Tapping into our conscience...

Pure, clean and precious

We are at last in the land of the Forty Shades of Green again and its good to be back! The rain has been falling and dare I say I've missed it and the temperatures have risen. So whats next? Well according to the weather forecast, floods! Still, we're not there yet so lets keep fingers crossed that perhaps it wont happen, but it reminds us that things are fast changing in this world of ours and maybe there is nothing we can do to stop the change. Or is there?...


I was speaking to a relation of mine who thinks our fears of Global warming are not worth it really as the change is going to happen no matter what we do. Well, he may be right to some extent but as I pointed out to him that doesn't mean that we should treat our world with disrespect and not make any effort to protect it. What we do may tip the balance. Anyway, back to the present. Water seems to be involved in this global warming crisis and it occurred to me this week that we still don't appreciate it. Here at the moment the water has been turned of in our homes overnight so that we can preserve it due to the reservoirs being low.

The Gearagh near Macroom

How can they be low in Ireland you may ask, I know what you mean as usually, we cant stop the rain. Well, with the recent freeze, we have had burst pipes and frozen pressure gauges ( i think) all over the place, hence some people (my parents included & inlaws) haven't had water for a week. But what concerns me a little more is that to prevent frozen and burst pipes people have been leaving on their water all night!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I know, I know, rock and a hard place comes to mind but this is water we are wasting. The lovely stuff that people in the third world just cant get hold of for a high percentage of the time, and if they do get hold of some it is unsanitary. Here we are just watching it go down the drain. Criticism? A little yes, but I too have filled up my sinks as I dont have water tonight and dont know when it will be back on for sure. I wont be leaving the tap running though but I do realise the problem of cost should I have a burst pipe some very cold night.

Not mine thankfully but check out
www.rainwater-barrels.com/blog

In the summer I put out my barrel to fill full of rain water as did my parents. What happened last week? It froze and couldn't be used. So whats the answer. I thought that I could use that water in our barrel to flush toilets at least. My intentions were good at the time but it looks like I may have to rethink if future winters will be the same. I dont know the answer but I do know that the cogs need to keep turning in my brain. If I find the answer I'll let you know but I would ask you sincerely to think about your actions. If you need to leave the water running all night from your tap make sure you are fully aware of what you are doing and have you thought of an alternative action or is this just the most convenient for you? Can we be bothered to at least try to think of an alternative? What will we do when we are charged for our water?I know there are many readers from all over the globe reading this blog and if you can offer some advice then please do. All you need to leave a comment is to own a Google account and you dont need to use it much after that if you dont want to. Remember, we are in this together and should work together. Leaving problems for the next generation to sort out is a cop out from us.

We're better than that, I know we are :)