Monday, July 5, 2010

My Challenge to You to Make a Difference

Monday, July 5, 2010

While not directly fitness related, I bring to you some food for thought with regard to your water consumption. I suspect that you, like me, keep water or some other drink somewhere close at hand most of the time. It seems everywhere you go, you see people with a bottle of water either in their hand or in their bags. Few of those people, however, put much thought behind the environmental repercussions (let's not even get into the associated health debate) of choosing to drink water from a bottle. Here is a little video that touches on that subject:




Tara Whitney is a photographer whose blog I follow, and a couple of months back she wrote a post regarding her efforts at leading a more environmentally friendly existence. In it, she mentioned a few of the things she has found to make that existence easier. While I had already stopped using bottled water myself, I had had an unbelievably difficult time convincing the hubby not to buy it. He argued that he just did NOT like to drink out of the containers I was using (those wide mouth 1 liter bottles), and keeping them rotated in the fridge to stay cold was just too much effort. Not to mention, the water got too warm for him before he could drink it all. To me, those all seemed like silly excuses, but they were significant enough to prevent stopping him from buying bottled water, so I needed to find a way around them. Tara's post further inspired me and the bottles below were our solution. I bought reusable plastic because Marc thought drinking out of a metal bottle sounded unappealing. I bought the metal bottle below to give them a run, too. Both sets were bought off Amazon. We already had water filters that I had been using, so now we just bottle that water up and keep it in the fridge for him. We've been doing this now for about 6 weeks, and I'm proud to say the reusable bottles are a success.
And so you have an even better idea what you'll be helping to save..Much of the water you buy comes from natural springs. Lots of it even comes from the springs here in north central Florida. These springs are some of the most beautiful places I have ever been or seen. They are at risk, though, as more and more bottling companies set up near them to bottle the water from the Floridan Aquifer that feeds them. Even I have seen the effects of this over the years that I have been coming here. The water levels have noticeably dropped in just that amount of time. This picture doesn't do them justice, but take my word for it. These springs are a resource we do NOT want to lose.
So, PLEASE, consider what I have brought before you, and think about how much money AND how much of our earth you can save by taking this one simple step.

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