity conservation. This was probably the least challenging because I already use very little electricity and water. However, I did notice that when I shower in the mornings and I am half awake, I probably use more water than I initially thought. I asked a friend to time me once, and it turns out that my showers are a little under 8 minutes rather than the 5 that I had expected. So, I apologize to all those people that I bragged to about taking 5 minute showers. I still protest that showers can be short, regardless of how long your hair is!!! Also, I noted the amount of time that I spent washing dishes, and I kept my loads of laundry to a minimum. With the electricity challenge, I simply kept on one incandescent light in my room when I needed to do homework, and that was enough. Most of the rest of the time I could get by with just opening the blinds in my room. Natural light is a beautiful thing! My roommate challenged me often, however, keeping on more lights than we really need. I also made sure to turn off lights when no one was in the room and limit my leisure time on the computer. I don’t know how the technology fast people could survive without a computer for 4 days. My computer is a very important element in my school work. Wrapping things up. This lifestyle project helped me to think about what I throw away, reduce waste in the workplace, and continue to conserve water and electricity. It’s been fun! Peace out!