#214 - I Feel Like Hans Brinker - Part Deux

Pfixing the Pfaucet

Last Tuesday I talked about checking for leaks in all of our faucets and toilets. And this past weekend I tackled one of the offending springs: hubby's sink in the upstairs bath. Here's how it went down. Or, rather, how I went down. Under the sink, that is. Get your mind out of the gutter already, this is a family blog. (Actually it's not. If you're under the age of 13, please stop reading now. I tend to use foul language and inappropriate innuendo - and I wouldn't want to be teaching you things that you should rightfully be learning on the school bus.)

Anywhich, back to the sink. I did some research online and found that the most common reason for a leaky faucet is a bad washer inside the faucet - which can easily be replaced for just about the price of a cup of coffee. So I started ripping the sucker apart. I took off the bottom part where the water comes out. Nope, just an aerator there. I took off the stylish 80's knobby part that looks like a plastic star. Nothing there but a dead end. Finally, I tried the last remaining joint - the part where the handle meets the base. No go. I even had hubby give it a try. I swear that connection must have been welded shut. So that meant to fix the leak I'd have to replace the whole damn faucet.

I head down to the 'Depot and pick out another Pflashdance-Pflashback, star-shaped Pfaucet (hey, it may be butt-ugly, but at least it matches the other butt-ugly Pfixtures in the house). Apparently they either produced way to many of these or there's a bigger demand for Pfabulous Pfugly Pfixtures than I thought. It was also quite a bit more expensive than just a washer. It set me back $61. That's a lotta coffee beans, my friends.

I head on home, pull my pants down below the crack of my ass, and immediately start dismantling the old faucet. Demo is definitely my strong suit. I had that sucker outta there in under 10 minutes. Putting the new one in? Well, it probably would have been easier if I'd read the directions, but I stumbled through it and was done and cleaned up in under 90 minutes, start to finish. And that's with the help of my two special apprentices dropping pipe wrenches on my feet every two minutes and trying to crawl into the very small vanity with me while saying "Mommy, I helpa you?"

Long story longer, I was hoping to just replace a washer, but had to replace the entire faucet instead. :-( But, it's done and now it won't be a wasteful drip anymore. :-) I don't want to donate the old faucet to the Habitat ReStore though because it's a leaker. :-( But I will take it down to a local recycler so he can pull off the copper piping and other salvageable metals. :-)

It's just been a roller coaster of emotion as you can tell. Hopefully fixing the crapper won't be so Pfrustrating.

#211 - I Feel Like Hans Brinker - Part I

Checking for Leaks

So I'm on a water-saving kick lately. I'm trying to chip away at that Riot Category and get it down as low as possible before summer arrives. It's not really cheating, per se, I just want to see if I can hit the 10% goal now, because I know in a few weeks that number will jump thanks to watering the garden and bathing the stinky kids more often.

And so, I'm diligently checking every sink, tub and toilet in my house for any sign of leaks. Here's how I'm doing it:

At night, I place an empty cup under each sink faucet and go to bed. In the morning, if there's any water in the cup, I know there's a leak. The same system works for the tubs. Our shower heads don't need to be checked since they're both tub/shower combos and the water won't even go up to the shower head unless the pulley-uppey thing on the tub faucet is up (sorry to go all technical plumber jargon on you there).

Toilets, though, are another matter altogether. Mostly, because they're more fun to check. [ECO-DORK ALERT] I remove the tank off the back of the toilet and squeeze in a couple drops of food coloring. Then I leave it be for 20 minutes or so. When I come back, if the water in the bowl is colored, I know there's a leak. That, or, one of the kids needs some medical attention stat. But if the water's still clear, I'm leak-free.

So, as you can guess, this is a two-part change here. I've checked for leaks and found two. Hubby's sink in the upstairs bath and the downstairs toilet. Now I've got to decide whether to tackle these problems myself or call a professional. I think I'll go with my standard M.O. of messing with it until I break it so badly that a professional will be able to charge me double the normal rate to make an emergency visit. That's just the way I like to do things.

#207 - Powder to the People

Switching from liquid dishwashing detergent to a powder

Yes, we're talking about my dishwasher. Again. Seems I just can't stop messing with that nightly routine. It irks me that I don't have the mental will to skip the pre-rinse and so I am trying to compensate by over analyzing all the other aspects involved in making my Corelleware shine.

You may recall that way back in November, I gave up my Cascade in favor of a gentler liquid detergent - Seventh Generation. Great product. Worked like a freakin' charm and without all the phosphates and fragrances. So why change again then?

