Plastic-free July: Day 17

I’ve failed to post anything for a few days because I’ve been really busy at work, preparing for giving some training/presentations as part of the week-long Digital Humanities Summer School. Being busy has, unsurprisingly, meant I’ve been less good at staying plastic-free: I’ve ended up with plastic-packed sandwiches and snacks bought (and eaten) in haste because I haven’t had time to prepare my own in advance; I haven’t always had time to make the journey to the shops that sell the plastic-free alternative to something I need to buy; that sort of thing.

Part of the point (for me) of this month has been to look for changes I can make to my shopping habits, and if things become habitual, it’s more likely that I’ll stick to them even when things are busy. In the meantime, I’m doing what I can.

Anyway, today I noticed the water which was provided by the venue (Wolfson College, Oxford) in one of the seminar rooms:

A choice between single-use plastic cups and reusable glasses! Of course, I chose the glass; but I genuinely don’t know why they do this: if they can provide reusable glasses at all, why not just do that? I guess there aren’t enough to go round, so they provide glasses only for speakers/trainers, and plastic cups for delegates/students? Not sure.

On the other hand, this time the conference freebie was a lovely shiny reusable water bottle:

Mind you, the organisers of the summer school did a fantastic job overall, so it’s not probably not surprising that they picked a nice conference gift as well! :-)