Saving Water.

"When the well's dry, we know the worth of water." - Benjamin Franklin

Droughts are fairly routine here in North Texas, but few people not associated with farming even consider the ramifications of reduced rainfall combined with increased populations. Kirk England in a recent newsletter mentioned the drought and suggested that we turn off the water while brushing our teeth. We're in a position to go further than that and it looks like North Texas could have severe water shortages in 2010 if we don't.

So, I bought a few shower shutoff valves ... two for our bathrooms and one for No. 1 and Dave. Em's brother installed the one in OUR shower:

and Em installed the one that's not shown (heh ... not because it wasn't installed correctly, because it WAS!). No. 1 is currently thinking that she likes to keep her butt warm while she washes her hair and shaves her legs in the shower, so theirs might get installed next year when there's not enough water in North Texas to keep her butt warm anyway.

Also, last evening I attended a class put on by Rainwater Harvesting in conjunction with my city's Make It and Take It.

Em had the season's "kickoff" to attend at Lone Star Park last night [he goes back to work tomorrow] at the same time as the class, but they were only 1 mile apart.

His orientation let out early enough for him to sit in on some of the class.



That's the woman who did half of the presentation, and next pic is me screwing around with our new rain barrel, which we drove home in the Mustang with the top down last night.



It wasn't so cold that we froze with the top down to accommodate the thing, and it does kindof add a grownup touch to the patio, dontcha think?



There's another 5-gallon bucket outside the photo, and we have no idea where to put the rainbarrel at this point. We don't have gutters and downspouts ... YET.

More links:
TAMU Water Edu,
Texas Water Info,
Texas Water Matters.

Other half of the presentation was done by Pam's husband, and he grew to become just a little OCD about saving water after learning about all this stuff. I can certainly see how that could happen.