Hi, my name is Christy, and sometimes I’m a workaholic. Not to the extent that it is impacting my health, because I usually get enough sleep and a good amount of exercise, but to the point that I did not have a day off from either working or volunteering over the past two weeks, so I was not able to write last week’s blog post. I now work a part-time job, an unpaid internship, and volunteer for two places, so I’m enjoying filling my time and staying occupied. However, the downside is that I have less free time to pursue my sustainability goals, so I do what I can when I find time. At this point, you know the drill. Goal updates and then story time.
Goals that I implemented:
- Tool 1 Stop Shopping goal: no new things except food and gas/try to buy local if new
- Update: The only things I bought were gas and food, so nothing added to fund. I also got an oil change and tire rotation, but I won’t count those because they are needed to take care of my car.
- Tool 4 Buy Local goal: buy from local restaurants and no chains/fast food
- Update: $5 in fund for quesadilla at Wawa (chain, but came in cardboard, which is better than polystyrene, aka Styrofoam)
- Tool 5 Turn Off The Lights goal: no phone until after breakfast and computer off by 9:30pm
- Update: I had my computer on later than 9:30pm twice, so $2 added to the fund.
- Tool 6 Consume Less Plastic goal: $5 fine for any disposable plastic utensils/straws/plates/cups
- Update: $5 in fund for polystyrene bowl (I will try to recycle it at Publix)
- Tool 7 Detox Yourself goal: detox laundry detergent
- Update: Done
- Tool 8 Make Stuff goal: make things and use what I have for gifts
- Update: Done
- Tool 9 Clean Your Closet goal: donate things I don’t need
- Update: Done
- Tool 10 Track Your Trash goal: turn off water in shower when not rinsing
- Update: $1 in fund for leaving the water on while rinsing
Goals that I still need to implement:
- Tool 2 Grow Some Food goal: plant beans in a pot
- Update: My beans did not grow, so I will try again with more/other seeds.
- Tool 3 Eat Local goals: look into and try to visit more Orlando and Kissimmee farmers markets and local produce, specifically through IDEAS for Us; start tracking meatless day/part-time vegetarian, in addition to already eating mostly plant-based
- Tool 6 Consume Less Plastic goal: consider a mini-goal of only buying products with recyclable packaging for a certain amount of time
- Tool 10 Track Your Trash goals: research waste collection/recycling in Orlando and Kissimmee, look into visiting a landfill, look into composting, consider doing a waste/water audit and carrying trash, research reusable feminine products, consider not using paper towels for personal bathroom trips for a certain amount of time
- Tool 11 Guzzle Less Gas goals: begin tracking gas usage and train usage, calculate my carbon footprint, ultimately donate to offset fund at the end of the four months, conduct cost-benefit analysis of trading in my RAV4 for a hybrid or electric car
- Additional goals: track time volunteering and interning and working, find and apply to interesting summer opportunities/beyond, determine motivation months based on larger-scale goals
Nothing New Fund this week: $13; Current total: $48
Given my busy schedule, I have not carved out time to work on my additional goals, but like I mentioned, I will get to them when I can. Specifically I would like to research recycling and make an Excel document of my gas and train (and now bike) usage as well as time usage, as I have the data, but I have not compiled them. Speaking of bikes, allow me to share a story of struggle and the solution that surfaced. (Can you tell I have an affinity for alliteration?)
