Happy new year everyone! I hope that 2024 is the best year yet, for all of us. I took the opportunity to revisit my three new year’s resolutions from last year, mostly to see how well I did.

• The first resolution was to “only buy one new item of clothing per month”. This went alright— although I don’t think there was a single month where I only bought 1 new article of clothing, I definitely became more conscious of my consumption habits, especially because it’s pretty cheap to accumulate massive amounts of thrifted clothing that just sit around cluttering up your apartment.
• My second resolution was to produce more of my own food, and I have to say that I surpassed this with flying colors. The most important factor was that I finally received a community garden plot in June (after being on the waiting list for a year and a half), which enabled me to produce massively larger quantities of food as compared to my tiny windowsill garden. I also became better at foraging; although alas, foraging fungi eludes me (though not for lack of trying), I spent a lot of time digging clams (foraged protein!!!), collecting nuts and wild greens and reading up on foraging literature.
• My third resolution was to produce less waste, and I do think that I managed to stick to this resolution, although not by any impressive amount. My younger brother gifted us his old Sodastream, which helped us massively cut down on our sparkling-water-waste (as major sparking-water-heads); growing our own food in my community garden plot also helped reduce food waste. We’ve also started shopping at a zero-waste store, which has helped us cut down on waste from cleaning products. Ultimately, though, the things that produce the most waste are also the hardest to eliminate: meat, which is packaged in plastic, frozen or preprepared products and food scraps. Unfortunately, our building isn’t connected to a municipal composting system, so my two best options are to bring my food waste into work with me to dispose of them in the compost bin there (downsides are obvious) or driving across town to a Makesoil drop-off point. But it kills me every time I dump perfectly compostable food scraps into the garbage. If anyone has any good ideas please let me know! I’m working on convincing my fiancé to go for a vermicomposter but until we have a balcony I don’t think I’ll be in luck.
• This year, my three resolutions are
• 1. Put more time and effort into my hobbies and interests, as opposed to spending time on my phone or watching stupid Youtube videos. This past year I really became aware of how much time I spend staring at my phone or laptop consuming useless drivel; luckily, my phone is in poor repair and I hope that this next year I’ll spend even less time on it. There are so many projects that I need to work on, or start, and the less time I spend interfacing with The Tech the better. This also means spending more time outside or exercising, in ways that bring me joy (dancing, yoga, weightlifting sometimes)— over the last year I’ve really tried to move away from the idea of pursuing health by following a strict regimen, and to integrate activities that make me active and happy!
• 2. Produce less waste. This will probably be on my new year’s resolutions list until I die, or become functionally zero-waste, whichever comes first. I think the steps that I’ve taken so far are a solid foundation, but I want to put even more effort into becoming lower-waste. The three non-negotiable I want to commit to are 1) eliminate single-serving food packaging (from things like snack foods, frozen meals or my favorite, Trader Joe’s beef sticks); the only exceptions are those that come in recyclable containers, and even then sparingly, 2) eat 100% of leftovers produced by cooking at home (something that I am incredibly bad at, which is no excuse, and yes I did grow up eating leftovers a lot, it’s definitely not a class thing) and 3) grow, hunt or forage at least 10% of the total calories I consume in a year (73,000 calories). This is going to be the biggest bitch, but I’ll be keeping track of how many calories I find for myself over the year and see how close or far away I get to the mark. I also want to find a way to compost my produce scraps,,, I’ll keep you posted.
• 3. Don’t die of stress. This year is bonkers insane for a lot of reasons, including the panic-inducing triumvirate of planning/experiencing my wedding, taking a full college course load, and working 35 hours per week, and I need to not develop any serious addictions or lose all my hair from stress (at least before the wedding). (BTW zero waste wedding post in the works)
• Anyways that’s all! Have a happy new year and hopefully I’ll post again before the AcTUAL new year (happy almost year of the dragon! Yeah!)