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(I have made many blog posts about this topic, but felt the need today to make more of a consolidated compilation. Hope you find this helpful in your efforts to shift the thinking & practice in your community!)

Regarding why I refuse bottled water unless it is an absolute emergency.

This is a very important topic, and some people recently have seemed baffled when I declined offers of bottled water. So I’m going to share some of the best public information that I know of.

This has all been out there for a long time, so I assumed everyone knew it. But, it’s a big world out there and there’s a lot of information for us to try to keep track of. See various links below and in the comments.

If you ever see me drink a bottle of bottled water, you are welcome to ask me if I’m OK, because it might literally be a medical emergency.

Most recently, I drank a couple of bottles of bottled water back in 2020, at a daytime event in midsummer where I was volunteering and I noticed I had started to experience symptoms of heat exhaustion. After searching extensively for a working faucet or water fountain to refill my cup and not finding anything, I finally gave up and drank two bottles of bottled water.

Still, I felt bad about accepting the bottled water, and was very angry with myself. I could have planned better, brought a bigger jug of water from home.

A fellow civic activist, who is also a fellow environmentally concerned citizen, commented on my post:

“I remember life before the cult of bottled water, before adults went around sucking on bottles of water like over grown toddlers. Yes, I understand the need to stay hydrated and the bottled water trend is here to stay but so is my mental image of over grown toddlers sucking on their bottles. Sometimes I even imagine them in cute little Oshkosh B’Gosh overalls. Makes my world more fun.”

To which I responded:

Yes, so true and so well put! And — Saying that the plastic trash bottled water trend is here to stay is a self-defeating attitude. It’s the same kind of defeatist mentality we have often lamented in our fellow Boomers, that everything is just doomed to stay the way it is even though we are killing the planet, oh well.

Isn’t it funny how the generation with the most money and resources IN THE ENTIRE HISTORY OF HUMANKIND is the one that just lays down and plays dead and claims helplessness over environmental and social problems? Hmmm …

The fact is: More and more people these days are conscientiously carrying their own reusable bottles. And, furthermore, we are deriving great self-expressive enjoyment from it, so I would say THIS trend is here to stay!

At a gathering the other week outdoors in a park, a couple of very glamorous ladies were toting those very large Stanley cups full of some kind of delicious beverage, and their cups that matched their gorgeous nails and stylish outfits were just very eye-catching!

People like you and me, who get out and about a lot, are in a great position of influence! I so enjoy carrying my cute reusable containers and utensils and beautiful heirloom cloth napkins from my childhood! #fashionplanet

We are stylish grown-up ladies, we don’t have to be part of the herd of overgrown toddlers!

Further exploration/action:

• If you don’t watch or read anything else, PLEASE PLEASE just watch this 8-minute video. She really sums things up. The Story of Bottled Water, by Annie Leonard (originator of the popular acclaimed series “The Story Of Stuff”)

• Please don’t assume that all these bottles are getting recycled. It’s very much the opposite. Google search: bottled water trash

• On a sidenote, when I was living in Tokyo and had an evening side-job at a karaoke snack pub in Shibuya, we got the water by refilling glass bottles with tap-water, and served that to customers. I’m pretty sure every karaoke snack probably did and does the same thing still. At least I hope so, I hope a bunch of them haven’t converted to single use plastic!

• There are communities that actually have a dangerous water supply. Flint, Michigan, is just one example. And the mining communities in West Virginia. When we drink bottled water just for convenience or as a status symbol, we are actually throwing those communities under the bus. Let’s step it up and push for REAL solutions!! As Annie Leonard says in her story of bottled water video linked above, the real solutions are: invest in public water infrastructure; prevent pollution; [install & use] drinking fountains; and boycott bottled water.

• If you for some reason just feel a compulsion to spend money on plastic bottles of water, please buy it for someone who NEEDS it. Here is a Facebook page where you can go to bid on their handmade jewelry etc and the money will be donated to buy bottles of water for workers and families in the coal camps of West Virginia. Where the water and land has been hideously poisoned by our endless consumerist capitalist demand for “cheap energy on tap.” Follow this Facebook page: Marked Melungeon Company Store.

