Wasting Water

When I moved here I found the yard very dry. I began watering every day and tried to loosen the soil. Nurturing it along, I began to create a garden of favorite plants, which needed more nutrients and more watering. The picture on the left it my house with unsightly lawn, a few straggling rose bushes. I tried to save them. I tried.

As the decade has gone by, it has been a losing battle. I kept working hard using my best gardening skills, after all, I am certified as a Master Gardener through the University of Santa Cruz. I kept spending money in the hopes that I would finally have a well established garden which would, more or less, take care of itself. Some plants did well. Some did not.

Unexpected protracted winter freezes, unusual for my climate, damaged favorites which needed special care to come back only to be damaged again during another year's freeze. Even though I watched the weather and ran outside to cover my precious plants, trees and shrubs, still frost damage occurred. During foggy times of the year, some plants were affected by mold.

I stopped attempting to amend the soil. I stopped watering the wasted garden so much. I had gotten to the point to make the decision. A little wisdom goes a long way and it was time to let nature take it's course. The plants died off that were not suited to my climate. As a Master Gardener, I should have known better.

Slowly, I have replaced them with Native plants  or Mediterranean plants which grow symbiotically here in the soil as it is, with the weather as it is, with the water or lack of water as it is.

As time goes by I hope to have a self sustaining garden, and a very cheap water bill.

Doesn't look like the same house. Does it?

Run Away Toilet

Toilets don't run away from home, though perhaps they wish they could.

If I were a toilet, I certainly would want to be clean. I would face my career with pride.

But, when I got old, my pride would turn into embarrassment and shame. I'm no longer useful. In fact I am a drain on the planet. My invention was to keep the planet clean and safe from pollution. But now, look at all those new fangled toilets on the market, the ones with the water saving ability.

I'm now considered a water hogger, a waster of a precious resource. Soon, I will be replaced. The city where I live has a program, a free low flow toilet for every resident. All they have to do is ask and someone will come out to the house and remove me, and others like me.

Where will we go? Can they chop us up into new material and turn us into park benches? I doubt it. Will we end up in the toilet grieve yard? I understand the name for that is "the dump"! How is that any better for the environment than leaving me where I am?

Oh, I know I have my faults. I didn't flush properly last night. I mean I took care of my complete responsibilities. But, I do have that one leaky part, that if anyone would take the trouble to repair, wouldn't leak anymore.

So, last night I leaked for a good (bad) 12 hours before I was discovered. It's not like I do this on purpose. It' not my fault! If they cannot repair me, the least they can do is hang around until I'm finished refilling the bowl. Then, they would notice the leak. I certainly make enough noise when I leak. At least they could hear it if standing in the bathroom with me. It's their fault for not hanging around and checking up on me, and wiggling my handle to stop the leak!

My time is coming to an end soon. I wish there were some way to prevent it. I wish there would be a new life waiting for me after this. But, like old grandma use to say, "If wishes were fishes, we'd all live in the sea!"

After that long leak of last night, it was the last straw, and now the city has been called. The workers will come in with their brand new low flow toilet and replace me. I will be taken away, I know not where.

A Piddling Amount of Water.

Do you look forward to receiving your utility bills? This month I definitely wanted to see them. So, when my city utility bill arrived I was ecstatic. There it was! I had cut my water consumption in half!!!

Month of December I used 2992 gallons

Month of January I used 1496 gallons

A savings of $11.38

If I do the same for 12 months it will equal $136.56. But, I hope to keep decreasing my water usage further. If I continue to find more reasonable ways to conserve water, I will save more. And maybe, just maybe, make a drop in the bucket of my environmental footprint.

What got me on this track?

Last fall the pipes beneath my cement floor began leaking. Why in the world anyone would put plumbing underneath a cement floor is beyond me!

When walking barefoot, I noticed one part of the kitchen floor was hot compared to other parts. It took a while for anyone to believe me, until the water was seeping up through the edges between the tiles. I didn't know how long the seepage of water had been occurring. It had been at least a month or more that I had been aware of the extra hot floor. It was hot because it was the pipe connected to the hot water heater.

That month my water bill showed I'd used 673,200 gallons!!! That's 450 times the amount of water I used this month. What a waste of water! What a dip into my budget!

It is not only the repair of the leaking pipe that helped cut my water bill. Because of what happened I became very aware of how wasteful I had been regarding water, so I began washing dishes and clothing differently, which I will write about further.