Littering is Wrong!

I participated in the "Walk Hampton Clean" event today. My neighbor, her son, and I walked my street and picked up trash. I'm guessing we picked up about 20 pounds of trash in an hour and a half. I was amazed at how much we picked up. The street didn't strike me as being particularly dirty. But it all added up. 

We picked up 122 cigarette butts. According to research about cigarette butt litter:

• the toxins that leach out of discarded cigarette filters and the remnant tobacco are harmful or lethal to some wildlife
• filters take 18 months to 10 years to decompose
• discarded cigarette butts start fires along roadways (I see burned areas at least once a year)

(These facts were taken from a quit smoking page. I used to smoke and if you are interested in trying to quit by using the same method that I used, here it is: Stop putting cigarettes in your mouth and lighting them up. It sounds like I'm joking, but seriously, just don't do it. White-knuckle past the urge to smoke. And five minutes later, white-knuckle past it again. And five minutes later, white-knuckle past it again. The next day, six minutes. The next day, seven minutes. Etc. Before you know it, you are over it. You just have to be stronger than the urge!)

62.54 miles of Hampton roadways were cleaned up today through this volunteer effort. I'm not sure if they are going to post any other totals...

The Hampton Clean City Commission hosted a cookout today for the Walk Hampton Clean volunteers. There was a lady working on a neat project, "Write your wrongs." She was asking people what things are just plain wrong, and writing it on a white-board. And at the bottom of the white board it said, "LitteringIsWrongToo.org" Then she'd take your picture with your saying. These are posted on their Facebook page. Here's a picture of me 'writing my wrong." And you can look here to see other pictures from the cook-out today.

I poked around their Facebook page and came across this video. There is an island in the ocean that is at least 1200 miles away from any other coastline. You'd think it would be pristine. Watch this video to see the far reach of litter.