A diary of my day with just two buckets of water!
Ok, so I bought my buckets. I am not sure it is cheating, but I went for a medium sized bucket, 10 litres... should be a doddle, I don't use much water anyway. Shower in the morning, cup of tea, bottle of water during the day and a coke at lunch. Easy, I should be able to boil some peas and have a bottle of wine with 15 litres to spare!
So the morning comes and oops, I have a hangover. Not a great start, made much worse by the fact that I can't down a pint of water and take a long shower... Why did I choose today? Oh yes, I remember, it is because there are a few days like this. Note to self, as a service to all the readers of this blog I think I should thoroughly research organic wines and beers at some point.
Right, so I have filled my bucket for a wash, and since I am such a loving husband, I have agreed to share it with my lovely wife (as long as I get first go). HORRIBLE!!!!! Water is not too warm and I still feel soapy. My apologies to anyone reading this over breakfast, in fact, the squeamish should probably look away now. Here is a link to some pictures of lovely kittens and stuff.
Anyway, I used up most of the water and what was left was all soapy by now. I am a considerate husband as well as loving.
Next up was tea... There is no way I am missing out on a cup of tea... another 0.75 litres for a couple of cups. I am starting to realise this might be a bit more tricky that I first imagined.
Now, without going into too much detail (click on the kitten link now!!! It is your only hope!) there is a horrible phrase that goes around some environmental circles that no matter how much I try, I simply can't cope with... If it's yellow, let it mellow, if it's brown, flush it down (Clearly not invented by Guinness drinkers then - you can't complain, the link to the kittens is up there). So this is going to be tricky, but to baffle you with a few facts, toilets are MONSTERS when it comes to water consumption. Each flush can use as much as 14 litres of water in old ones, and even a new one will use 4 to 6 litres. I am not going to like this. Again, I made sure I was first in the queue and used the rest of the shower water as a sort of flush. NOT NICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So, over 10 litres down and I am not even out of the house yet!
My ipod hates me! Walking to work I get Ocean Colour Scene and The Waterboys on shuffle. Suddenly I realise that I take water for granted! This is not going to be fun.
Lunch was ok, but I have finished my water. Gulp! (or rather, not!)
YIKES! I need a wee! Toilet has auto flush and I am definitely washing my hands (unlike the other bloke who just walked out of the toilets! DISGUSTING!)
So, mid afternoon, time for a count up... shower and stuff, 5 litres, water, coffee, teas and stuff about 2 litres, that flush and washing hands, let's call it a polite litre. So 7 down and 13 spare.
Water: a resource that we take for granted
Think I will celebrate with another coffee...
Now, evening comes and then it hits me. First up is cooking. I decided to use water in the spirit of the challenge, so another litre gone there. Then water with the meal itself and then THE WASHING UP! Stupidly I had decided to use every pot and pan we had in the house and furthermore had spot welded half the dinner to it! I love that burnt flavour!
So suddenly we are down to a couple of litres left and I still need to go to the loo!
So all in all it was a success, but has made me realise how much water we use and waste. In fact I cheated a bit as we would often water the garden, clean the house etc.
So any ideas you have on how to cut down or save it would be welcome. One friend suggested saving the water wasted while waiting for the shower to warm up for watering the plants.
Toby's blog: environmentallychallenged.blogspot.com/
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Environmentally Challenged, Toby set himself the task of surviving the day with just two buckets of water.
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