Eating Healthier
Hello All! It's been a while since I posted, and I wanted to provide an update on what's going with me.I'm still living a mostly plastic-free life, except I've recently made a few important changes to my anti-plastic pledge.
First, in an effort to do some serious weight loss, I've decided to forgo my plastic pledge in the rare occasion that being plastic-free forces me eat food that isn't the best for me.
For example, if I don't have time to make a lunch before work and I have to go to a restaurant to grab something, I have decided to choose getting a salad (even if it comes in a plastic shell) over a less healthy sandwich.
Second, I have also started buying bagged lettuce on occasion. I've been doing this because I want to incorporate more salad greens into my diet and I'm getting pretty sick of spinach, one of the only plastic-free leafy vegetables I can find.
When all is said and done, these few changes will not amount to much plastic used. Maybe one plastic clamshell (or less) and a few plastic bags per month.
Still, I'm unhappy to start using more plastic, but it's something I have to do for myself and my health.
Update: It's several months later, and I'm no longer buying salads in plastic shells or bags. Maybe I'm saying this because it's almost summer and the farmers markets are starting up, but who needs it!
Comments
I'm lucky enough to shop at a grocer that carries over 6 kinds of plastic free greens.
Something I really try to do is make about 4 'to go' salads at a time so if i'm consistently in a hurry I have something to grab. Also, Kashi's frozen dinners are pretty enviro friendly and the root of all evil - wal-mart - carries them for $2.75 over here. I don't like shopping there, but as a poor college student, I have to pick my battles. ($5.69 at whole foods or dirt cheap at wally world where I only make an every 3 month trip?)
Thank you for making this blog!
I wish you luck in this endeavor. :D
As for picking up food orders, I haven't gotten that far with my glass jars. Up until now, I have just stuck to sandwiches and the like that are wrapped in paper.
may i suggest growing mesclun salad mix in a pot. the seeds are cheap, it doesn't take long to grow, and you can just snip of leaves as you need.
the other option is sitting down in the cafe/restaurant to have your lunch on a real plate but i know this isn't always practical especially on a busy day.
congratulations on all your efforts so far anyway! i'm only just starting to try and reduce plastic and one major problem here in New Zealand is that milk only comes in plastic bottles or tetrapaks that can't be recycled here.
Madz in NZ
Don't beat yourself up over this. Do what you can -- it's more than most others are doing. :)
Jim (sans Google acct)
In the meanwhile, have a Merry Christmas!
Good luck on your weight loss goal.
I don't usually do this, but I have a blog as well and I always wonder who the readers are that cross my web site sooo...
I thought I would say hello, and introduce myself. I was trying to find information about Burt's Bees and whether they were actually a 'socially conscious' company like they claimed, and somehow stumbled across your blog. I read the entire thing word for word in one night, and I was so impressed with your energy and dedication to living your 'life less plastic.' It is seriously awesome. It was also really eye-opening for me, because I had no idea how much plastic we consume in our everyday lives-- I hadn't even thought about it. The next day I went to the supermarket and after reading your blog, I felt like I saw plastic EVERYWHERE, I couldn't get away from it... and it just made me even more impressed with your decisions and your perseverance.
I know that you wrote an entry once about how you wished that more people wouldn't think that living a plastic-free existence was 'weird'- screw them!! It is AMAZING what you are doing. Not only are you trying to reduce the world's dependency on plastic, but you are publishing about it, so that people like me read it and become aware. I now feel so much more conscious about the way plastic is used, and I'm trying to think of ways to cut down my plastic as well.
So anyway, thanks for being such a great inspiration and please continue what you're doing and posting, I really like reading your entries! and I just created a new blog myself and I gave you a little shout-out on one of my entries (http://brittanygoesgloballyconscious.wordpress.com/), so feel free to check it out if you'd like.
Thanks and keep writing!
-Brittany
Health definitely takes precedence. If Lays finds a way to give us Doritos without any packaging, that doesn't mean we should eat it.
Also I'm not sure restaurants are a very plastic-free option anyway, individuals can be much more efficient at forgoing plastic.
http://spices4health.blogspot.com/
As for the salad in a bag, your health should come before your plastic-free existence, always! Although I agree with some of these other comments, that it should actually be much healthier for you to avoid the salad in a bag altogether... healthier but much less convenient, I know. We can each only ever do so much, though. Your blog is still an inspiration! Thank you!
http://www.containerseeds.com/articles/mesclunarticle.html
Plus plastics is changing our hormones http://heartspring.net/plastic_xeno_estrogen.html
I enjoyed browsing through your blogs and applaud your efforts to go less plastic... with the gulf oil crisis I know we have to go oil less period.
I know what you mean about feeling like you shouldn't sacrifice your health for the sake of not using plastic. I'm constantly faced with this scenario because I don't do any of the shopping in my house and if I want to get proper nourishment I usually end up eating something out of plastic, but it's very frustrating.
to avoid the plastic frenzy next winter, have you considered putting together some winter veggie/fruit storage (freezing, drying, canning)? plus you can always get things like jam in the winter from the grocery store. and I haven't yet figured out if those birdseye boxed frozen vegetables are plastic-free or not (paperboard box with a foil-paper wrapper), so if they are, there's always that.