• Regarding recycling: “Americans buy 29 billion water bottles a year. For every six bottles people buy, only one is recycled. … U.S. landfills are overflowing with 2 million tons of discarded water bottles.” And it takes up to 1,000 years for one bottle to decompose.(healthyhumanlife.com) Numerous other websites report similar figures, or even worse.

… Began a meme I saw on an acquaintance’s feed this morning. It goes on:

“… you aren’t confessing your love for the candidate. It’s a chess move for the world you want to live in.”

Yes!! Or as a friend once put it, “It’s like public transportation, you don’t expect it to take you right to your door.”

Once you have voted in the candidate of your choice, the work has only just begun; even if they get into office, you still have to keep pushing for the world you truly want to live in.

Oh: And even if the candidate of your choice doesn’t get into office, you still have to keep pushing for the world you truly want to live in.

Because what’s the alternative? Give up? I don’t think so!

Lots of people are posting right now about how Wall Street indexes have plunged, so everyone should take the opportunity to buy, buy, buy! I don’t mess with Wall Street, for many reasons. Or bitcoin either.

I understand why people do mess with mutual funds, stocks, etc.; people are just trying to survive and thrive. And a lot of people don’t know about other options such as local investments.

And many of us don’t know the damage that we are doing (to the planet, to our communities, and to ourselves) by continuing to feed big distant corporate entities. (And BTW for various reasons, even the so-called “socially responsible investment funds” are not really a good alternative.)

The truth is that a lot of us feel shafted by big corporations. But, if we are investing in Wall Street, we are also supporting the big distant entities who are shafting us.

On my blog, and here on this page too, I have posted extensively about other approaches to investing, as well as ways to live abundantly without needing to amass so much money as to require a fund that grows 7% a year or whatever.

The two best ways I know of to not need to amass a large nest egg that grows at a planet-killing percentage per year, are

1) Reduce your need to earn; and

2) Learn about the eight forms of capital (only one of which is money).

I have posted on both of these topics. You should be able to find multiple posts by typing the terms into the search field of this blog. If you don’t find the posts, give me a shout and I will dig the links up for you!

By the way, the reason I read for the recent stock-index drop is that the US economy is not growing as fast as expected. This bespeaks a very flawed collective understanding about what the real economy is.

GRIST magazine has a wonderful series of “climate fiction” stories. The series is called “Imagine 2200.”

“Imagine 2200, Grist’s climate fiction contest, celebrates stories that offer vivid, hope-filled, diverse visions of climate progress. Discover all the 2024 winners. Or sign up for email updates to get new stories in your inbox.”

This is one of the stories: https://grist.org/climate-fiction/imagine2200-cabbage-koora/

I’ve read several so far.

As a frame of reference, I trial & error’ed several temp + humidity combinations, and the resulting wet-bulb temperatures.

“The wet-bulb temperature is the lowest temperature that can be reached under current ambient conditions by the evaporation of water only. Even heat-adapted people cannot carry out normal outdoor activities past a wet-bulb temperature of 32 °C (90 °F), equivalent to a heat index of 55 °C (131 °F).” (Wikipedia).

For those who don’t know, wet-bulb index of 95 is widely accepted by scientists as the limit beyond which human beings can theoretically only survive for a few hours.

But, now experts are saying that even 88 or above can be dangerous — even for healthy young people.

Here are three sets of temperature & humidity values that I input, and the resulting wet-bulb temperatures:

99F, 87% humidity –> wet-bulb 95.65 (deadly range)

94, 87% –> 90.76

94, 80 –> 88.58

To calculate the wet-bulb temperature where you are now, visit this link: https://calculator.academy/wet-bulb-calculator/

I make up acronyms all the time. Some of them stick with me. The acronym habit might be a product of growing up in a military household.

Here, in no particular order, are a few of my favorite ones. (By the way, just because I said I made it up doesn’t mean someone else didn’t previously make it up. If you learn of an instance of any of these that is not by me, let me know so I can give proper attribution.)

POFIFOTO – Been using this one for some years now. It stands for “Put One Foot In Front Of The Other,” and I use it to keep myself moving forward when it feels like I’m getting derailed and discouraged, indulging in catastrophic thinking about the enormity of whatever task or mission.