Well the Liquid 7G comes in a plastic bottle, whereas the Powder 7G comes in a cardboard box. We all know that plastic is a petroleum-based product made from a non-renewable resource and that it cannot be recycled, rather, it can only be down-cycled into fleece, park benches, sleeping bags and whatnot. Cardboard, on the other hand, comes from a renewable resource and, in fact, this particular box is made from recycled fibers. Cardboard can also be recycled many times before the fibers break down too much to be useful.

So really, it's all about the packaging. Not the product.

But as long as we're on the subject of dishwashers, I thought you might like to know that I've worked very hard to minimize the amount of water I use when pre-rinsing. I've got it down to a trickle that I shut on and off while rinsing and I keep the plug in the drain so that I can just swish the silverware around at the end. Anyhow, all this obsessing has dropped my pre-rinse water usage down to a paltry 2 gallons per night. Armed with these reduced numbers, I have since developed a little formula here that proves that, for me at least, pre-rinsing my dishes actually saves energy. I know. I know. I need to let this go, but I CAN'T! Anyhow, here goes:

Pre-rinsing my dishes utilizes two gallons of cold water (I don't use the hot water for pre-rinsing) This allows me to use the short cycle on my dishwasher, which gives me a total of:

• 2 gallons cold water
• 6.1 gallons hot water
• 36 minutes of electricity

This means I've used 8.1 total gallons of water. And at 440 BTU's to heat one gallon of water, we've used 2,684 BTU's of energy (.786 kWh). I've also used .84 kWh for the motor. That totals 1.626 kWh.

If I don't pre-rinse, I skip the 2 gallons of cold rinsing water, however, I'm now forced to use the Heavy Wash setting on the dishwasher to get all the crud off the dishes. This means I'll be using:

• 0 gallons of cold water
• 8.5 gallons of hot water
• 89 minutes of electricity

Broken down, this equates to 8.5 gallons of water, 3740 BTU's (1.095 kWh) and 2.08 kWh for the motor, for a total of 3.175kWh.

So, here's the comparison:

PRE-RINSE: 8.1 gallons and 1.626 kWh vs. HEAVY CYCLE: 8.5 gallons and 3.175 kWh

Hands down winner is the pre-rinsing, saving me over 146 gallons of water and 565 kWh per year! Whew! Now FINALLY I can rinse in peace!

#188 - Dropping A Brick In The Toilet

Sounds Like A Euphemism For Taking A Crap

But it's not. It's actually a way of further reducing the amount of water you use every time you flush the toilet. Only, in my case, I didn't use a brick. I used three empty glass honey jars I had sitting around - one for each toilet tank in the house. I filled each one with two cups of water and placed it in the tank, away from all the moving flushy-type stuff.

Tada! Instant water savings every time I flush! Which is much less often than it used to be (yeah, have I mentioned that this is a slippery slope change? Once you get used to seeing pee in the toilets, you tend to stop flushing unless the toilet paper is actually coming up over the rim ;-).

Also, have I mentioned how much I am LOVING Technology-Free Day? The only downside is it doesn't leave me much time to work on my Monday post, so they end up being kind of short. Like this one.

Savings:

Two cups of water per flush and I'd say we're now averaging eight flushes per day. So 8 x 2 = 16 cups per day, or one gallon. In one week, that's seven gallons of water. In a year, 365 gallons saved! That shaves another percentage point off my riot numbers! Woo Hoo!

Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

This literally could not be easier. Fill jars with water. Set jar in tank. Forget about it forever. The only caveat I'd give is to make sure the labels are off the jars. You don't want them to come off and float around in the tank -- they might interfere with the flushing mechanism.

#178 - Your Face Will Freeze Like That

Changing Up My Nightly Face-Washing Routine

Despite my previously discussed pre-rinsing compulsion, conserving water is actually one of my favorite things to do for the environment. Water conservation changes are nice, immediate-feedback kind of changes. They're easy to calculate, requiring just buckets and measuring cups. And I love that I can visually see what I'm saving, rather than just talk about invisible kilowatts or therms.

So whenever I find an opportunity to make a little water change, I jump on it. In fact, I started instituting this face-washing change several months ago, but didn't have it tweaked to where it was a convenient enough that I was sure it would stick. Until now.

Let's say it's time for bed. What do I need to do? Well, I need to wash my face, put on astringent and my rosacea cream, then brush my teeth before hitting the sack. Now I already managed to save 76 ounces each day with my new tooth brushing routine, and I needed to cut down on the face-washing water waste as well.

