No Impact Experiment Day 3, 4, 5

The past few days were focused on transportation, food, and energy.

Transportation:
Transporation is probably one of the easier challenges because I have lived without owning a car for about 4-5 years now. I take the bus, and every so often ride my bike, to work and back and share rides to activities. No Impact Man had the leads even giving up elevators, but I will do that more for health than impact.(and I don't do it all the time). If anything I would like to increase my bike commuting to work this year.

Food:
I have made a new year's resolution to eat locally but it is proving to be more challenging than I imagined. My favorite store TJ's not only has lots of packaged goods, but fruits and vegetables from lots of places other than California :( But on the other hand I just picked up a box of organic vegetables from a farm in Petaluma called Countyline Harvest. I can order a box week to week and for 25.00 I got an amazing amount of freshly picked (today) veggies! Now I can support a local farm and get an amazing amount of good produce I can afford. I think I will be able to use it for a week and a half to at least almost two weeks (gonna try cooking with turnips for the first time!)

I have also decided to buy food with less packaging and will be transforming my kitchen over the coming weeks to be able to accomodate for bulk foods. Will have fun with some before after pics with that, too!

Energy:
This probably the hardest challenge for me. I like my TV, I like cooking with a stove, and I like turning on my little heater when my steam heat unit just isn't powerful enough to warm my little apartment. What I do already is shut down things with power strips. I am all for solar power when I can get my own place, but I leave camping to being outside, although maybe watching less TV and reading more wouldn't hurt:)

5 things I am grateful for:
1. Fresh farm produce brought to my community
2. Warm clothes (It's been COLD in the city!)
3. Digital camera so I can take pics to share on my blog
4. My job (so many people out of work)
5. My sis so I can learn more about making less trash this year :)

No Impact Experiment Day 2: Trash

Today I was asked to look through a trash bag of stuff I created on Sunday and separate stuff into piles - one pile of stuff used up to 10 minutes and stuff used longer than 10 minutes. My bag:

Used longer than 10 minutes:
pair of shoes I bought at Goodwill

Used less than 10 minutes:
box from take out food
plastic wrap
paper coffee grind holder
candy wrapper

It was a simple exercise but very effective...especially when the pile for < 10 minutes was so much larger!!! I have a lot of rethinking to do about purchases and packaging. For example, I, along with hundreds of people in California, LOVE Trader Joes...but Trader Joes is notorious for selling packaged stuff - fruit, prepared meals, etc. Man, I LOVE all the convenience, but while standing in the checkout line today all I could see was the potential for filling a landfill - all those goodies piled on the way to the cashier crying out for me to pick them up and quickly, secretly slip them into the cart before my conscience had a chance to catch up. I think I need to reevaluate what I have available in my kitchen for storing food stuffs and purchase bins for things, like cereal, that I can buy in bulk.

No Impact Experiment - Day 1: Consumption

During Day 1 I have been challenged to reevaluate what I want to purchase this week and consider what I can get other ways, whether my own stuff, second hand, or self-made. How timely considering it is the week after Christmas and many people, including me, have gift certificates to use :)

What I realized as I thought about what I wanted to purchase with my holiday money is that I am a pretty particular shopper. I drive my sister crazy musing for hours and days over a purchase - clothes, kitchen gadgets, etc - doesn't matter what, I just don't want to waste money or buy stuff I won't use! I think I do want to refocus myself this year on combing the used gear websites and stores thoroughly before buying, however. I realize I already am on a route towards reduced purchases, but I can add a stronger focus on used goods, too.