Eco-Sabbath

It's now time for a much needed Eco-Sabbath. This week has been challenging and exciting to try out because I had never done anything like this before. Today we got up and out of the hotel really early and left to go home (or back to Wofford). The Atlanta trip was a lot of fun, but it's time for a much needed day of rest. I got home about two in the afternoon and went straight to bed and got well-deserved nap in.

This day also gave me some time to reflect back on the week and see how I did in my "carbon cleanse". I think overall I did pretty well with what I had to work with. In college it's hard because you share a lot of things, and I also had a vacation at the end of the week that kind of threw off my results. Other than those things I think a made a lot of progress as well as some good habits to keep around to help conserve water, energy, fuel, and to try to not be as wasteful as I have been in the past. This week has been a great experience, but only time will tell if it had an effect on our future decisions...

Giving Back

While in Atlanta, It was really hard for me to give back to the community. Even though I was unable to give back this weekend, I have done many things in the past. One of my favorites was going on a mission trip to New Orleans in the Summer of 2007 right after I had graduated from high school. We were rebuilding a house that had been wiped out during Katrina for a woman and her husband. I had never really done anything other than simple volunteer work or give old clothes away so this was a big stretch for me. This experience made me realize how lucky I was to have the things I have, and even though I wasn't receiving anything in return from this strenuous labor, the look on the couple's face really said it all for me. They had been living in a FEMA trailer since 2005 and they finally got to see their house taking shape again after two long years. Though we only stayed for a week, we almost finished all of the dry wall in the house, and the group that worked the week after us finished the house up. It was a really great feeling to see the change that you can make in a person's life.

This week's "no impact" theme has really helped me realize that I have been careless about consuming numerous things such as water, fuel, and energy and need to cut back for sure. I am going to try and do more volunteer type things in the future, because it's good to help others and not expect anything in return because we are truly blessed as it is.

Water

Water is something that is very similar to energy in terms of our consumption. Almost every building in the US has running water and we make sure we use as much of it as we can. Water is not very expensive for humans to use, so we do so without really even thinking about it. Whether it be for drinking, showering, brushing teeth, or watering your lawn, all people use water. I am guilty of overusing water for sure. I usually take at least two showers a day, not sure why, but it has become a habit. I try to drink a few liters of water a day to stay hydrated and healthy for when I ride my bicycles. I do laundry, one to two times a week, and I, definitely leave the faucet running whenever I brush my teeth. Changing some of these simple habits in the slightest way could change my whole footprint in terms of water consumption.

For the rest of this week, I will be in Atlanta, so I will have to change these habits while in an unfamiliar setting, but I don't think it will be too bad. My main habits I need to change are, showering, doing laundry, and turning off the faucet when brushing my teeth. I can learn to take faster showers, and cut my showering to once a day. I can stop doing laundry as often, and wait to do it when I am literally out of clean clothes to wear, and I can simply turn off the faucet when I am brushing my teeth. I will continue to drink the same amount of water because my lifestyle and exercise plan requires me to stay hydrated. These things may be hard for me to change at first because I usually do them without really thinking about it. Maybe once I start to change these things, I will keep them around as new habits for the future to help decrease my H2O footprint.

Here is a link to some statistics on water use in the US over the past few years:
http://water.usgs.gov/watuse/

Energy

One thing Americans really take for granted is the availability of energy in this great country that we live in. We leave lights on, run air conditioning, leave all kinds of appliances running, and wash clothes often using the convenience of a washing machine/dryer. Going through the exercises listed in the "no impact week" reading, I realized that I am just as guilty as anyone else when it comes to energy consumption. My roommates and I often leave the lights on in our rooms even when no one is using the rooms. The bathroom light is constantly on, In our suite, all together we have seven televisions, four refrigerators, and three video game consoles, so I guess you could say that we are using a good bit more energy than your average college student.

In order to fix these habits, a huge lifestyle change is going to happen in this suite. For this week, I will definitely turn the lights off when leaving the room, and I am going to try and get by with the clean clothes that I have from doing laundry last week. I can also unplug some of the things that  I don't use very often, and cease to use them for the rest of the week. Since I have to use a computer to write this blog, that will be one thing that  I can't give up for the rest of the week. Hopefully the weather is nice, so that I can enjoy going outside while I am still here on campus. This weekend in Atlanta, I can cut back on energy use by turning lights off in the hotel room, and unplugging chargers and things when I'm not using them. On campus, I can also turn off the air conditioning and leave windows open instead.

