Monday- Christine Brown

I was really afraid to go trash digging but I was curious and I did it anyway. It was a mistake to tell my mom to get a scoop my dog's poo instead of using a plastic bag because when I opened the trash can I got a full blast of the stench. I kind of failed at this part because I was unable to sort out the trash, but at a glance, I know there was a bunch of toilet paper, bottles, wrappers, and bags. The toilet paper I realized was probably used for no more than a minute, the bottles, maybe an hour, the wrappers, about thirty minutes, and the plastic bags, about thirty minutes- to an hour as well. I also saw a small disposable cup, big enough for one gulp. I realized that everything we use goes through an extensive process: cut trees or extract something irreplaceable or non-replenishable from the environment, process it, manufacture it, market it, all so we can use most of it for less than a minute. I'm sure there's more steps in between the one's that I mentioned. According to a cost-benefit analysis, the cost is so much more than the benefit, I would say a thousand times more, but that's just a wild guess. Remembering the film "No Impact Man" Colin Beavan mentions something about us needing trees to trap carbon dioxide but instead we use it for toilet paper. We compromise our health, the sustainability of our environment, and the survival of future human civilizations all so we can wipe our butts for two minutes. Surely this does not mean we must neglect our hygiene but that we must find an alternative that is harmless to the environment. I also discovered that it is difficult to not make trash because just about EVERYTHING is packaged in plastic or cardboard. I made hamburger helper today, there was plastic from the meat package, cardboard from the hamburger helper box, plastic that contained the macaroni, and paper that contained the cheese mix. There was four pieces of trash that was made just so I could make a ten minute meal that I would probably not finish completely and I would end up throwing away the left overs. Actually, that's exactly what happened. And that was just dinner, what about breakfast and lunch? and i'm not the only person who needs to be fed, I have three other family members who also ate their own meals and made their own trash. It seems as if to not make trash, you can't eat, go to the bathroom, do your homework, or engage in any activity that requires the use of paper or synthetic materials.

day 1- sat/sunday- Christine Brown

So I actually did this a day early, I started on saturday rather than sunday because I knew we would not be going to the grocery store on sunday. I commute so I still live with my family and I still go grocery shopping with my mom sometimes. My mom has bought between 2 to 3 of those reusable shopping bags but she always forgets to bring them and she ends up using a bunch of plastic bags for her groceries anyways. This time I made her use one of reusable shopping bags and she looked at me crazy and said, "what, what are we doing now?". I told her that it was essential to saving the environment and she replied by saying "But I need those plastic bags to pick up lola's poo". But what about the environment?!! So, I recommended that my mom buy a scooper so that she may scoop the poo from the floor to the trashcan, but she complained by saying "But the trash can will smell!". I began to think that saving the environment is impossible with this woman. As we shopped around we saw "green light bulbs" which are eco friendly light bulbs that save about 400 dollars worth of energy a year. I told her that we should buy those but my mom immediately snapped back and said, "we already have those!"... I do not think we do, but I did not want to argue at that point. As I placed the groceries in the reusable bag, she looked at me with a sour face and said, "your smashing everything by putting it all into one bag". I looked in the bag and there was nothing "smashable" to begin with. I was really excited for this day, but at the end of the day I felt really frustrated because I realized people don't understand how serious it is to save the environment, and even if they do, they hesitate because of the minor inconveniences.