The biggest problem I had was waiting for the water to warm up. For some reason, it takes a good 30 seconds or so before the hot water gets up to our bathroom sink. In the meantime, all this perfectly clean water is being lost down the drain. What a waste. Then, even when the water is warm enough, it's still running down the drain while I wet my face, lather up and rinse off. All told, it took 18 cups of water to wash my face. And I was repeating this process every. single. night.

So here are the issues I've been facing (pun intended) while trying to tweak my routine:


1. Washing my face with freezing cold water at bedtime? Not so much with the relaxing, getting sleepy feeling.

2. I have to use splashy water on my face. I can't use a washcloth because my lovely rosacea skin will have a nasty reaction to the scrubbing and I'll be the one googling scab terms.


So, bearing those two issues in mind I've come up with a workable solution. It's not perfect, but it's better than it was:

First off, I've mimicked my handwashing rountine so that now I don't turn the faucet on full blast and I shut the tap off while I lather up. That saves six cups.

Secondly, I switched my face-washing routine from bedtime to "get in our jammies" time, which happens at 7:00 pm sharp (I have kids, ergo, I have schedules). So now it doesn't matter if the faucet is spittin' ice cubes. In fact, the cold water actually helps me get through the rest of the evening without dozing off. So not waiting for the warm water saves another six cups.

The downside to all of this is that, being such an Anal OCD Annie, this means that I also have to brush my teeth at 7:00 pm because you can't wash your face and NOT brush your teeth. But, as it turns out, this is also helping me with the NO WASTE challenge, since it means I can't eat anything after this point.

So now with my every-so-tweaked face washing routine, I'm saving twelve cups of H2O down the drain - that's a 66% reduction in what I had been using.



Savings:

From where I was six months ago: twelve cups per night! But, again, I've been working on this and tweaking it for a while now, so the true change from yesterday to today is considerably less. However, I like to accentuate the positive, so I'm going with the 12 cup figure and say that I'm saving nearly 275 gallons of water per year, just by changing my routine a tad.


Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

Obviously, the difficulty in this change was devising the plan. Now that I've figured it out, it's as simple as can be. Just shows you what perserverance (and the ability to withstand frigid icewater being splashed on your face) can do.

#168 - Define "Normal".

Stop Using the Normal Cycle on the Dishwasher. Or Don't. You Decide!

I had a pretty big blonde moment last week, when I read a post in one of my newsgroups about a woman looking for help on how to cut back on her water usage. She went on to describe all the current water-saving measures she was taking -- fewer showers, not watering the lawn, using the short cycle on the dishwasher, putting a brick in the toilet (not what it sounds like), etc.

Wait. Did you see it? The third one on the list? SHORT CYCLE? What the hell is THAT about? So I checked the front of my dishwasher and lo and behold - I have a button on there that says "Light Wash". I have been using the "Normal Wash" since the day I got it. Want to know what the difference is? Yeah, so did I:

The Normal Wash on my GE Built-in runs 56 minutes and uses 5.9 gallons of water. The Light Wash, however, takes only 36 minutes but uses 6.1 gallons of water. You know where they hid all this information? Deep inside some pieces of paper stapled together and labeled "Useless Guide and Manual". WTF?

Oh, my bad. I guess that's "User's Guide and Manual". Close enough.

Anyhoo, here's my quandry: Do I stick with the Normal Wash or switch to the Light Wash? One uses less water, the other uses less energy (My electricity, BTW, does come from a renewable energy source, and yours can too!). I'd love to hear what you all think about this dilemma -- just so long as you don't suggest I handwash! You know, because after all that pre-rinsing, I'm exhausted.

So, in the words of Linda Richman, "I'm feeling verklempt. Talk amongst yourselves..... I'll give you a topic: A Light Wash Cycle is neither light nor cyclical. Discuss."

#157 - Do Not Disturb

Saving The Environment While Traveling

Depending on where you travel, you may find yourself in a "green" hotel that has CFL lightbulbs, recycling bins in every room and organic snacks in the mini-bar. Or you may be staying in a dump down by the interstate with a suspicious looking stain on the carpet and a double deadbolt-and-chain combo lock on the door.

OK, perhaps your budget plays in to that scenario somewhere as well. At any rate, you don't want to blow the whole environmental thing just because you're away from home, so here's some tips I've found that help me to stay green whenever I go away...


Tip #1 - Reuse your towels, washcloths, sheets, etc. In fact, go a step further and place the "Do Not Disturb" sign on your doorknob for your entire stay. Not only will these prevent the wasted energy required to clean your room daily, but you'll also get interesting looks from the cleaning staff when you do finally emerge.