I think this part of the week will be really tough because I don't think we realize how much energy we use without even thinking about it. I guess I will probably learn this the hard way from going through these exercises mentioned in the "no impact week" instructions...

Food

Something I have been trying to do for the past few months is eat healthier. I have definitely curved my diet into something that is better for me. Combining diet with my cycling as exercise I have managed to lose twenty pounds over the past few months. My main thing that I have cut back on is drinking soda, I have lowered my soda intake to sometimes not even having one a week. I drink a lot of juice and water. I have gallon jugs that I refill to cut back on plastic being disposed of in the room, and I also use nalgene bottles to drink out of. I have also cut back on the snack foods I had been eating and have been eating a lot of fruits as snacks. Instead of red meat for protein, I have also begun eating a good bit of peanut butter after bike rides and strenuous activity.

Though my eating habits have become healthier, I still definitely have my splurges. I end up eating Phase IV chicken fingers at least once a week, they are really good. Also my parents come down for dinner a lot, so I end up eating steak, chicken wings, or some other food that is not super good for me. Overall, I am really proud of the progress I have made with my eating habits. I am hoping to lose a bit more weight to get into better cycling shape so that I can do well in the Assault on Marion in may and continuing to adjust my eating habits will help out a lot. At Burwell, I have stuck to salads and the sandwich line, which I would probably do even if  I wasn't eating healthier because Burwell food has been awful this year. Hopefully the rest of this week and during my trip to Atlanta this weekend, I will be able to continue my healthier eating habits!

Transportation

Though I am an avid cyclist, I rarely use my bicycles for transportation, mainly just exercise. I usually just drive to the store or wherever I need to go without even really thinking about it. Cutting back on my fossil fuel burning this week will definitely be the hardest part for me mainly because I drive so much. The overuse of fossil fuels is a huge problem in the U.S. today, and I am guilty of contributing to this problem. I like to take day trips home, go places to visit friends, and sometimes just drive around to have some alone time. Today I even went and met my parents for dinner and ran errands without thinking about it.

My trip to Atlanta this weekend is also going to effect my consumption of fossil fuels this week. The good thing about our trip to Atlanta is that my friends are meeting me at Wofford and we are taking my car which is the most fuel-efficient of the group. For the rest of the week I will definitely cut back on my driving and walk or ride my bike places if it is reasonable. While we are in Atlanta we will be walking everywhere because the Hotel is close enough to the Georgia Dome making it reasonable to walk there.

Though I will not be participating in reducing my fossil fuel emissions this week as much as others in the class may be. I am still going to try to be aware of my consumption of fossil fuels and try to curb my driving habits to make my vehicle more fuel efficient. I guess that's a start.. right?

Check out the US Energy Information Administration's web site for some statistics on energy and fuel consumption: http://www.eia.gov/

Trash

Today is day two of our low impact week and it focuses on trash. The manual said to divide up the waste that we collected in our bag yesterday into piles of things we used more that ten minutes and things we used less than ten minutes. Mine was mostly things that I had used for less than ten minutes because it was for the most part and apple core and a banana peel, so I really didn't bother taking them out and dividing them up. This unit on minimizing out garbage output will definitely be a challenge. Most snacks I eat, if not fruit, are packaged in some sort of wrapper and the manual says to stay away from these things. I guess I'll just have to stick to fruit-only for the rest of the week, which isn't a bad thing.

The manual also talks about carrying reusable drinking containers around with us, which I already do with my Nalgene bottle on most days. The one way this week will be altered is that our public dining services at Burwell already offer reusable cups, plates and silver ware, so we won't even really have to try very hard to minimize trash output in those areas unless we do something else for meals. One thing I do in the mornings is drink juice, and once the bottle runs out I will have a large recyclable jug to do something with, so I will have to do something about that also. Right now, I think I can manage this garbage output pretty well.

The problem with Americans is that we are extremely wasteful people. We see this in Burwell every day. People trashing plates full perfectly edible food. That is the huge problem with having a place that is all-you-can-eat. I usually don't commit this offense because I'm on a healthy kick right now where I get a sandwich and a salad every day and definitely eat it all. Right now I think I have this garbage output situation on lock, but only time will tell how this will go. Maybe I just don't recognize my own wastefulness.