Car Free Week

Wow... we have been car-free for a week. Granted, this was forced upon us. Still, it's nice to know that we can pretty much get around without a car. There have been some problems, however.

Timing is a bit of a problem. For me to get to work, I need to either ride the scooter or take the bus/bike. Either way, it's between 30-45 minutes. Even in a car, it takes about 30 minutes because of traffic. If I ride the scooter, I get to work stressed out, extremely hot, and gritty. The bus is better, but timing is a bit of an issue. Also, it takes C some time to get home from work. About 15 minutes, and considering traffic, it might actually take him longer to drive than to ride his bike home. The problem is that for my sanity, I need to leave home before he gets home. This week we finally fixed up some nice babysitting which gives us a comfortable margin of error. Is it worth the money? Definitely. I may not be saving any money by not using the car, but I needed a little bit of time before work and C needed a little time after work, so that we weren't always flying to/from home.

Groceries. I'm finding this is a big problem. I just REFUSE to buy all my groceries at Expensive Mart. I could take all the kids to the HEB in the bus (at least a 1/2 mile walk each way plus the bus ride, or 2 buses... painful), but I just can't. I'm not that strong. I'd rather eat pasta every day.

Our refrigerator is looking pretty bare. We're out of fruit. We're out of vegetables. The only reason we have milk is that we bought it at Expensive Mart. There's just not that much to eat anymore. Pasta with jarred sauce, sprinkled with cheese. A different shape of pasta.... some eggs.

What do you think? Is it even possible to take all the kids to the store? My plan is to go to the store as soon as we get the car back.

Be prepared!

Maybe because I was never a scout, I seem to be having trouble learning this lesson: Be Prepared.

I drove the little one to the Children's Museum today. Why? Because it was hot and the trailer was hooked up to a wimpy bike. It's actually a pleasant bike ride, so I really should have ridden the bike. Alternatively, I could have taken the bus, but that (of course) would have required some planning.

So what happened? I drove E to the museum, and the car broke down. I had to push it into a safe place and C had to rescue it after work. What a pain. And I ended up taking the bus home anyway (which was very pleasant).

So now the car's broken, and it will be a few days (at least) until it's fixed. Time to experiment with being car-free.

I scooted to work this evening. Blech! The traffic is awful, and it's much worse sitting in the humidity and heat, breathing in exhaust than sitting fresh in my car listening to NPR. It threatened rain, but did not rain after all, although I was prepared with a big rain coat and a change of clothes. I'd feel much safer taking the bus. I checked out the schedule and it might be doable.

Problems with the Bus

Last night we went to my brother's house for Easter dinner. (Which was awesome, thanks guys.) We decided that we would do a sort of "park and ride" by driving to the bus stop, parking the car on the street (free on Sundays!) and taking the bus. Going to my brother's house was no problem. The bus was right on time, the ride was pleasant... the walk from the bus stop to the house was about 10 minutes -- not too bad. It took about 40 minutes in all (driving would have been about 20). But on the way back, we missed the bus. Big problem! We walked to the bus stop, but just as we were getting there, we saw the bus go by -- early! Almost 10 minutes early. This was NOT COOL, as the next bus wouldn't be by for another hour. It was already past my kids' bedtime, so my cousin and my brother's girlfriend gave us a ride to the car -- why two people? Aha! Because we don't all fit in one car. So, it didn't save any gas at all -- in fact, it was worse. We should have saved 14.6 miles of driving. Instead, we caused 30 miles of driving. ARGH!!

Lesson learned? I guess it's not realistic to take the bus at night with the family. OR we'll have to plan to be at least 15 minutes early at the bus stop.

My brother did let me know about a cool new feature of google -- in some cities, you can do google directions and click on a tab that says "Take public transit". It will give you various options of where to take the bus and tell you how much money you will save. According to this feature, driving would have cost us 7.06, whereas the bus only cost us 1.00 (because of the young kids and my student status). I think this is a pretty realistic driving cost. A while ago I calculated how much it cost us per mile to drive, and it came out right around .50 a mile. This figure is not just for gas, but wear and tear on the car, maintenance, etc. The IRS rate for 2007 business use was 48.5 cents per mile, so about the same.

I'll be updating the driving numbers on Wednesday.

5 bags down, new sins, BYOP

Today is day 5 of "unstuffing". I got rid of a bag of playdoh toys that I found in the bottom of the closet. Actually I got rid of about 2/3 of the bag, keeping the most fun toys to play with. More magazines -- I had no idea there were SOOO many magazines laying around the house. A puppet theater that I have had for at least 15 years and have never played with. This is a little hard because my mother gave it to me, but I've never used it. I have the puppets and my kids play with them all the time, but it's time to let go of the theater. Last but not least, a whiteboard. Don't need it. There's one on the other side of the easel anyways.

My MIL is watching the kids tonight, so C drove them there in the car and will bus/bike home. So, he's violating the terms of his car divorce, but it's a pretty good solution (I think). Tonight is the midnight full moon bike ride, so she is kind enough to watch the kids so we can go.

Less waste, but a giant pain....
We went to dinner at WF tonight. I love to go because the food is great and there is a playscape for the kids. We decided to bring our own plates from home (plastic) so that we would not have to use disposables. We brought our own silverware too. No problem.

What I had not really thought about was the return trip. With dirty dishes. Yuck! I don't mind bringing the dishes. I don't mind scraping them into the trash. I feel pretty happy sitting outside, being a good example. But putting dirty dishes into my bag to bring home was not the highlight of the night. I guess the overall good feelings I get cancel out the annoyance overall. Next time I'll have to thing of a better way to bring them home.

New sins
Apparently there are now 7 new mortal sins (not replacing the original 7 -- in addition to). One of them is pollution. Yeah for that! Other groups have talked about the importance of caring for the earth, and it's nice to see the Catholics join the party. Hopefully this will lead to more recycling. One time I had a job copying the church bulletin and it took ALL day because it was so many pages. Every church dinner (across denominations) I've been to has been served on disposables. Maybe now that pollution is a sin....

I've read lots of very negative comments about the new sins. Maybe the pope wants to clear room in heaven, because almost everyone I know has committed one of them. There also seems to be overlap (at least in the version I read). If one sin is creating poverty and one is excessive wealth, you don't really need another one that is increasing the divide between rich and poor, do you?