I want my future to look like

This class this semester has profoundly effected me, I don’t want to come off sounding corny but I’m sincere in saying that I no longer look at the world around me in the same way. Just for starters I recently said to my husband that I don’t want our life to be one of consumerism, like having the feeling that we need to buy the biggest TV just because and we don’t need to feel like we have to have a humongous house to be happy in life. Five years ago I would never say something like that, five years ago I did want the 7 bedroom, 3 bath, house for four people. But college has changed my perspective of priorities. It is no longer a priority to consume and shop and work to the bone to support those habits. Its hard for my family to understand where I’m coming from, a lot of my collegiate associates get what I’m trying to say. For my husband this was a harsh realization that we will have to work hard at compromising about what I future holds and how we’ll meet all our needs. I want our future to be filled with satisfying work, like growing our own food and having an efficient farm and figuring out a way to become more sustainable, a sustainability that suits us. I’d rather splurge on energy efficient tools, like solar panels, than a 70 inch LCD T.V. with built in Blue-Ray. I’d rather build a small energy efficient home with a bit of land than buy a 300 sq. ft. house without a lawn. Somewhere between all of that lies a compromise that will suit our goal and pockets. None of this self realization would have been possible if I wasn’t exposed to many different ideas at college. .

Recycling facts

WATER

*Between 1950 and 2000, the U.S. population nearly doubled. However, in that same period, public demand for water more than tripled! Americans now use an average of 100 gallons of water each day — enough to fill 1,600 drinking glasses! (EPA, 2008)

*A recent government survey showed that at least 36 states are anticipating local, regional, or statewide water shortages by 2013. (EPA, 2008)

*Most people realize that hot water uses up energy, but supplying and treating cold water requires a significant amount of energy too. American public water supply and treatment facilities consume about 56 billion kilowatt-hours per year — enough electricity to power more than 5 million homes for an entire year. (EPA, 2008)

Appliances and Fixtures in General

*If all U.S. households installed water-efficient appliances, the country would save more than 3 trillion gallons of water and more than $18 billion dollars per year! (EPA, 2008)

*If one out of every 100 American homes was retrofitted with water-efficient fixtures, we could save about 100 million kilowatt-hours of electricity per year — avoiding 80,000 tons of greenhouse gas emissions. The greenhouse gas savings would be equivalent to removing nearly 15,000 automobiles from the road for one year! (EPA, 2008)

Bathroom: Sink, Toilet, Bath, Shower

*About 75 percent of the water we use in our homes is used in the bathroom. (California Energy Commission, 2006)

*If your toilet is from 1992 or earlier, you probably have an inefficient model that uses between 3.5 to 7 gallons per flush. Newer, high-efficiency toilets use less than 1.3 gallons per flush — that's at least 60 percent less water per flush! (EPA, 2008)

*If just 1 percent of American homes replaced an older toilet with a new WaterSense labeled toilet, the country would save more than 38 million kilowatt-hours of electricity — enough electricity to supply more than 43,000 households for one month. (EPA, 2008)

*The average bathroom faucet flows at a rate of two gallons per minute. Turning off the tap while brushing your teeth in the morning and at bedtime can save up to 8 gallons of water per day, which equals 240 gallons a month. (EPA, 2008)

*Letting your faucet run for five minutes uses about as much energy as letting a 60-watt light bulb run for 14 hours. (EPA, 2008)

*Leaky faucets that drip at the rate of one drip per second can waste more than 3,000 gallons of water each year; A leaky toilet can waste about 200 gallons of water every day. If your fixtures have leaks, you should get them repaired! (EPA, 2008)

*A full bath tub requires about 70 gallons of water, while taking a five-minute shower uses only 10 to 25 gallons. (EPA, 2008)

Other Household Water Needs

*The average washing machine uses about 41 gallons of water per load, whereas newer, high-efficiency washing machine models use less than 28 gallons of water per load. (EPA, 2008)

*The typical single-family suburban household uses at least 30 percent of their water outdoors for irrigation. Some experts estimate that more than 50 percent of landscape water use goes to waste due to evaporation or runoff caused by overwatering!
Consider installing a drip irrigation system to water your lawn and garden. These systems use between 20 to 50 percent less water than conventional in-ground sprinkler systems. They are also much more efficient than conventional sprinklers because no water is lost to wind, runoff, and evaporation. (EPA, 2008) http://www.oberlin.edu/recycle/facts.html

