Recently I read an article in the local alternative weekly about the amount of water used in our part of the country. We face drought conditions in a few years due to overuse. One of the suggestions was to not shower every day arguing that most people don't need to unless they work a physically demanding job.
I shower every day, it helps wake me up in the morning before coffee and I really do enjoy a long hot shower. Heck, if I had the time there would be many days where I would shower till the tub filled with hot water and then soak in the tub till it cooled and then another hot blast from the shower before I got out of the bathroom.
But this is not water smart. So today I just washed face and pits in the sink. I have felt itchy, sticky, and greasy all day. I feel gross. Now I also exercised today but it was only tai chi, not exactly high impact. Still, Wife just told me that I smell bad.
So maybe I'll just work on taking shorter showers and not turning the hot water up too high. Small improvements are better than no improvements.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
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2 comments:
I also cannot stand the icky feeling of going without a shower. Admittedly, I take a long, hot one everyday. I do understand this "we waste too much" point-of-view, but I don't think stop showering daily is a legitimate response.
I think you are right to attempt to shorten your shower length, correct response. You know, our culture seems so polarized in how we respond to things. We’re so all or nothing. But, the middle-way seems the best to me: limit not quit, cut back not cut out.
GrandmaN was a Depression-era thinker (she was born in 1908, I think). I know what advice she would have given (I remember doing this as a child when the water heater was on the fritz and not providing enough hot water). GrandmaN would have said to only run the water when it was really needed (wetting, rinsing) and to turn it off while you are scrubbing.
Pretty smart, I think, and not an awful compromise.
When I went to Scotland in 1997, the dorm showers were set up TonyN's way. There were push buttons at waist level for the water, like the style of button you would see on a push sink. (Does that make any sense?)
The premise was you pushed the button and got wet, water cut off, you lathered all up, and then pushed the button again to rinse.
We USA'ers couldn't handle this. Through group discussion, we realized that if you leaned with your elbow on the button, you could take an almost continuous shower.
I think that's a lifehack.
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