Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Busy vs. Green

This week I'm going to be a lot busier than I have been for the last little while. I'm leaving the house before 7 a.m. and fighting traffic, then fighting traffic again nine hours later (I hate traffic). So what happens when a busy life collides with green ambitions? Yesterday I noticed that green lost, being busy had a very un-green effect on my lunch. Instead of homemade lunch in reusable containers or on a plate, I packed a microwave meal. You know the kind - a food-like substance sitting on plastic, with plastic film, in a a waxed cardboard container. Even worse, it turns out there was no microwave where I was, so I ended up at Tim Horton's getting lunch served to me in bags :)

As I battled traffic on the way back home, I decided the next lunch would be greener. I'm not a morning person, so getting up even 15 minutes earlier to make a better lunch is not going to happen. For me, the key is going to be finding lunches I can make the night before in a minimal amount of time that will still taste good the next lunch hour. A quick trip to No Frills and I have the makings for some deli sandwiches, fruit, and a treat. The sandwich will be packed in a re-usable container (when you're making lunch the night before, don't put tomatoes on the sandwich, I learned this one the hard way!). The fruit is it's own container. The Ah-Caramels are individually packaged in plastic - too bad but still way better than eating out or microwave meals! If I'd planned better, I would have made a batch of cookies, or another batch of the Chocolate Peanut Squares that would have been ready for this week's lunches. I think I'll try to stock up on some homemade desserts (less packaging), of course then I'll have to store them in the freezer so that they don't get eaten right away!

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