Disposable Plastics Challenge! – Tyler Sturos

            Disposable plastics are essential in most people’s lives nowadays. Plastics such as Ziploc bags, milk jugs, water bottles, and other disposables are a cheap and much more portable option than what was used in the past. Due to the portability and low cost of these plastics, they are used for just about everything nowadays. While recording how much plastic I used and collecting it for a final picture, it made me feel guilty, knowing the damage that it causes to our environment. However, while doing the second part of the challenge- going two days without disposable plastics- made me realize how simple the disposable plastics make my life. Now, here is a summary of how my days went.

Day 1 and 2

Day 1 and 2 helped me to realize how much plastic I use and then throw away. The picture below does not show all that my house used. Missing from the picture is about 10-15 water bottles that were used by my roommates at spittoons, as all three of them are tobacco users. Both days went about the same. I wake up, eat a bowl of cereal in a plastic bowl. Just in that meal, I used the disposable plastic bag of cereal, a disposable plastic bowl, and a disposable plastic jug of milk. I then pack my lunch for in between classes. In this lunch are some fruit snacks, 2 plastic Ziploc bags, a water bottle, a Gatorade bottle, a little Debbie or 2, and a bag of chips or 2. The only product in the entire lunch that I pack just about every day is the paper bag that I put it all in. I then continued on these 2 days to use plastic at dinner as well. The first day I ate a Tony’s Pizza, which is wrapped in disposable plastic. The second day I ate taco bell. The taco bell was mostly paper products except for the cup and straw that were used and tossed in the garbage. The rest of both of the nights, I ate snacks which were wrapped in disposable plastic, stuff like Nutty Bars, fruit snacks, chips, and just about every other unhealthy snack. As I said before, the picture does not have all of the plastics used. It would have a lot more if I could have collected it all.

Day 3 and 4

Day 3 and 4 were not too difficult, I just had to change up the things that I ate for meals. The lunch I packed had to be replaced with a few things. I still brought a sandwich, but instead of a plastic Ziploc bag, I used a sandwich container. I brought peanuts instead of fruit snacks and put them in a container as well. In another container, I put yogurt from a large container of yogurt-which unfortunately is made of disposable plastic but I was limiting buying using large container. Instead of drinking water bottles and Gatorade, I brought Brisk to drink throughout the days. For breakfast, I ate bananas and drank orange juice-from a cardboard carton- instead of cereal. For dinner, the first day I ate chicken noodle soup. The second day I ate macaroni and cheese. For snacks later on, I ate things like homemade chocolate chip cookies from my mother and candy, which came in cardboard containers. Overall, I’d say that the shift worked out well, it just takes more preparation and some foods are limited.