Low Battery Challenge
Living life with your phone at 5% battery, knowing you won't be able to charge it for a long time...
Sounds like a postapocalyptic scenario? No, it's just part of my Low Battery Challenge!
Lately I've been using a lot of energy. And I don't mean the kind of energy you get when you're overdosing on cofee. I mean the stuff that kills you when you poke your fork too far into the toaster.
I don't like to use this much energy. As a half-hipster, I care about the environment. I even hug trees. But by using so much electricity, I'm not exactly helping the environment. So I set up a challenge for myself for the month of October; the Low Battery Challenge.
What's the goal?
Use as little electricity as possible in October! Going cold turkey on electricity is almost impossible these days, especially since I have a lot of online assignments.I'm going to try this anyway, because looking at the facts makes me sad and a bit desperate.
On an average day I:
- wake up, turn on my phone, radio and laptop. I use my laptop for about 40 minutes, the radio for 15 minutes.
- use 40% of my phone's battery at school and the other 60% at home.
- come home and work on online assignments for about 2.5 hours.
- watch tv (when my homework is done) for another 1.5 hours.
- write blogposts and comments for about an hour a day.
- waste another hour on sites like Facebook, doing nothing.
- turn on the radio multiple times a day, which adds up to at least another hour of using energy.
What am I going to do?
For the next month I'll be trying to spend a maximum of four hours a day playing with electronics. This is not going to be easy. For example: I can't turn off my phone. Everytime I do, something goes wring and people who really need to reach me can't reach me. I also get a lot of information about college and homework over the phone. In case you're wondering: yes, I do need that information. A lot. So now I'm using it all the time and I have to charge it every day. I'm going to try to bring that back to once a week.
The radio is not going to be on anymore while I'm doing homework. I don't really pay attention to the music anyway. It's mostly just distracting me from my homework. If the radio's off, I can concentrate on my homework and have it done within two hours.
I'm also setting a limit of 20 minutes a day for checking my e-mail, timetable changes and Facebook. If necessary I can check my e-mail more often, but Facebook only once a day. That pointless site is devouring waaaay too much of my time.
Then the tv is left. I don't watch a lot of shows, but I can't live life without my Futurama episode on weekdays (30 minutes, including commercials) and my Catfish-Awkward-Faking it marathon on Sunday. Still, that would bring my average down from 1.5 hours a day to approximately 40 minutes.
How about blogging?
Don't worry, my blog will be updated just as often as you're used to. I'm just going to take a different approach. Instead of staring at the screen for way too long, I'm going to draft my posts in my blogging notebook, then when I'm done drafting I'll type it out as fastas I can so I have some time left to read your posts and comment on them. As long as you're supporting me, I'll be supporting you ;)
I am also going to do (almost) weekly updates on my challenge. They'll be posted on the 7th, 14th, 22nd and 29th of October. On the 3rd of November, I'm doing a round-up.
I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about this challenge. I'm not sure if I'll make it till the end of the month. On the other hand I'm very excited: using less electricity means wasting less time, whichmeans I'll have more time for writing. Who knows, maybe I'll be able to publich a book by the end of October!
Wish me luck, and stay tuned for more news on the Low Battery Challenge!
4 Fellow Ramblers
This sounds like an awesome challenge! I'd like to do this too- except I have no school and literally nothing to do until December at least- other than surfing the internet >.>
ReplyDeleteMaybe I'll take up this challenge when college starts :D
Can't wait to see how it goes for you!
I'm so nervous for tomorrow! Great to hear that you'd like to do the challenge too, but you're right to wait a while. Keeping yourself entertained with no school to fill your days with can be hard without electronics. If I survive this month, I will do this challenge again next year, so maybe we can do it together then!
DeleteThis is such a meaningful challenge! I wish you luck amazing girl!!:D
ReplyDeleteJune
The Journeys' of my beating heart
Thank you :) I'll defenitely need some luck!
DeleteYour comment made me blush... :)
I solemnly swear that I am up to no good! Wait, no, I mean: I solemnly swear that I will answer each and every comment ;)