more baby steps!

The wonderful and amazing Jiem made a post a bit ago with a few "baby steps" everyone can take to make your daily activities just a little more eco-friendly. I thought I'd just expand on that for a post today. Some of these were discussed in a previous meeting, but it seems a good idea to go through some things in either case.

• Print back to back: We all print long essays and assignments and whatnot for school, right? Right. In order to save paper, it can be a good idea to print to odd pages first and then the even pages on the backs. Of course, this takes a second of brain power in order to figure out how to put the papers back in so it all works out, but I think that it's beneficial in the grand scheme o' things.

• Use smaller margins: In the same vein, it can be good to make your margins smaller so you can fit more words on less pages. Now, when you need to do strict MLA or something of the sort and there are specifications this doesn't really work out. Most of the time, though, there's no problem. I usually go for 0.6 inches all around, because after that your printer starts to object.

• Don't leave the lights on: This seems obvious, I know. BUT, it can be important to remember that, as far as energy goes, simple light switches are the type of device that don't take a whole lot of energy to get going. By that I mean that any extra second the light is on (when you don't need it) energy is being wasted. Like, if you were to leave a room for twenty minutes but were planning on coming back, turn the lights off. TVs and the like should be left on (up to a certain point) because turning them on and off needs a lot more energy. Make sense?

• Stick a bucket in your shower: I noticed this at a friend's house, and I think it's a neat little idea. So, nobody wants to go into a shower before the water has warmed up, right? That's no fun. But while the water's warming, it's also running, which means there is some waste happenin' there. A good solution would be to get a bucket, name is Wonderfully Helpful Gorgeous Shower Bucket, and stick it under the faucet/head/whatever it's called. It'll fill up with the cold water that you don't want so that when you're ready, you can take it out and go about your business. Use that cold water for something like watering your plants!

So, maybe just pick one thing to try out and get used to and take on another if you're feeling up to it. But don't rush anything and then fall out of the habit. It's better to do a little than too much if that's going to happen!

Baby steps!