Clean up your trash

Jonny told us about this when we were in San Fran, and it blew my mind...not in a good way, but I do feel this is something worth knowing about. There is a patch of plastic in the ocean roughly twice the size of Texas. The North Pacific Gyre is an area between the US and Japan where ocean currents act as a vortex, accumulating garbage from Japan, China, Alaska, Canada and the U.S which all concentrate into a specific zone of plastic trash the Northern Pacific Ocean.

The blue swirls are all the trash.

Consequently, I am thinking about trying to use less plastic...which is much easier said than done. Not using plastic bags is a great start, but I have come to realize that plastic lurks in places you wouldn't even think; aluminum cans have plastic liners, most food items that are packaged in "paper" like OJ containers are actually coated in plastic as well, not to mention things like toothbrushes and shampoo bottles......This girl from Chicago has got some good ideas, though.