This idea turned out to be much easier in practice than I thought it would be. I usually shower in the morning and don’t have all the time in the world anyway. (Quick tip: soaping up is much easier with a full bar of soap. I was down to a sliver over the weekend, and using them increased my showering time a full minute.) In fact, I will be consciously making this effort for a while, as I haven’t really experienced any sort of emotional or physical change - I don’t find myself missing longer showers, and I’m pretty sure I’ve maintained the same degree of hygiene.
Food for Thought
If I could have a shower like the ones at the beach, would that be so unbearable? The kind that requires you to push the button every 10-15 seconds to keep the water flowing. Think about how much water you could save while you are putting on soap or shampoo. Most water conservationists already recommend shutting off the water while you are soaping up, but frankly, I don’t want to bother with that. However, if the water were to stop on its own, I wouldn’t have a problem with that either.
Or what about wetting your hair and shampooing BEFORE you even turn the shower on. This might not work for women or for men with longer hair, but most men only need a handful of water in their hair to get a good lather going. I’m definitely going to give this a go, and I’ll see if any complications arise from it.
Going Paperless with OptOutPrescreen.com
The Good Human (thanks to Genevieve @ StylishGuide.com for the link) did a post entitled 35 Low-Cost Ways to Green Your Lifestyle, and #13 provides a link to OptOutPrescreen.com, a service that will stop the insane torrent of letters you get in the mail from credit agencies letting you know that “You’ve been pre-approved!” I’ll sign up and see how it goes over the next few months.
