I found myself in quite a bind earlier today, as I realized upon waking up that I had left my Halloween costume shopping for today, the first day of our No Impact Man experiment. And of course, the challenge for today was to consume less. However, I remembered having read on the No Impact Experiment online guide about utilizing second-hand stores, such as Buffalo Exchange and Goodwill. So I decided to do my Halloween costume shopping at Iguana and American Vintage, both of which are vintage stores located in the San Fernando Valley, where my home is. I successfully purchased a black dress, and felt a bit better about the purchase because the dress is, in a sense, a hand-me-down. But I also wanted earrings to go along with the dress; however, both Iguana and American Vintage only sell brand new jewelry. So I solved this problem by borrowing earrings from my friend instead. Two problems solved. Then later on in the day, I remembered that I had previously planned on taking my Environmental Science homework with me to Coffee Bean. However, knowing that I would probably end up purchasing a medium sized coffee (using one cup, one cup sleeve, and one cap) as well as something to eat (wrapped in plastic), I opted against the trip to Coffee Bean and instead made coffee and a snack myself and worked on my homework at home. Just before writing this blog post I came upon a quotation by Matt McDermott that reads, “Buying nothing, doing less, and being lazy can help the planet!” I realized that while doing homework at home for quite a few hours of my day today is not necessarily considered lazy, it was time spent consuming much less than many other activities could have. And I also switched today from handwriting my study guide notes to typing them. I feel it was a successful and relatively consumption-less day one to the experiment!
(Had this typed out in a word document on Sunday but forgot to post it until today)
-Michaela Pickett
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