Blog Action Day ~ Water

October 15, 2010 Blog Action Day topic is water. I have not checked the email links this morning (Sept. 28) to garner more details about why water is the chosen topic.

What I know about water is So Cal is running out of clean water supplies. Drought conditions caused the city of Long Beach to implement laws regarding water usage. I see violations of that every day of the week ~ or every day I take a walkabout.

Things I did to save water: "If its yellow, let it mellow; if its brown flush it down". Small bladder, I do save water not flushing every hour on the hour. I eschew the rule when using public restrooms. This long held habit does not work too well with the required by law low water usage toilet in this apartment. Need to flush three times to do the job one flush would normally do. Even if it was just yellow. (How gross to go public with that.)

I stopped running water while brushing teeth. I started wearing clothes more than once before washing them. Home from work, when I still worked, change into comfortable clothes. The jeans would hardly require washing and would put on same pair the rest of the week. Exception would be if I was going out with friends. Wearing a t-shirt several times on sweat-days is not a good idea. I never, like an older sister, washed bath towels after every usage.

Just little drops in the bucket to save water. How about you? What do you do to save water?

It was 106 degrees here yesterday and I feel for people living on the streets who were probably in more need of water than homed people. When I was homeless I would plan my walks to wind up at a water fountain to refill the water bottle just as it ran out. I recently wrote about drinking out of public water fountains.

I am not big on buying bottled water. I would say to people who lectured me about drinking sink water that I grew up drinking it and it did not kill me yet. The exception to that would be when I visited a sister who lived in Paulsboro New Jersey before she and husband purchased a home elsewhere. There was oil in the water. No shower and I hated taking a bath, the water even smelled oily.

At that time in my life, I could not bare skipping a daily shower or bath. Summer time I could take three or more showers. Staying overnight for more than one evening, I was forced into using Paulsboro's oily water. Today? I go for days at a time without showering. I do not do that to save water, however.

I always feel like I am going to fall when standing under the shower head and would put off jumping in the shower. Now I tend to sit in the tub while showering. I do not stink ~ sponge baths take care of odor causing body parts like underarms. Did a lot of sponge bathing while street living.

Okay, too long, as is usual for me. That is it, my Blog Action Day post about water.