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 Just in case
you’re not lucky enough to be married to a man who will beat you
into
submission every time you take a shower that lasts longer than a
two-minute Navy shower,
I want to give you a few green tips that will improve the quality
of your life.
You……I mean YOU….. can do small things everyday that will affect
the wellbeing of our planet. I know that you may not think that
you alone, can make a difference, but you can.
In my opinion, one of the most important things you can do is to
cut down (or elimintate) your use of plastic.
Plastic does not biodegrade and will probably end up in a land
fill for eternity; or worse yet, the North Pacific Gyre (a
floating mass of plastic the size of Texas.)
What affects you personally is that most single-use plastic
contains BPA (Bisphenol A); a chemical found in hard plastic that
leaches into the food or liquid it holds. Examples are water and
baby bottles.
BPA interferes with reproductive development in animals and is
linked to cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and breast cancer in
humans.
The website to refer to for alternate uses is:
www.waterbottlesreviewed.com
Ed always says to
“pick the low hanging fruit.” Do what’s easiest. Whatever money
and time
will allow, find ways to go green. Sometimes, you will be
surprised to find that using natural products can cost you less
than chemical bases ones. Wherever you live, you can find ways to
detox your life throughout your home.
IN YOUR KITCHEN
 Switch over from chemical based cleaning products to natural
products. Generally speaking, what’s good for your body is good
for your kitchen.
Even if you can buy organic fruit and vegetables from a nearby
orchard or farm, be sure to clean them with a natural vegetable
wash.
The most expensive appliance in your home may be your
refrigerator. It requires five times the consumption of the
average television set.
Buy an Energy Star fridge with the freezer on top and do without
the water dispenser and icemaker which uses a lot of energy. Place
it somewhere in your kitchen away from the stove or dishwasher so
it won’t use more energy competing with the heat. Keep your coils
clean, which means pulling it out from the wall and cleaning it
every year. Keep the temperature at 37 to 40 degrees Fahrenheit
for the fridge and 5 degrees for the freezer.
The better environmental choice for a stove is generally gas over
electric. And believe it or not, self-cleaning ovens, because they have more insulation, use less
energy than regular ovens.
As in every other room of your home, your kitchen should be lit
with compact fluorescent (CFL’s) instead of the incandescent that
most of us grew up with. Only about 10% of the electricity used by
incandescent is light. The rest is heat.
IN
YOUR BATHROOM
Amazingly enough, you can waste so much water in your bathroom.
Every toilet that was bought before 1994 uses from 3 to 5 gallons
of water each time it’s flushed. If you get a new toilet, it will
use only 1.6 gallons or less of water with each flush.
The EPA has given out information on how you can create a lower
flush toilet by putting a plastic container, (such as a milk jug)
filled with water inside the tank. Doing that would save over a
gallon for each flush. Because a leaking toilet can waste over 750
gallons a month, you might check for leakage by putting a few
drops of food coloring into the tank. In less than half an hour,
check the toilet water to see if it’s leaking.
For your shower, you might exchange the showerhead to a low-flow
one, and add a filter to
eliminate the clorine which comes from the municipal water source.
Because clorine in tap water has been linked to an increase in
some cancers, the less you are exposed to, the better.
The clorine that comes through your bathtub faucet can be
eliminated by getting a Bath Ball faucet filter.
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