So I’m walking the dog (happy to be there!) and the teenager (not quite as thrilled) through Toronto’s gorgeous ravine system and what do I see?
Mostly plastic trash nestled under the shrubs. Drives me crazy!

the pristine pics of nature

Fall colours!

Rico, camouflaged in the leaves

People generally have a handle on this most basic behaviour … not littering … but there’s lots more to this picture. Like how can we live our lives and do our jobs without generating so much trash to begin with? Why are so many things made of plastic and in a plastic box with plastic shrink-wrap then in a plastic bag? And why are they designed to be used just once and thrown away?

reusables have really upped their game. These are gorgeous!

Back in the day, I felt great if I could recycle something. Zero guilt, and the sound of songbirds chirping thankfully at my awesomeness. Now I’ve learned that though recycling is good, it’s like the least good thing we can do. It’s still single use, and a lot of what we think is recyclable really isn’t (looking at you, ubiquitous coffee cups!). Don’t get me wrong, I still try hard to recycle whatever I can, and pay attention to the rules wherever I am. But recycling is just the first step. Whoops, not littering is the first step so recycling is the second step :).

October 21 is a pretty major day in these here parts (cough, VOTE, cough). It’s also the start of Waste Reduction Week. This year, we’ve gone bigger than ever! It used to be 1 week, now we do 2. We used to just have 3-R’s, but now we have 5. We also used to play the Inter-Hospital Challenge with 3 organizations, and now we’re up to 7! Speaking of that, please, if you happen to work at any of these sites: Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare, Michael Garron Hospital / Toronto East Health Network, Norfolk General Hospital, SickKids, Sinai Health System, Unity Health Toronto, or University Health Network, play and get everyone you know to play too…