You win some, you lose some

It's everywhere.  New Orleans was a great time, but I still was bombarded with plastic.  Most of my problems are coming when I go out to eat.  I have been pretty good about asking for a drink with no straw, but there were times that the waitress still gave me a straw.  Some bars only sell drinks from plastic cups, which I didn't realize until she handed me my beer.  Needless to say, plastic is still kicking my butt.

I did find a sweet little store called lush.  Basically it is a little boutique with a ton of girl beauty products with a little wall for guy stuff.  I found some soap cut from a big brick, a deodorant bar made of all natural ingredients for smell and baking soda, even a shampoo bar that comes in a metal tin.

                                                            Shampoo

                                                          Soap

                                                                   Deodorant

Nicki and I have changed some habits with grocery shopping.  We bought some cinch up produce bags so we can buy our vegetables, beans, ect. in bulk and not have to worry about having it wrapped in a plastic container.  Now we just need to remember to bring it to the store each time, so we can buy everything we need at the store.  We are buying all of our juice in glass containers, and we don't use plastic bags for anything.   We have our own bags that we take to the store, and if we forget, we just carry it out in hand.

Luckily for us, our grocery coop has a lot of eco-friendly options, but there are a lot of things in the store that has been wrapped with plastic.  Some glass bottles have a plastic safety wrap over the cap.  Cookies, pasta, some rice, premixed ingredients...almost all come in a paper box, but inside its still wrapped with plastic.

All in all we have realized there is a big learning curve this month.  Each time we go somewhere and are surprised with plastic we try to remember to be more specific the next time.  I hope at the end of this week I can say we did better than last week.

Major Fails...plural.

I started this week out with a tasty treat at chipotle.  I was super pumped to start this months resolution and had reminded myself to not use any plastic before I ordered.  I told the cashier I would like a basket without any paper/plastic sheet on top.  Instead of grabbing me a regular basket, she grabs the paper off the top of a pre-made basket, crumples it up, and throws it into the garbage before putting my burrito on it.  What a great start to the month.

Thursday we went out to catch a show in town.  Nicki couldn't get her drinks in anything but plastic.  The bartender wouldn't let her carry around a can or glass mug.  So unfortunately, this week has started out pretty poorly.  I told Nicki that night I was going to have to be more proactive this month.  It was easier with the food, because I just had to worry about myself.  This month it seems everyone I have encountered makes it really hard for me not to use plastic.

Today I was sure I could make it work.  This morning Nicki roped me into getting up before 9 and going to a babystore.  We picked Wobert up some cloth diapers so we can show our family what kind we want, but some of them were individually wrapped in plastic bags.  I'm pretty sure the Mrs. didn't want to hear me tell her we couldn't buy them because they were wrapped in plastic, so I didn't say anything.

Tonight we went to the grocery store and had to pick up some scallops.  Last week when I bought seafood they put it in a paper and wrapped.  I thought it was safe to assume the same would happen tonight.  The meat man put my scallops in the paper wrapping and then proceeded to dump them into a large plastic bag.

Plastic 4 : Ryan 0

This week I am going to be in New Orleans, so it's going to be tougher not to use plastic. My goal is to go the whole trip without wasting any plastic. Now I just got to quit being lazy and go out and buy a metal water bottle.