For the past few months, I have been driving ten minutes to the nearest SunRail station, taking the SunRail train into Orlando, and then walking 0.3 miles (about five minutes) to get to the Orlando Science Center. I take the train whenever I can, because it is safer, more reliable, cheaper, better for the environment, and I can use that time to do something that I can’t do while driving. I also don’t save much time by driving, because I have to leave early enough to ensure that I arrive on time even if there is traffic. The location of the office where I work on grant-writing for my internship with Orlando-based non-profit IDEAS For Us is about 1.4 miles from the nearest SunRail station, so it only made sense that I would try to do the same for my internship. However, the office is located in a not-so-nice part of the city, so the first time I tried to walk to and from the station, I was heckled by some people as I walked by and did not feel safe. I decided to give my bike a try instead, because that way I would feel slightly safer than I would when walking (another safety risk being cars, but I luckily have good bike brakes and always assume they won’t stop for me/see me). On one of my first days traveling to my internship, I drove on the Turnpike and I-4 as I do when I have to drive to work at the science center, and I was half an hour late because of a seven-car crash on the Turnpike that left only one lane open. After also hearing about a deadly crash on the Turnpike going southbound on a day that I took I-4 into Kissimmee to spontaneously volunteer after work instead of driving home, I took it as a sign to drive as little as possible.
This past Tuesday, I had a ten hour work shift before my usual three hour volunteer shift in the evening (not including my commutes to and from Orlando and the other side of Kissimmee), and I had already been working for over a week without a day off, so you could say my judgment was a little impaired. I obviously didn’t have time to work on my sustainability goals much, but I still wanted to get the ball rolling, so I decided that the next day, I would bike to the train station from home, take my bike on the train, and then bike to the internship office so that I wouldn’t have to drive at all. I confirmed a place to store it at the office with my supervisor, filled my tires up to the recommended air pressure, and made my time calculations based on Google Maps and the train schedules in order to get to the office on time. The train station is 4.7 miles away, and Google told me it would take 23 minutes to bike there. I gave myself seven minutes buffer time knowing that the trains always come and depart three minutes before their scheduled time, so about half an hour.
Two things I did not consider: although I am in good shape overall, it has probably been a few months since the last time I rode my bike, and my backpack with my laptop and other supplies in it weighs about 13 pounds (which I determined after the fact). I started my emissions-free commute that morning, and when I was about halfway, it seemed like it was taking me longer than Google told me it would. I’m pretty good at accepting challenges, so I started speeding up, and I ended up having to pedal as fast as I could for the last few miles to make it on time. It was a cool morning, so I wore long sleeves, pants, and a vest, so by the time I made it to the train station, I was sweaty, smelly, and tired. I narrowly made it onto my train, and I made it to the office on time, but let’s just say that my physical appearance wasn’t what it could have been. After my time in the office was up for the day, I made my way back to the train station, being careful not to be hit by any cars, and took the train back to my home station. I thought my ride back home would be leisurely, because I had no other plans for the day and no deadlines. I took it really slowly, mostly because I was tired, but by the time I made it home, I was absolutely exhausted. I felt like I had just run ten miles (and I know what that feels like because I did that when training for a ten-miler race in high school). Yeah, my commute was emissions-free, but biking 12.2 miles total that day with 13 pounds on my back wasn’t the most sustainable choice. A short cost-benefit analysis reveals, in retrospect, the obvious solution: driving the ten minutes to the train station with my bike in the trunk, taking my bike on the train, and then biking to the office maximizes my benefit. I am saving money over driving to the office, I am saving time and sweat over biking to the train station and then taking the train or driving to the office, I am being environmentally friendly over driving to the office, I am being slightly safer by driving/riding the train/biking than if I were driving to the office, biking/riding the train/biking, or driving/riding the train/walking, and I get a little bit of exercise but not too much by biking 2.8 miles total. I’ll give my new method a go next Wednesday.
Something that I have pondered over the past few months is how I choose to spend my time, and I wrote a parody about it, which I think also applies to the choices we make regarding how sustainably we live. I recorded myself singing it while accompanying myself on the ukulele, so please enjoy this rare recording of one of my parodies below. I also have a parody blog where I post the lyrics to parodies that I write, so you can find the lyrics for Simple Choice here. Living an imperfect zero-waste life is better than not reducing your impact at all, considering the trade-offs and circumstances we encounter, so don’t give up. Try to reduce both fate’s temptation and your environmental impact and may thee use naught new.
Naught New 