As I mentioned yesterday, many of you have taken the challenge… so many in fact that I felt a separate sub-blog was in order to collect all the tallies. And so (drum roll please) I hereby announce the inauguration of the

Here is a recap of the challenge rules as well as two ways to post your photos and tallies to the blog. It’s not too late to join the fun or just leave comments for the other participants with your ideas, suggestions, or bursts of inspiration. I’m sure those who have posted already would love some support.

THE RULES:

1) Collect all of your own plastic waste, both recyclable and non, for a minimum of one week. If you want to go for more than one week, great! Just keep each week’s collection separate.

2) What qualifies as yours? Anything that benefits you. So, if your housemate or significant other brings home a tub of yogurt that you both share, the tub goes in your tally. But if you hate yogurt, never touch the stuff, and wouldn’t have bought it for yourself in a million years, it’s not your responsibility. What about stuff for your kids? I’ll leave that up to you. Whatever you decide, just be consistent about collecting it. Personally, I’d be very interested to see how much plastic waste is generated by babies, since I don’t have children myself.

3) Live normally in the first week. It doesn’t help to artificially reduce your plastic consumption for the sake of a one-week tally if you will go back to living with more plastic afterward. Think of this exercise as a scientific experiment. Nothing more.

4) Guilt is not encouraged. Nor are comparisons with other people whom you perceive to be doing “worse” or “better” than you in terms of plastic waste. This exercise is for purely educational purposes. Guilt doesn’t help.

5) Take a photo of your stash and list out the items at the end of each week that you participate. You might also want to include details about what things are recyclable in your community or not. If you have a sensitive food scale, you might consider weighing your plastic as well. A bathroom scale won’t really be accurate because plastic is so light weight.

6) Guilt is unnecessary.

7) There is no time limit for doing this exercise. This is an ongoing challenge.

8) Guilt will only get in the way of understanding. It’s not needed for this challenge.

9) Seriously.

POSTING YOUR RESULTS:

After you have completed the exercise, take a picture, complete the questionnaire, and upload your results. I’ll post your tally as soon as I can. Please feel free to email me if you have any questions or if you don’t see your results posted within a day or two.

Questions? Comments? Can’t wait to get started? Let me know!