Simple Suggestion #233... ALWAYS shop with reusable bags

Here it is, 27 years later, my very first reusable grocery bag. Way back, when I was living and teaching in small-town Alberta, I bought this green Co-op grocery bag that announces that it's "Helping You Make RESPONSIBLE CHOICES." It has been used thousands of times since then, and gathered a collection of others along the way. It's gotten so that, if I don't have my reusable bags with me, I don't go grocery shopping, or I carry a few items out in my arms.

Plastic shopping bags are a scourge for our planet. Plastic, period, is. So anytime we can cut its use out of our lives, we should. I'm very good at remembering my reusable bags for groceries, but too often forget them when I'm shopping for other items. There's no reason why the clothes I bought my daughter last week couldn't go into our big cloth Pet Planet bag instead of a new plastic one. No reason at all!

Unthinking convenience has become the be all and end all for too many of us consumers. It's time we use our heads and avoid single use items of all shapes and sizes. And mostly, that just means that we need to adjust our habits, and our mind-sets.

So here's the challenge -- to use reusable bags every time you have to buy something. And to nix shopping if you've forgotten your bags. It won't take long to develop a good habit that way!

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