Releasing Balloons into the Air - The Vatican's new Symbol of Peace

Vatican dove being attacked by crow and seagull.
(From Today Online)

The Vatican used to release doves in St. Peter's Square as a symbol of peace. Until the doves were attacked by seagulls and crows. Not a very convincing symbol of peace. Plus the animal rights groups raised concerns.

But worry you not... the Vatican has come up with a solution. This year, a group of children released balloons into the air as a symbol of peace. Very colourful. Very bright. Are released balloons really a symbol of peace? That is debatable.

Vatican releases hundreds (thousands?) of balloons.
(From The Guardian)

All you have to do is type "balloons" and "environment" into a web search and, voila... you will find plenty of evidence to support what you probably already suspected. Balloons are not good for the environment.

On the first hand, all of those colourful balloons eventually come to earth as garbage, pollution, litter. They don't just evaporate in the atmosphere or rise indefinitely to heaven. Some are supposed to burst into tiny pieces at a certain altitude, but what about the ribbons?

Razorbill bird killed by balloon ribbons
(From Balloons Blow)

Which brings us to the second point. Released balloons kill animals such as turtles, birds, seals, Bighorn Sheep. Some animals eat the ribbons, including the balloon fragment at the end of the ribbon. The balloon fragments block their digestive system and the animals starve to death. Other animals get tangled in the ribbons - around their necks or their legs.

Me thinks the Vatican missed the boat yet again on this "symbol of peace". In reality, it would seem that it is actually an act of harm - against the environment and our animal neighbours. Check out Balloons Blow or One Green Earth for more information on the insidious effects of released balloons.

Toilet Troubles

So, our toilet stopped working. The inflow thing stopped working, so the thank wouldn't fill up. Rather than get a new inflow thingie, we decided to go out and buy a new toilet. After a bit of internet research on Rona and Home Depot, we went to Home Depot and bought a $169 toilet.

Nowadays, there is a lot of incentive for people to get rid of their water-guzzling toilets and replace them with low-flow models. Any toilet with a tank bigger than 13 litres is considered a gas guzzler. There are all sorts of eco-efficiency scales, but the toilet we bought qualifies for a $50 rebate from the city as well! So bonus all the way around.

A few days ago, we removed the old toilet and installed the new toilet. I had watched a toilet installation before... but this was the first time I did one... and it went pretty much without a hitch! So, we have a new 4.8 litre low-flow toilet. It's tiny... like I mean... tiny! The tank looks to be half the width of the old one and it flushes so quickly and fills up really fast as well.

Part of the city rebate program is that you have to measure the water capacity of your old toilet and then make it unusable. So I measured the tank... the width... the water level height and the depth from front to back... Let's see that is... hmmm... 22.4 litres. I did the calculation again and yup... We had the Cadillac of toilets... a real 12 cylinder water guzzler! That means that every time we flush today, we save 17 litres of water or thereabouts... We save 4 milk jugs worth of water everytime we flush now... amazing...

Which means we need to look at the toilet in our spare bedroom bathroom... it too is a Cadillac in the toilet department... Might be time to buy another toilet!