Black Friday

The book A Reasonable Life was very interesting and one part that I would like to reflect on is about “Sunday shopping” which I wanted to correlate to Black Friday. That one day a year we as Americans practically celebrate capital and consumerism, when we’re on a turkey high of tryptophan and wake in the wee hours of the morning to shop and shove all morning long. I myself woke at 3pm to stand in line at 5pm to purchase a PS3 Christmas bundle that came with two games. But I refused the temptation to shop and shove my way inside a big chain store like Wal-Mart and Target were people have actually died from being trampled to death so others can save and shop and save and shop.
I think we’re junkies for the bargain, we push physical limits to be able to say we made the best purchase possible. The disturbing part is that this happens at a national level, that people all over America shop and shop and shop on this one day, which makes a couple of other people pretty darn rich. It’s almost sickening to think that humans turn on humans to get the last really good deal, or people stomp over others to snag a bargain, but when something like 9/11 happens people donated blood beyond capacity and had to be turned away. Its not surprising that the theory of humanity has been pondered for centuries and has stumped the most intellectual of people.

December 12, 2012

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/11/091106-2012-end-of-world-myths.html

The end of the world is near—December 21, 2012, to be exact—according to theories based on a purported ancient Maya prediction and fanned by the marketing machine behind the soon-to-be-released 2012 movie. But could humankind really meet its end in 2012—drowned in apocalyptic floods, walloped by a secret planet, seared by an angry sun, or thrown overboard by speeding continents?

All of these are myths and people are afraid to the point they are contemplating whether they should kill themselves or not before this time is coming. The media has always scared people. We need to know fact from fiction. Go to the library and do some research. Find out on the citations and when it was published. If it comes from the government, university, or a professor from a university then you are in great hands.

Some people are so naive about science. They need to broaden their ideas and facts about the planet.

What I have to come appreciate more

This class has not only taught me a great deal about ecosystems and the environment, it has opened and broadened my mind. I have to come a point that our planet is a valuable source to us. I knew about certain things like green house gases and what not. I learned more about the Industrial Revolution and how the agriculture went from hunter-gatherers to being a huge civilization associated with technological advances.

I think that people's prosperity has narrow-minded some individuals. They are concerned about making more money, having more prestige, and wealth instead of spending time with their loved ones. That is another reason why our divorce rate is so high. I also think that advertising has corrupted our child's minds. This country is very liberal and we have alot of freedom to do basically what we want.

I have to come appreciate the planet as a whole and life itself.

People and Resource

I just want to say as final words about this class. This class was nothing like I thought it would be. In the beginning I thought blogging was something that we shouldn't take seriously. But when i start blogging, I didn't want to stop blogging. Every time I blog, I always find something interesting and learn something from it too. I felt proud of myself. Because I am not a big fan of reading books and learning all these information in a very little amount of time was something to be proud of to me. I read Ishmael and watched two videos because of this class. I feel like now I know the reason why Dr. Hirsch wanted everyone to blog every week. Normally I don't learn anything from my other classes because we just take the tests and forget about it after a week.
I just want to say Thanks to Dr. Hirsch for letting us to post blogs and I hope US will find solutions to the global crisis.

Animals Can Tell Before Disaster Strikes

There is evidence to support the fact that animals can sense things before we can. Earthworms come out of the ground before an earthquake, sharks flee the shore when there is a tsunami, birds waited to fly south when there were a series of hurricanes in Florida. There are many more examples of this in an article on mongabay.com. I found this very interesting in itself but it is also interesting in another way. For all of those people who do not believe that the Earth is in danger, they should look around them at the animals. We are in a period of mass extinction, marine life is in danger, biodiversity is decreasing, the rainforests and the creatures that reside in them are disapearring. It should be obvious that the animals are trying to tell us something. They are basically screaming at us that there is going to be a disaster if we continue on this path. We would not be able to exist without animals so not to care about animals is the same as not caring if you have water to drink. An example of a lack of biodiversity is monoculture when there is not enough biodiversity. This can lead to disaster in the form of a food famine. Having a lack of biodiversity led to the irish potato famione, the european wine industry collapse and many others.