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Adidas takes a solid step toward sustainability with a new embrace of recycled plastic.

The plan will save 40 tons of plastic each year.

Adidas is rolling out a bit of welcome news to people who love sports and care about the environment.

On July 15, Financial Times reported the sports apparel company plans to phase out use of "virgin" plastics (first-use plastic that hasn't been recycled), switching over exclusively to recycled plastics by 2024. This pledge includes the company's products as well as its offices, stores, warehouses, and other facilities. A CNN report puts the amount of plastic saved at 40 tons per year.

Over the past couple of decades, Adidas has made a number of other adjustments to its product lines in the name of sustainability. Its website notes that with a few small exceptions, the company stopped using polyvinyl chloride (PVC) in its products in favor of more sustainable and low-impact plastics in the years since.

Adidas displays Germany's World Cup jersey in June 2018. Photo by Hans-Martin Issler/Getty Images for Adidas.

Adidas isn't alone, either. A bunch of other companies are making moves to a more sustainable future.

At this year's World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, 11 global brands pledged to move towards 100% recyclable, reusable, or compostable packaging. Amcor, Ecover, Evian, L'Oréal, Mars, M&S, PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, Unilever, Walmart, and Werner & Mertz all signed on to make the shift by 2025. Ultimately, if there's hope to reassess how much plastic we use and how we use it, it'll take consumer pressure on brands to embrace sustainable technologies.

Individual decisions are good — such as choosing not to use plastic cutlery, not using single-use straws unless you have to, and opting for reusable bags at the grocery store — but it's brands that can make the big changes. Putting pressure on brands to find newer, more sustainable options can also have the effect of fueling innovation and technological advances.

Plastic use is a real problem in need of a real solution.

A report from earlier this year pegged the size of the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" at three times the size of France, spanning 617,800 square miles and made up of 79,000 tons of plastic. It's gross, it's sad, and it's absolutely avoidable. Globally, 8 million tons of plastic end up in the ocean each year.

[rebelmouse-image 19397473 dam="1" original_size="750x562" caption="NOAA divers cut a Hawaiian green sea turtle free from a derelict fishing net during a recent mission to collect marine debris in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Photo by the NOAA Photo Library/Flickr." expand=1]NOAA divers cut a Hawaiian green sea turtle free from a derelict fishing net during a recent mission to collect marine debris in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Photo by the NOAA Photo Library/Flickr.

According to the most recent data out of the Environmental Protection Agency, the United States places more than 25 million tons of plastic in landfills and burns nearly 5 million tons, but recycles just 3.1 million tons each year. The trend isn't looking so good, either. National Geographic found that 91% of the world's plastic isn't being recycled, and if we keep on the pace we're at, there will be 12 billion tons of plastic in landfills globally by 2050.

We deserve a world free from trash. More companies should follow the lead of Adidas and others.

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Community

Facebook group brings people together IRL to make meaningful friendships

True

Making new friends as an adult is challenging. While people crave meaningful IRL connections, it can be hard to know where to find them. But thanks to one Facebook Group, meeting your new best friends is easier than ever.

Founded in 2018, NYC Brunch Squad brings together hundreds of people who come as strangers and leave as friends through its in-person events.

“Witnessing the transformative impact our community has on the lives of our members is truly remarkable. We provide the essential support and connections needed to thrive amid the city's chaos,” shares Liza Rubin, the group’s founder.

Despite its name, the group doesn’t just do brunch. They also have book clubs, seasonal parties, and picnics, among other activities.

NYC Brunch Squad curates up to 10 monthly events tailored to the specific interests of its members. Liza handles all the details, taking into account different budgets and event sizes – all people have to do is show up.

“We have members who met at our events and became friends and went on to embark on international journeys to celebrate birthdays together. We have had members get married with bridesmaids by their sides who were women they first connected with at our events. We’ve had members decide to live together and become roommates,” Liza says.

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Members also bond over their passion for giving back to their community. The group has hosted many impact-driven events, including a “Picnic with Purpose” to create self-care packages for homeless shelters and recently participated in the #SquadSpreadsJoy challenge. Each day, the 100 members participating receive random acts of kindness to complete. They can also share their stories on the group page to earn extra points. The member with the most points at the end wins a free seat at the group's Friendsgiving event.

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friendship

Democracy

This Map Reveals The True Value Of $100 In Each State

Your purchasing power can swing by 30% from state to state.

Image by Tax Foundation.

Map represents the value of 100 dollars.

As the cost of living in large cities continues to rise, more and more people are realizing that the value of a dollar in the United States is a very relative concept. For decades, cost of living indices have sought to address and benchmark the inconsistencies in what money will buy, but they are often so specific as to prevent a holistic picture or the ability to "browse" the data based on geographic location.

The Tax Foundation addressed many of these shortcomings using the most recent (2015) Bureau of Economic Analysis data to provide a familiar map of the United States overlaid with the relative value of what $100 is "worth" in each state. Granted, going state-by-state still introduces a fair amount of "smoothing" into the process — $100 will go farther in Los Angeles than in Fresno, for instance — but it does provide insight into where the value lies.

