What can you change?

[chasea]

I see a lot of waste in an average work day. I also see a lot of needless spending, which means pretty much the same thing. I once worked for a man who had a jet dedicated to bringing him oranges from other parts of the world. I estimated he spent 4-5 million dollars on orange juice every 6 months. Obviously he was wasteful in other areas, but the orange juice is a good indicator.

The flipside of my "Things I Want Like Now" thread would be called "No No No No NO" and include things like the worlds most expensive kebab ($1,220.00) and a company in Hoboken that videotapes you destroying whatever you want, provided you pay for it. This is ridiculous. We all know it.

And we all overspend in certain areas of our own lives.

I live pretty cheaply. I really only have to worry about rent and my phone bill. I try not to be wasteful.

But my cheap boho loft in Brooklyn means the roof leaks right over the kitchen. So other than storing beer and leftovers in the fridge, the kitchen does not get used. This means I eat out every day. Every meal I consume is prepared by someone else. That's a lot of money wasted. It also leads to a lot of wasted food; something I am not proud of.

So here's the thing. I am going to correct this. I am going to type out my transgressions online, and then I am going to do something about it. That is money that can be spent more wisely, not spend at all, or given to someone in need.

So that's that. Well, not exactly. I can't just say it. I have to do it.

We all are wasteful in some way. We all can improve.

Where can you improve? What do you plan to do about it?

[Brandon White]

Wasting water to keep lawns green. In the summer here, its not so necessary, but August through May requires twice weekly watering to prevent dead brown grass. In the future, I'd like to landscape smartly as to not require so much water (less grass of course). Monthly water bill is in the mid $300's - without watering the lawn its around $100. At least 90% of our plants are natural to our region so they can stay alive without intervention.

That's about all I can think of. We are pretty cost effective in most day to day activities.

[davids]

My family does a pretty good job with this, mostly driven by my wife. So I'm pretty conscious of areas where I could be better.

We recycle a lot. But I still toss the random plastic bag rather than rinse it and stuff it in the bag 'o bags to recycle. And I need to remember to grab some of my wife's hoard of grocery bags prior to heading to the market, instead of bringing more home.

I've been driving less & less over the years. And we even kept the old gas-guzzler past its expiration date just to avoid adding it to the waste stream (here's a hint: factor the environmental impact of manufacturing your shiny new hybrid into your Green Calculation before pulling out your wallet.) But I should still ride the 6 mile round-trip to Flat Black for my coffee beans rather than get in the Fit. Or take the T downtown for the movie rather than drive to the suburban theater.

In general the lights go out and the heat, fans or AC go off when we leave the house. But we should suck up the 20 minute cool-down/heat-up period to drop our consumption still further. I was bummed to read how much power a cablebox/DVR consumes, days after I finally got one. But there's nothing I can do about that in the short-term if I want the technology.

We're pretty good with water, too: I'm rinsing the dishes less & less as my trust in our new dishwasher grows (the old one went after 20+ years) and I take short showers, shave with a dribble of water flowing, turn off the faucet while I brush my teeth... My save-the-world daughter still isn't with that part of the program - she can spend hours standing the shower, and she blow-dries her hair even in 90-degree heat.

We've talked about putting solar panels to our flat roof. I think they may actually be cheap enough now to pay for themselves pretty quickly. That could be cool.

We're doing a pretty good job, I think. But there's more we could do.

[caleb]

Rent is by far our single biggest expense, but living near work and public transit saves us on auto expenses. For example, I got my oil changed before Christmas and am just now getting to the 3000 mile mark. Overpaying for rent is going to change by the end of the year, though. There are cheaper places to be had that wouldn't increase our transportation costs too much and I'm going to make sure we move to one of them. High rent is lame.

I think food and drink is our biggest controllable sink hole, a conversation we were just having last night. I would say we blow several hundred a month (often more) hosting people at our house for dinner, drinks, or barbecues. That would be fine if it was reciprocated in equal measure by our guests, but it's not. Some people who are otherwise really nice can be thoughtless leeches when it comes to eating and drinking. So, the frequency of events will get cut back and the guest lists will get trimmed.

We've cut back the dinners out and cook more at home, but cooking food at home isn't really cheap either. Good food costs money. And there's almost always waste - leftover ingredients or forgotten leftovers in the fridge. Cooking and doing dishes take lots of time. While eating good food at home is cheaper than eating in good restaurants, a $5 lunch out isn't really that bad of a deal every now and then because brown bagging isn't even close to free.

If we really wanted to cut our food costs (both money and time) I think we'd consume more processed frozen foods. Yup, they're really bad for a person. But, they're quick, easy, and cheap. I know plenty of Cat 1/2 guys who haven't hardly cooked a real meal or paid to eat in a restaurant in years. They basically subsist on sandwiches and frozen food. I think it was Ullrich who once said that if the oven is hot enough anything will burn; these guys are living examples.