Tip #2 - Bring your own toiletries. I know it sounds like a pain, but those itty-bitty bottles of shampoo, conditioner and lotion require a LOT more packaging than your big ol' bottle of Burt's Bees. Plus, who knows what kind of scary petro-crap is in those overly-fragranced bottles of goo?

Tip #3 - Don't drink the water. Seriously, there's nothing worse than finding one of those "please help us save the planet by reusing your towel" cards right next to a couple bottles of complimentary Aquafinas. Kind of sends a mixed message, don'tcha think? Don't drink the bottled water -- send them back to the front desk and drink from the tap instead.

Tip #4 - Use the fine china. If your hotel room has those cheap, disposable plastic cups (or worse yet, those plastic cups that are hermetically sealed in more plastic), then call the front desk and ask for a couple of REAL CUPS to use while you're there. Be sure to tell them WHY you want them.

Tip #5 - Keep 'em separated. If your room doesn't have a separate waste can for recyclables, ask the hotel manager where you could find one. You might have to bring them down front to have them recycled. Or you might even have to bring them home with you. That's the price to pay for environmentalism. Deal with it.

Tip #6 - Tell it like it is. When you checkout and they ask you how your stay was. Be honest. Tell them what you liked and what you didn't like. If possible, speak to the manager about the environmental concerns you have regarding his/her establishment. The only reason they would have to change is to keep wonderful customers like you from going somewhere else.


Hope these tips help you out. If you have any other enviro-hotel suggestions, please leave them in the comments so we can all get a little greener on the road. But not in a carsick kind of way.

Water, Water Everywhere....

I think I need a drink...

Well, folks it's Christmas Eve and I'm relaxing on the couch with a cold cider and some warm long johns. It's been quite a day here. We discovered last night that our hot water heater has sprung a leak. A big one. And it soaked through the dry wall in the garage and drenched all of hubby's power tools and building materials.

So instead of spending the day wassailing and going for sleigh rides, we were hauling out the garage, drying off tools and ferrying a generous load of gooey drywall and limp cardboard to the dumpster. But it wasn't all bad.

Ok, it was.

There is no one to call at this point, since tomorrow is Christmas day and we'll be gone for part of the week on vacation. So hubby drilled some holes under the water heater to allow the water to drain into a bucket (remember, the hot water heater is what heats the house, so we can't just drain the whole thing and deal with it when we get back). Fortunately for us, our dog sitter is our next door neighbor and he said he'd keep an eye on it for us.

So as I'm hand-drying routers, sawzalls and drills, I'm feeling a little down about the whole situation. I mean, I'd love to replace the whole damn heating system with a super energy-efficient solar-powered on-demand water heater, whole house fan and heat pump, but we just don't have that much cash laying around. So I know I'm going to settle for replacing the much less efficient gas-powered hot water heater with another one just like it.

But then I started to think about how lucky we are to even have a home. At a time when many Americans are losing everything because they opted for an Adjustable Rate Mortgage - and helplessly watched their monthly payment swell out of control - we should be thanking our stars that I'm a nervous Nelly and opted for a fixed rate. Otherwise, we could be in the same position as many others. So at least we aren't losing our home. It's just disintegrating around us.

But the bottom line is this - Sometimes you do what you can. If cash weren't an issue, we'd be living in a totally green home surrounded by energy efficient appliances, with a wind-turbine outback and R-45 insulation in the walls. However, like most Americans, cash is an issue. A big one. And it sometimes prevents me from going as green as I'd like.

So I make the changes I can with the money or time that I've got and call it a day. What else can I do?

Merry Christmas to All, And to All, A Dry Night.

Day 133 - Wash N' Wear N' Wear N' Wear...

Wearing Clothing Until It Actually NEEDS Washing

Remember last month, when I thought I was so clever to come up with the idea of wearing my jeans twice before washing them? Yeah, well, turns out -- that's a pretty slippery slope.

Apparently, wearing previously worn jeans is like the gateway drug of garment re-use. Because, folks, I gotta be honest, I am checking damn near every article of clothing to see whether or not I can get a second run out of it. My very scientific method for determining the wearability of any garment is: The Sniff Test. Not all items make it to the test lab (there's a difference between "green" and "gross"), but lots do -- like sweaters, sweatshirts, hoodies, and sweatpants.

Surprisingly, most of my items pass their initial post-wear sniff test. They don't always pass the no-coffee-stains-or-toddler-snot-trails test, but they seem to hold their own against the old nose radar. At least, I think they do. If you see me out and about, maybe you could be a pal, take a whiff, and either confirm or refute my results.