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money

Identity

One man turned nursing home design on its head when he created this stunning facility

"What if we design an environment that looks like outside?" he said. "What if I can have a sunrise and sunset inside the building?

92-year-old Norma had a strange and heartbreaking routine.

Every night around 5:30 p.m., she stood up and told the staff at her Ohio nursing home that she needed to leave. When they asked why, she said she needed to go home to take care of her mother. Her mom, of course, had long since passed away.

Behavior like Norma's is quite common for older folks suffering from Alzheimer's or other forms of dementia. Walter, another man in the same assisted living facility, demanded breakfast from the staff every night around 7:30.

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Pop Culture

People are sharing the adult problems that 'nobody prepared you for' and they're so true

Here are 21 of the most relatable.

via PixaBay

Being an adult is tough.

Nothing can ever fully prepare you for being an adult. Once you leave childhood behind, the responsibilities, let-downs and setbacks come at you fast. It’s tiring and expensive, and there's no easy-to-follow roadmap for happiness and success.

A Reddit user named u/Frequent-Pilot5243 asked the online forum, “What’s an adult problem nobody prepared you for?” and there were a lot of profound answers that get to the heart of the disappointing side of being an adult.

One theme that ran through many responses is the feeling of being set adrift. When you’re a kid, the world is laid out as a series of accomplishments. You learn to walk, you figure out how to use the bathroom, you start school, you finish school, maybe you go to college, and so on.

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adulthood

Health

If you're grieving a loved one this holiday season, here's a gift you can give yourself

After losing her almost-4-year-old daughter to epilepsy, Kelly Cervantes created a "grief companion" that meets people wherever they are in their grief journey.

Images courtesy of Kelly Cervantes

Kelly Cervantes wrote her way through grieving the loss of her daughter, Adelaide.

Kelly Cervantes begins the Introduction to her book with five words: "Grief sucks. It's also weird." It's a concise truth that anyone who has lost a loved one knows all too well.

Grief is a universal experience—none of us get through life without loss—but it's also unique to each person. Most of us are familiar with the popular "stages of grief" theory, but denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance (along with guilt and a host of things) are less like sequential rungs on a ladder and more like pools you fall into at various times as you stumble your way through the grief process. Grief is not linear and it's not neat and tidy and it's not predictable.

Take it from someone who's been there. Kelly Cervantes lost her daughter, Adelaide, to epilepsy just shy of her 4th birthday. Using writing as a therapeutic tool to help her process Adelaide's medically complex life, death and everything that came after, Kelly created the book she wished she'd had as she was trying to navigate her own grieving process.

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grief

Adidas takes a solid step toward sustainability with a new embrace of recycled plastic.

The plan will save 40 tons of plastic each year.

Adidas is rolling out a bit of welcome news to people who love sports and care about the environment.

Adidas isn't alone, either. A bunch of other companies are making moves to a more sustainable future.

Plastic use is a real problem in need of a real solution.

Your purchasing power can swing by 30% from state to state.

"What if we design an environment that looks like outside?" he said. "What if I can have a sunrise and sunset inside the building?

92-year-old Norma had a strange and heartbreaking routine.

Confusion is common in Alzheimer's patients, but Makesh knew there had to be some way to minimize these conflicts.

Instead of rooms or units, each resident gets a "home" on a quiet little indoor street reminiscent of the neighborhoods many of them grew up in.

Instead of a boring panel ceiling, residents look up and see a digital sky, which grows dimmer late in the day to help keep their biological clocks in tune.

Throughout the day, nature sounds and fresh aromas like peppermint or citrus are piped in.

For Makesh, this isn't just about making patients comfortable, though. He wants to change how we think about the endgame of severe dementia.

Of course, we're a long way from a cure for Alzheimer's.

Here are 21 of the most relatable.

1. Lack of purpose

2. No bed time

3. Friendships

4. Bodily changes

5. People don't change

6. Money

7. Our parents age, too

8. Free time

9. No goals

10. Constant upkeep

11. Exhaustion

12. Loneliness

13. Dinner

14. Time changes

15. You're responsibile, even if you didn't mean it

16. Work is like high school

17. Nowhere to turn

18. The happiness question

19. Constant cleaning

20. Life costs money

21. Keeping above water

"You, white friend, need to speak up and say something when I can't."

1. You're going to have to get uncomfortable.

2. "Your black friend would like to say something to the racist lady, but doesn't want to appear to be that 'angry black man.'"

3. We are constantly monitoring our surroundings and adjusting our clothes, hair, speed, and speech to maintain white comfort.

4. "Your black friend wishes you'd play more than Beyoncé. There are more black performers than Beyoncé."

5. Speaking of which, performative blackness is really uncomfortable.

6. "Your black friend feels like a man without a country."

7. We would love it if we could stop talking about our anxiety and frustrations regarding racism. But right now, that's impossible.

The billionaire passed away on November 28 at the age of 99.

After losing her almost-4-year-old daughter to epilepsy, Kelly Cervantes created a "grief companion" that meets people wherever they are in their grief journey.