It's Not Easy Being Green

I need your help.

Though I am fairly cynical regarding the new "Green" movement I would like to try and look past the trendiness and do my part. It's not that I don't want to save the planet, I just don't know that ridding the Earth of plastic water bottles is the answer. Anyway.

Everyone at my office has been tasked with identifying at least one PSP. PSP = Personal Sustainability Project. I think the term was originally coined by Walmart. Not sure. But PSPs are commitments made by individuals to do their part in any small way to help the cause. Examples of PSPs I have heard around the office include:

• Biking to work (This won't work for me for obvious reasons.)
• Not printing emails (I think this is a no-brainer.The whole point of email is that it isn't printed... I think that one is cheating.)
• Eating a vegetarian diet (I believe in the food chain. I think Mother Nature understands that. She did invent bacon after all.)
• Only putting out one trash bin per month - recycling all other waste (This one intrigues me. Though I think I fill our kitchen trash about once a DAY.)

None of those work for me.

I try! I wash all of our clothes in cold water (in a non-HE washer...), I carefully wash and dry every single empty (Organic!) baby food container so that my family can reuse them to hold buttons and nails and such, we use those damn inconvenient compact fluorescent light bulbs -- I even wash all my dishes by hand so as not to run a half-empty dishwasher!  But I use disposable diapers, leave the TV on when no one is in the room, and I loooooooove to take long showers. Is that wrong?

I need some help on this one. Any suggestions for my PSP?

Comments

[Nancy Bunch]

Buy reusable shopping bags. I tell you, they have changed my life. One bag can hold as much as 4 plastic Wal Mart sacks, so going to the grocery store is actually easier. Plus, between shopping trips they make for crazy-handy tote bags.

Or, you could find out where you can take old electronics to be recycled and take all yours, and maybe offer to take other people's too. Does it have to be an ongoing thing?

[Mom]

Car pool!!!! Combine trips you take in the car. Pretend you're really paying $5.00 a gallon for gas and really thing about "if" you need to make that trip out in the car. I believe we have to get away from foreign oil. The only way is to cut back on our usage. Good program!!! Llaura should be proud!

[Laura]

Oh geez- I could make you crazy with all the suggestions I have... but I have 3 main ones.

1) Recycle! (It is completely possible to do only one can a month for the actual "garbage"- so much of it can be recycled! Paper, plastic, newspaper, cans, even electronics!)

2)Cloth diapers. (I can hear both you and Jeff sighing and rolling your eyes with this one- but they make very cute cloth 'nappies' that are great!)

3)The Keeper (Learn it. Live it. Love it.)

And for the sake of everyone not being annoyed with me, I will end there. love you.