What does my rapid decline into pigpen-mode have to do with the environment? Water. And lots of it. Sweaters are bulky. Sweatshirts are bulky. Hoodies, sweatpants and jeans are all bulky. And they all take up loads (pun intended) of space in the washing machine.

Savings:

If I can get two runs from 8 bulky items per week, I'll save two loads of laundry every month throughout the whole cold weather season. That translates to a savings of over twelve loads of laundry per year: About 144 gallons of water and over 28 kWh saved.

Difficulty Level: 2 out of 5

You always have the fear that your nosedar is wrong and you're walking around smelling like a middle school locker room after basketball tryouts. But, just remember: Those that mind - don't matter; and those that matter - will tell you when you're stinky.

Supplemental Post - From Toilet to Tap

There's a very interesting article in today's New York Times that talks about a new water purification system in Orange County, California. It just goes to show you that for every problem, there is a solution. You just need to look hard and ignore the naysayers.

Day 127 - Dirty Rotten Scoundrels

Bathing The Kids Just Twice a Week
Caveat: Unless they're really gross.

Summer is officially over. Well, it has been for a while now, but it finally feels over here in Richmond, "hotter than the surface of the sun" Virginia. I know, you desert dwellers out there are laughing at me, but remember - I'm from Northern New York where 45 is considered "shorts and a sweatshirt" weather and you don't wear a coat until your snot freezes.

Geez Louise, I've just started this post and already I'm off on a tangent. What the hell was I supposed to be posting about anyhow?

Oh yeah, fewer baths for the kids. Right.

Anyhow, this cooler weather translates to cleaner kids. Less sweating, a lot less mud to play in, and fewer worms to dig. They don't sparkle or anything, but they don't leave sludge trails either. So, to conserve some more precious H2O, I will be dropping the number of weekly baths for the kiddos from three to two.

It helps that both of them are now officially potty trained and tend to urinate on themselves a lot less these days. Of course, this whole plan gets tossed out the window if one of them rolls in dog crap or vomits on themselves.

And don't go feeling all sorry for them -- they're not huge bath fans anyhow. Ethan has some hydrophobia issues that are cured only by the lure of a plastic submarine and Daphne has her Mommy's white Irish skin that dries out like the Sahara in winter. Trust me, they'll both be happier this way.


Savings:

I fill their tubs up pretty full, so I'd guesstimate it's about 30 gallons of water for each bath. I'm a mean mommy, though and make them bathe together, so that one tubful covers both of them. At 30 gallons per week and the cool weather lasting through till the end of April, I'd say we're looking at a savings of roughly 720 gallons a year.

Now think about this: If the entire "dirty dozen" of Ethan's preschool classmates did this, together we'd save nearly 9,000 gallons of water. And, if the whole preschool joined us, it would be about 78,000 gallons per year. For perspective, that's enough clean water to meet the drinking needs of over 200 people for a full year... from just one preschool.


Difficult Level: 1 out of 5

Another one of those changes that it's real easy to get behind! No more whining, no more soaking wet Mommies, no more unintended floor moppings. Dude, Sign Me Up.

PS... HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!!!! :-)

Day 106 - Forever in Blue Jeans

Wearing My Jeans at Least Twice Before Laundering

OK, now that I've got you all humming Neil Diamond songs from the seventies, let's talk about my pants.

The cool fall weather that I love so much is finally upon us and I have put my three ill-fitting but comfortable pair of dungarees back into the ol' wardrobe rotation. These were all purchased just last year, after I finally decided that 18 months post-partum was a little to long to be wearing maternity jeans. Being relatively new, they are all that dark-blue, looks-like-I've-been-wearing-them-to-work-in-a-coal-mine color. What I'm trying to say here, is that a little dirt is hardly noticeable on these jeans.

So, I've decided that, to save water, laundry detergent, dryer energy and denim wear-and-tear, I will be wearing my jeans until they can practically walk themselves to the hamper. Or twice. Whichever comes first. Hubby always wears his jeans at least twice and it's not like I notice it on him, and his jeans are the older, nearly-faded-white color, so who the hell will notice on me? And if someone does notice and has the balls to say something, God help 'em - cuz I'll go all Song Sung Blue on their ass.


Savings:

In the fall/winter/spring, I usually wear jeans five days per week. Rather than washing after each wear, I will wear them twice. So in one week, instead of washing 5 pair of jeans, I'll be washing 2.5 pair. Now let's assume that it takes 10 pair of jeans to fill a load of laundry (they're bulky and heavy). I will be saving an entire load of laundry every four weeks. Jean season lasts November - April or 26 weeks, so that's a savings of 6.5 loads of laundry per year. That equates to 78 gallons of water and over 20 kWh saved.


Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

The only difficult part is that I'm a slob and I'll need to try a little harder not to spill food, coffee or the kids' paint on my pants. I know I can do it though. I'm a Believer.

Day 104 - Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

Skipping A Shampoo Twice a Week

In light of this artice I just read about the massive droughts hitting our Australian friends, I have decided to do another water conservation post. It continues to amaze me that few American realize what a luxury it is to have clean, potable water flowing from dozens of taps in our homes. I'm sure we all take it for granted occassionally, but if we don't start slowing our personal consumption, we too could find ourselves in a state of mandatory restrictions (oh wait, we ALREADY ARE!).

Today I pledge to skip two hair washin's a week. Every week. Tuesdays and Thursdays will become my "grease is good" days and I'll forego the normal lather and rinse (never been much of a "repeater" -- just seems so "been there, done that").

It would appear from my post history (hehehe, yeah, that sounds funny) that I am just inching my way towards adding more "To Hell With Personal Hygiene Days" and maybe I am. My brother in law -- HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRIAN! -- indulges in multiple THWPHDs per week and no one thinks he's gross. Except when he takes them consecutively. Anyhow, I think I might be headed down that path, but first I'm going to see how little water I can consume while still rinsing off the stink.


Savings:

Shampooing takes me approximately 90 seconds from the time I pick up the bottle till I get all the gunk rinsed out. That cuts my shower time down to four minutes! That also saves me approximately 4 gallons per day, twice per week, for a total of 8 gallons per week. In one year, that's a savings of 130 gallons. Just a drop in the bucket, but every drop counts.


Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

I've said it many times before, but it bears repeating. Going green does not have to be about buying new green gadgets or expensive organic food. The best ways to go green are usually to just STOP. Stop eating so much beef. Stop buying so much crap. Stop traveling so much. Stop using so much water. Just stop. There, you've done something good for the environment just by stopping. And who knows? Maybe once you stop, you'll have a chance to look around and see something beautiful that you might have otherwise missed.

Day Ninety-Five - Post-Compost Post

Making Changes To What I Compost

Do you remember that happy day last month when my Garden Gourmet Compost Unit arrived? I have been happily keeping a bucket o' scraps under my kitchen sink and filling it with coffee grounds, biodegradable straws, apple cores, and any other organic matter that we generate. The problem is, I haven't been as diligent as I should be and I've been sending a lot of stuff down the garbage disposal, assuming that it was a relatively benign thing to do.

But I stumbled across some interesting research that showed that using my garbage disposal is only marginally better than tossing food scraps in the trash. Egads! Here I thought I was so eco-conscious by putting organic matter down the drain and it turns out, eh, it's not really a big improvement.

The reason for this is that garbage disposals use high volumes of water, at the sink and at the sewage treatment plant. Sewage with a high organic content also has a higher Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD), a measurement that gauges how many chemicals are needed to clean the sewage before it is expelled from the plant into free-running bodies of water.

So I have learned that being lazy about my food scraps gobbles up copious amounts of precious water resources AND adds more chemicals to our water system in the name of "clean" water. I simply cannot have that on my conscience. From here on out I will become a scrap Nazi. Here's the order for food disposal: People, Dog, Compost, Over the Fence (what the hell, if I can do it with 10 pounds of dog crap each week, I'm sure an occasional chicken bone won't be noticed), Disposal. That's right -- disposal is now the absolute last resort for food scraps and I have decided to never again toss food scraps into the landfill. Dammit.


Savings:

I would guess that I send about 1.5 cups worth of organic waste down the drain per day. Over the course of a year, that adds up to 547 cups of food waste that has to be treated with chemicals and diluted with more water.

Geez, I wonder if that would feed a starving family somewhere. I bet it would. Good grief, are we a wasteful society or what? Maybe I should concentrate more on reducing that waste. Well, one change a day... maybe that can be tomorrow's challenge.


Difficulty Level: 4 out of 5

Yes, folks, I truly am a Lazy American. The added burden of properly picking up and disposing of bloated goldfish crackers and unwanted french fries earns itself a 4 on my difficulty scale. And yet, I pay money to belong to a gym where I can go specifically to NOT be lazy. Sometimes, even I don't understand me.

Day Ninety-Four - More Like a "Don't"

Keeping the 'Do Short

When I was young I had long, silky blonde hair that hung way down my back in springy curls. Then I got old. And a few pregnancies, a thyroid imbalance and many years later, my hair is dirt brown, frizzy and lifeless. But the good news is: it's short so there's a lot less of it to look at. And a lot less to worry about.

