No Impact, Weak Experiences

Day 1 - Consumption
I had a really good start to my No Impact week due to the fact that I slept for most of the day, making it difficult to consume.  However, whenever I tried to drink water from my dorm room sink instead of opening up a bottle of water I discovered that the water quality is beyond horrible here and went about my normal bottled water drinking habits for the remainder of the week, but at least I tried, right?  I also went to Jones dining hall to get some dinner and got my food on a paper plate instead of the little styrofoam to-go containers because I figured that way I'm not consuming as much... which was the my personal goal for the day.

Day 2 - Trash
So I figured the trash day would be pretty difficult, which it was.  The overall goal would be to create less trash than I would in an average day.  Before class i had to print out 24 pages of notes; not a very good start to the day.  I ate a Lunchable for lunch, which is in a little plastic container.  I'm not really sure if that's better or worse than eating food from a dining hall in a styrofoam container, but for dinner I had Ramen which I ate from dish ware, however it is individually wrapped.  I also drank two bottles of water today so the goal for the day wasn't really reached, however I feel that realizing the excess amount of trash created in a typical day will help me to be more careful in the future.

Day 3 - Transportation
Okay so transportation was the day I was least worried about, seeing as how I mostly walk everywhere on campus.  The goal was to not have to cause not to use gas/diesel powered transportation at all today, but I realized that wouldn't be possible when I had to attend a meeting for my sorority in the evening.  On the bright side, I did car-pool with two other girls.

Day 4 - FOOD!
I was looking forward to food day, mostly because I love food and having a day dedicated to it really excites me.  Unfortunately, I didn't have time to visit the farmer's market today, which I was actually looking forward to.  As far as knowing what's in my food and where it comes from I pretty much failed because I eat at the dining halls for the most part.  But for day 4, I think I was more successful that unsuccessful because I don't eat red meat in the first place and also most of the snack food I keep in my dorm is organic, or certified organic anyways...

Day 5 - Energy
So the goal for today was to not use the elevator once, and avoid any other unnecessary energy use.  I did pretty good, I didn't take the elevator at all.  As far as the rest of my energy use, honestly I didn't put much effort into saving, I took about a 30 minute long, warm shower to start off the my day and kind of forgot about saving energy for the remainder of the day, but looking back on it now this day would definitely prove to be the hardest for me.

Day 6 - Water
Let me just start off by saying that I'm a little sore today from taking the stairs to my fourth floor dorm all day yesterday, which is completely pathetic, motivating me to do away with elevator use all together.  But anyways the goal for today was to use less water that I would in a typical day.  I definitely didn't abide by the "If it's yellow let it mellow" rule, however I did put a sticky note on my bathroom mirror reminding me to turn the faucet off it didn't absolutely have to be on which helped.  I also took a pretty quick shower today.

Day 7 - Give Back
The goal today was simply just to give back in some way.  When I sat down to start blogging tonight I was under the impression that I somehow managed to not be successful on the seemingly easiest of the days, but when I thought about it a little harder I realized that I held the door multiple times for one of my good friends who's in a wheelchair.  I also held the elevator for a group of people that wouldn't have made it on if it wasn't for me putting my arm into potential danger.  I know that I could do a lot more to give back if I actually made a conscious effort, but that just didn't happen today.