Sunday + Monday

Day One: Consumption
After making a list on what I need to buy for the next week, I realized it was pretty easy to cut most of it off the list because as college students, the majority of what we need is already included in our meal plans; Panther bucks, cafeteria food, etc. Everything I do buy that is packaged is from Jazzman's Cafe, so for the next week I won't buy the fruit bowls, parfaits, white chocolate mochas, and sushi that I always buy. Instead, I will only eat at the cafeteria and pack extra food that I need to get me through the day instead of constantly buying from either AF or Jazzman's. This will reduce the majority of things I buy as well as the amount of trash I produce. Additionally, I think this is an efficient way to keep more money for other uses; as Americans we buy so many things on a daily basis without thinking twice, and this experiment makes me realize all the unnecessary things I purchase, such as a coffee from the cafe, when I could very well make the same product myself in my dorm room; just get instant coffee, hazelnut creamer, and hot water instead! =)

Day Two: Trash
My roommates and I greatly decreased the amount of trash we have by taking out all the plastic spoons, forks, and knives we've been using and got metal utensils. Also, we bought more mugs that we can just wash and reuse whenever we need to. To remedy the rather large issue of how many water bottles I go through on a single day, I started bringing a reusable water bottle to all my dance classes and keeping that one constantly refilled. I did not have as much trash as I thought I would; I have a lot of snacks in bulk that aren't individually packaged so that I don't throw away a wrapper every single time I eat some of that snack. The only thing I threw out was my smoothie from AF, and then I realized I wasn't allowed to buy these kinds of things for the week and felt bad on not remembering about my consumption level. However, after switching to reusable cups and utensils, I can already see a significant decrease in how fast our trashcan fills up in our dorm room. What I would like to continue working on, however, is how many water bottles we put in the recycle bin. While yes, we are recyling them, it would be even more beneficial if all three of us could switch to reusable water bottles instead of going through multiple bottles in one day and constantly having to buy more.

Day 1: Sunday

Sunday is usually my grocery shopping day in order to stock up for the week. I was making my list as I saw this assignment and somewhat freaked out. I quickly made my list shorter but I couldn't completely forget grocery shopping all together because I have classes during the week during meal times. Since it was Halloween, a lot of people went out and purchased costumes but I just found things around here so I did not need to increase my consumption for the day. I don't plan on going shopping for anything else this week which makes the list part easier. There's nothing on it so far so there's no need to cross it out. Day 1 was pretty simple and it was a great start to the experiment.

Day 1: Consumption

We began the No Impact for a week experiment today with the easiest of the steps, Consumption. Simply put this means that we are not allowed to purchase new consumer goods this week which as as a college student isn't very hard to do for such a short amount of time. This step of the No Impact process would be much more difficult if done for an entire year, but not for a week. The idea of stopping consumption is that it will help the environment by decreasing waste output while keeping money in your wallet. This sounds like a good idea on a personal level, but this could be bad if too many people decided to cut their consumption of new goods. The American economy would perish without consumers and if we were to experience another economic crisis environmental issue would be pushed into the background. Maybe I'm being dramatic here but hey, at least it'll save me money.

Sunday: Day 1

Sunday was the day we began the No Impact Experiment with the topic of consumption. This activity turned out pretty easy for me since I woke up really late and the only productive things I did during the day was going to dinner at the school's cafeteria and doing my homework. So, I put in practice the "Cool Idea #1" from the No Impact Experiment guide, to be lazy! As Matt McDermott suggests, "buying nothing, doing less, and being lazy can help the planet." I also made a list of some things I need to buy this week at Target, trying to cross out the things that were not that important. I also liked the video "The Story of Stuff", which we had previously watch in class. I really like how it explains to people how the excess of consumption is affecting the world, the environment, and ourselves as human beings.

Sunday: Day 1

I wasn't sure how I would do with not buying any new items today, yet surprisingly it was pretty easy. The only thing I bought the entire day was a taco and a drink which i kept the trash of and stored in an empty waste basket that i decided would be where I kept all the trash that day. Even for not buying anything new, and focusing on trying to not produce much trash, i still found it so easy for trash to accumulate. I was glad that the only trash I did create all day was just from food and no other source, because I figured that foods trash would be the hardest to maintain. I also saw from this first day that had I not been a college student, it would be a lot easier to consume food without involving any trash. Here there is nothing that I can get without creating some sort of waste, which makes me think that they dont intend to have a college student doing this project. All in all though it was a interesting day focusing so much on things I usually don't pay attention too.