Remember when I talked about shortening up my shower routine? Well yesterday I went and got my hair chopped off and my even shorter 'do will help reduce my shower time even further. Less hair means less shampoo used and less shampoo used means less rinsing. Small change? Yes. But a change nonetheless.


Savings:

My new 'do saved me roughly 45 seconds of showering (hey, when you're down to a six minute shower, that's nearly a 13% reduction!) and saved me about a 1/2 teaspoon of shampoo. Over one year, that's 3.9 hours of showering and 26 ounces of shampoo. That's roughly 1,000 gallons of water saved just by having short hair! Wow, does that make Sinead O'Connor an environmentalist?


Difficulty Level: 2 out of 5

Well, short hair does need to be cut more, so it means a trip to the salon every other month or so. Definitely not a money saver. And I have to ask the stylist to skip the shampoo treatment and just squirt my hair down, so I'm not wasting additional resources for the cut. Other than that, it's pretty low maintenance. Just like me :-)

Day Ninety-Two - Go With The Flow

Don't Run The Water Full Blast While Hand Washing

Did you ever notice how when you go to wash your hands, you act like the faucet only has two options --"on" or "off"? I know I do. It's either shooting out full blast or it's off and I never seem to maneuver the handle anywhere in between.

So today I set up my little experiment with a big bucket in the sink to see how much water I use to wash my hands. At full throttle, eight seconds of hand washing (don't freak out, Mom -- NOBODY actually sings the whole alphabet song when they wash their hands) results in 9 cups of water. Then I tried it at half throttle.

Oooops, accidentally went full throttle. Geez, if it's this hard to do when I'm concentrating on it, how am I ever going to stick to this one?!?!? Dump the water and start over.

Try again... ok half throttle, that'll work. Also, once the hands are wet and I'm in sudsing mode, might as well turn the tap off with my elbow. Now time to rinse.

Ooopsie, full throttle again. Of course, it's hard to be too precise when turning the tap on with your elbow. Ah, screw it, just rinse 'em off. OK, clean as a whistle and thoroughly rinsed. Another eight seconds of hand washing. Total water used (even with the full throttle rinse) was three cups.

Lesson learned: Shutting the tap off entirely while sudsing probably made an even bigger difference than going half throttle. Combine that action with going half throttle, and I'd be looking at only two cups of water used.


Savings:

Assuming I remember the half-throttle part, I'll be saving seven cups of water per handwashing. How much hand-washing do I do each day? Hmmmm, I have two messy kids, a pooping-machine dog, a slight case of OCD, and a bad coffee addiction. I wash my hands at least 16 times per day. That's a savings of 112 cups per day, or over 2,500 gallons per year.


Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

The only thing that would make this easier is if I had one of the really cool foot-pedal faucets like my dentist has. Then I wouldn't have to try to turn the faucet back on with my elbow.

Day Ninety-One - They Call Me Mellow Yellow

Turning A Blind Eye To DH's & DS's Bathroom Habits

Do I really need to say anything more about this? You all know what I mean here. I'm going to stop nagging the boys about not flushing and/or following up after them. 'Nuff said.


Savings:

Our toilets are very water-conscious at 1.6 gallons per flush. They average about four "forgetfuls" a day, for a total of 6.4 gallons per day.


Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

It will make me crazy at first but I'm sure I'll get used to it. Who knows maybe I'll even get a little mellow myself.

Day Seventy-Six - Gone To The Dogs

Repurposing All Our "Stale" Water

Continuing on my water conservation kick here, folks. Going to see if I can keep it up all week. Let's start with some 411. We've got a dog -- a big girl, weighing in at just under 100 pounds -- our black lab/husky mix "Oreo" goes through about three bowls of water per day. Each dish of water holds 4 cups of water, so that's .75 gallons of water per day, 5.25 gallons per week, 273 gallons per year. Now before you get on the phone to PETA because you think I'm going to stop watering the dog, just listen.

Every day, the kids and I fill up our reusable water bottles and head out on our merry way. They are usually refilled a couple times throughout the day and are taken to bed at night. Hubby also drinks water in the evenings and he usually leaves his half-full glass on the coffee table, where it leaves a nice white ring. So by the next morning I have four water cups with varying amounts of "stale water" in them. Of course, with our super-high American standards, there's no way we'd drink the stale water, so it gets dumped down the drain. Until today.

Fortunately for us, Oreo has much lower standards than we do. I mean seriously lower. I saw her eat dirt yesterday. Not because she was hungry, just because it was there and looked like it might be tasty. Anyhow, she now is the lucky recipient of all our stale water. She will also be receiving all the crazy ice cubes that leap forth from the ice dispenser, in what appears to be a last ditch effort to escape the inevitable.

