A Challenging Day

Over the weekend I went to a Diabetes Expo with my sister-in-law and mother. My 2-year-old niece was diagnosed as a diabetic about a year ago. There family is learning how to eat a diet that is healthy for a diabetic. The expo was a huge opportunity for people to give away samples. Everything was either a paper handout to explain the company services/products or a single serve package to give the product a try. It was great for my sister-in-law to get all these things to try. Her daughter is a rather finicky eater, so finding options that she will go with is difficult. It was challenging for me because I knew that the majority of the people filling their goodie bags will potentially toss what they've received without necessarily utilizing it.

While with my sister-in-law and my mother we decided to go out to lunch. My mother was insistent about wanting to buy lunch. Seeing as she is from a small town and unfamiliar with big city prices, I tried to find some low price options. We narrowed it down to a chain taco restaurant or a chain sandwich shop. We decided on tacos and there I was trying to figure out how to place my order without getting all the extra wrapping. During this lunch I threw away the paper liner from my basket, a paper napkin and a paper cup. I failed to plan ahead for this meal, leaving my fabric napkin and to go cup at home.

The day clearly started out poorly with my choices. But once I got home, my husband and I finished installing a compost bin. YEAH!! I've been anticipating this and had a week’s worth of compost to immediately put in the new bin. It felt fantastic. He made the bin from scrap wood that we found in our basement. We had to buy wire for the sides and hinges for the top, but mostly it was made of all things we had lying around.

That evening lead to the next challenge: having visitors who are not familiar with recycling. Some of their actions were as if they think recycling is a joke. They had beers and the next day I found a few beer bottles in the garbage. The garbage was located behind the recycling bins, which were clearly for glass bottles. I’m not sure if this was intentional or a mistake. Regardless it reminds me that there are a lot of people in the world who are still not recycling. In the city of Minneapolis it’s particularly easy to recycle and you even get a discount on your garbage bill if you do. Hopefully our time spent with our friends left a positive influence on them to see how easy it is to recycle.