NOGARA – No One Gives A Rat’s Ass. I think I made this of a couple of years ago. It originally was negative self-talk, meaning, nobody cares about your stupid work or effort. But, more recently I have turned it around, and I instead use it to talk myself out of beating myself up when I have said or done something stupid. Own it, make amends, move on, do better. Nobody cares that much about my blunder (as long as I own it); they are all involved in their own stuff.

NETIFEB – Not Every Thing Is For Every Body. Just started this one, I use it to keep myself focused on quality (of the work I put out) rather than quantity (mass appeal, Likes etc.).

DAISNAID – Do As I Say, Not As I Do. Or, also, Do As I Say, Not As I’ve DONE. This one is for when there’s a communication habit or other behavior that I have found to be ineffective, and am therefore in the process of changing. Or something unhelpful that I don’t do anymore but that I have fallen into in the past.

ITWIT – (New addition that came to me today, December 8.) It Takes What It Takes. I like how it rhymes with “nitwit.” Because this morning I was finishing the second half of 1) hauling a bunch of bags of leaves that someone had tossed at curbside (I accomplished this part yesterday evening); and then 2) deploying them in the yard. The deploying part, which I had set for myself to knock off very easily this morning, was taking me longer than it felt like it should. And I kept spilling leaves and bumping into stuff it was really getting to be annoying. And it came to me, “it takes what it takes.” This resonates with one of my favorite pieces of advice from Peace Pilgrim, always been one of my favorite pieces of advice, that if we’re feeling overwhelmed then we’re trying to do more than is our job. It takes what it takes! Maybe some other chore gets put off till later. And we have to stay in the moment instead of thinking ahead to how much of the stack remains. That’s one of my big pitfalls, not staying in the moment enough. But I have tools to help me stay in the moment, and when I use them, everything works great.

Reading people’s encouraging stories about their experiences wearing Kamala t-shirts and whatnot. It’s a great way to connect with people and let them know of ways to get involved. That said, not everyone wants to directly declare their political preference; it can be especially tricky if you live in a small town, for example.

On that note, I got an idea for some jewelry, and a T-shirt, that are not direct but would still have the desired effect of gathering our people:

1) Jewelry: a whistle worn on a chain as a necklace, with a cat’s face painted on it or a cat sticker stuck to it.

2) A T-shirt with an image of such a whistle. No words, just an image. People will get it, and the people who don’t get it and they ask what is that, you could just answer, “It’s a cat whistle.” And smile sweetly and go on about your day.

3) If we want a bolder version of the t-shirt to include words to drive the message home, we could add a slogan that says “I see your dog-whistle, and raise you my CAT-whistle!”

(Yes of course, many if not most women in our movement are not single or childless or cat-ladies per se, but I think the phrase has become pretty standard to indicate what it indicates, which is #TeamKamala and #VoteBlue!)

For my fellow NPAs who might be struggling with all these calls to vote Democrat, I made this short TikTok video addressed to my fellow lefty anarchists. But really I’m calling all NPAs. Because I feel your pain. And this election really is important. As much as the two mainstream parties may feel like just two variations on the theme of elitism, plutocracy, war-mongering, and authoritarianism, there are some very key differences, and lives are at stake.

One of the tips I give is that the most likely successful course of action will be to first make sure we vote out the creeping fascism. And then after November (and don’t forget to vote in your primary in August as well if applicable), we have to keep up the pressure on the White House and Congress in order to get the truly progressive things accomplished in society.

Two suggestions for you in the meantime: join Veterans for Peace, read their literature and share it and attend their zoom meetings; and connect with Not Another Bomb, sign & share their petition calling on Kamala Harris / Biden administration right now for an arms embargo, and attend NAB’s zoom action meetings.

PS. Production note: My preference for how to produce a message i choose to wear is either DIY, or order direct from the campaign/Dem orgs (in cases where the message I want to convey is being offered for sale to support the campaign, a Democrat org etc.), or else have it made by a Black-owned business or other local business in my area who I want to support. I am currently making my cat whistle by painting white nail polish on a nice steel whistle that I happen to have. And I will make a cat face with sharpie on one side, and maybe the word “meow” on the other side.

OK! I got my whistle made, and am wearing it right now. Here’s a pic of both sides.