All this water adds up too. It fills her bowl to the brim at least once, usually with enough left over to water the three houseplants I have somehow managed not to kill yet. This then cuts her bowl refilling by 1/3, reducing her total "new" water consumption to a half a gallon per day.


Savings:

Simply put: .25 gallons per day, 1.75 gallons per week, 7.5 gallons a month, 91 gallons per year. Good Doggy! If all 73 million American dog owners did that, we'd save over 6.5 BILLION gallons a year.


Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

Much easier than cleaning those white rings off the coffee table...

Day Seventy-Five - Scrub-A-Dub-Dub

Closing the Drain Before Starting the Water

I must be in the mood for water conservation this week, cuz I've instituted another "water change". Starting today, when bathing the kids (or me, for that matter), I will no longer perch on the edge of the tub, watching the water shoot out full blast -- straight down the drain -- whilst I wait for it to reach the optimum bathing temperature. Why do I do that anyway? I'm just going to keep sitting there swishing the water around with my hand until I have "evened out" any water temperature discrepancies before putting the kids in (Good God, man, how anal am I?!?!).
I timed it today and it takes nearly two full minutes for the hot water to travel from the garage up to the kids' bath. During that time, approximately five gallons of A-1 super-clean water go right down the drain. What a waste! Not anymore. Starting today, there will be no pre-warming of the bathwater. It is what it is and if I'll just add more hot to even it out - not exactly rocket science, is it? And yet, a lot of folks do it. Supposedly "green folks", just like me.


Savings:

The kids take about three baths a week. They bathe together, except for "shampoo night" when they get to bathe seperately, but we don't drain the tub between baths. Me? I take a bath maybe once a month. Note to first time readers -- I do SHOWER daily, though... except for To Hell With Personal Hygiene Days. Hubby doesn't "do" baths... something about "sitting in a tepid pool of his own filth"... So, let's call it 15 baths a month, times 5 gallons per bath - that's 75 gallons a month, 900 gallons per year - over one full ccf.


Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

Again, like so many other changes, this takes zero effort, just a new way of doing things.

Day Seventy-Three - Muey Go-Go

Heating Water in the Microwave Instead of Running the Tap

***WARNING***

This post contains information that will make you think I'm a bad mom (as if some of the other posts don't?). If you believe that all toddlers should be fed nothing but fruits, vegetables and free-range poultry while drinking their soy milk in a non-plastic container -- stop reading now! Also, get some kids of your own to mess up, as mine are taken.

It has been said that children crave stability and schedules in their lives. It helps them to feel secure with their surroundings, thereby allowing them to grow up to become stable, well-adjusted and healthy individuals. That's why day in and day out, each morning when my kids wake up I mix them up a nice hot cup of sugar-laden instant cocoa. It's become a tradition and I'll be damned if I'm going to jeopardize their budding senses of self-worth by messing with this routine.

However, I am starting to see the dark side of this little tradition and it is - water waste. It takes exactly 18 cups worth of full-blast tap-running before the water turns hot enough for their cocoa. That's over one full gallon of water, just to get the two cups required for the cocoa.

The solution should be simple - just put the water in their little Playtex sippy cups, pop 'em in the nuker and voila! hot cocoa. However, due to all the concerns regarding pthalates and BPA leeching, I no longer put anything plastic in the microwave.

Being your average Super-Consumeristic American, my mind immediately leapt to "I should buy some sort of vessel to heat the water in that has a spout for pouring - A 'Water Holder Heating Substitute', if you will. I wonder if they'd have one at Target...". But I decided I didn't want to break my compact (AGAIN) so I scrounged in my cupboards for such a strange item. Wouldn't you know, I found two perfectly good "Water Holder Heating Substitutes". One is my Pyrex glass measuring cup that holds two cups of water. The other is our ceramic gravy boat (which is so big it's more like a gravy cruise ship) that holds about two and a half cups.

So now armed with my new 'WHHS', I'm all set to whip up another round of my famous "Swiss Miss" sugar-fest any time my 2-year old asks me for "Muey Go-Go". And I won't drain the lake while I'm doing it.

Savings:

I'm SUCH a bad mom, that the kids often have seconds of my morning health drink. So I'd say they average 1.3 cocoas per day. That's over nine cocoa making sessions per week, for a total of 11.375 gallons of water wasted! In just one year, that's over 591 gallons of water wasted per year!! Egads!

Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

Super-easy. No complaints -- from me OR the kids!