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Starbucks is ditching straws. Here are 5 other ways to keep plastic out of the ocean.

Starbucks is the latest company to ditch plastic straws as a way to help clean up our oceans.

A single straw may seem like a tiny blip on the radar of environmental blights, but then consider that 500 million straws are used by Americans — just Americans — every day. According to CNN, that's enough plastic straws to fill 125 school buses. Every. Single. Day.

Plastic straws are a perfect size and shape for marine life to ingest, and since most of those straws end up in the ocean, that tiny blip multiplied by billions each year equals a significant problem.


Some cities have banned single-use plastic straws — though not without legitimate controversy — and many restaurants have stopped handing them out as a rule. McDonald's has plans to phase out plastic straws in its U.K. restaurants. And now Starbucks says it plans to phase out plastic straws by 2020 and redesign their drink containers to create a better strawless drinking experience.

But straws aren't the only plastic problem for our planet.

We all know by now that our oceans are in dire need of a cleanup. Thankfully, we have some promising technologies designed to help clear the garbage patches — which are largely made up of plastic debris — that have built up in the ocean's gyres.

Cleaning it up is important, but so is the fact that we need to stop contributing to the problem. Humans use and toss away tons of plastic — like straws — that many of us simply don't need to use in the first place. And despite our efforts to make sure we throw away and recycle things properly, far too much of that plastic ends up in the ocean, altering the ecosystem and threatening marine life.

Here are some ways — in addition to skipping the straw — that we can all keep more plastic out of the ocean.

1. Shop with reusable bags. Some states and cities have banned plastic grocery bags in an attempt to encourage people to bring their own. There are lots of affordable, durable alternatives to plastic grocery sacks, and they're easy to keep on hand. Though it takes some time to develop the habit of remembering to bring your own bags into the store, it's worth the effort.

2. Stop using Ziplocs. This one is tough, as few things are more convenient than a Ziploc bag. But miraculously, people survived for millennia without them, so it's definitely possible to go without. If a hard reusable container just won't cut it, try a beeswax-lined cloth snack pouch. All the convenience of a plastic bag, but without the ecological footprint.

3. Carry a reusable water bottle. Not only are plastic water bottles you buy in the store a waste of plastic, they're also a waste of money. We live in a developed nation where clean, drinkable water can be found around every corner, yet we spend up to 1,900 times more money than we need to on buying bottled water — and many of those bottles end up on beaches or floating in the ocean. Stainless steel or glass water bottles are great alternatives.

4. Buy in bulk. That little plastic bottle of oregano in the spice section of your grocery store has a high environmental and financial cost. Look for stores that sell items in bulk bins, and ask the store if they will "tare" a container you bring from home. (That means they weigh the empty container and subtract that weight from the final total after you've added your bulk item.) Spices in particular are usually far cheaper to buy in bulk, and other items, like flours, grains, and beans, often are too.

5. Pick up trash when you see it. This may seem like a no-brainer, but many of us are squeamish about picking up garbage out in public. We all pass garbage on our sidewalks and streets all the time, and much of it will eventually end up being washed into the sea. Make it a goal to pick up trash every time it's in your path and place it in the appropriate receptacle. (But don't put garbage in overflowing cans with no lid — it will end up blowing right back out.) An extra hand washing is a small price to pay for keeping trash out of the ocean.

Small changes in our collective habits can make a difference.

Though we all enjoy convenience, when it comes to plastics, our comfort has a high cost. Reducing our consumption, recycling when we can, and reusing as often as possible is still the trifecta of environmental stewardship. If we all do our part, we can keep our oceans clean, healthy, and beautiful for generations to come.

A pitbull stares at the window, looking for the mailman.


Dogs are naturally driven by a sense of purpose and a need for belonging, which are all part of their instinctual pack behavior. When a dog has a job to do, it taps into its needs for structure, purpose, and the feeling of contributing to its pack, which in a domestic setting translates to its human family.

But let’s be honest: In a traditional domestic setting, dogs have fewer chores they can do as they would on a farm or as part of a rescue unit. A doggy mom in Vancouver Island, Canada had fun with her dog’s purposeful uselessness by sharing the 5 “chores” her pitbull-Lab mix does around the house.

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Representative Image from Canva

Let's not curse any more children with bad names, shall we?

Some parents have no trouble giving their children perfectly unique, very meaningful names that won’t go on to ruin their adulthood. But others…well…they get an A for effort, but might want to consider hiring a baby name professional.

Things of course get even more complicated when one parent becomes attached to a name that they’re partner finds completely off-putting. It almost always leads to a squabble, because the more one parent is against the name, the more the other parent will go to bat for it.

This seemed to be the case for one soon-to-be mom on the Reddit AITA forum recently. Apparently, she was second-guessing her vehement reaction to her husband’s, ahem, avant garde baby name for their daughter, which she called “the worst name ever.”

But honestly, when you hear this name, I think you’ll agree she was totally in the right.

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An English doctor named Edward Jenner took incredible risks to try to rid his world of smallpox. Because of his efforts and the efforts of scientists like him, the only thing between deadly diseases like the ones below and extinction are people who refuse to vaccinate their kids. Don't be that parent.

Unfortunately, because of the misinformation from the anti-vaccination movement, some of these diseases have trended up in a really bad way over the past several years.

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A beautiful cruise ship crossing the seas.

Going on a cruise can be an incredible getaway from the stresses of life on the mainland. However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t an element of danger when living on a ship 200-plus feet high, traveling up to 35 miles per hour and subject to the whims of the sea.

An average of about 19 people go overboard every year, and only around 28% survive. Cruise ship lawyer Spencer Aronfeld explained the phenomenon in a viral TikTok video, in which he also revealed the secret code the crew uses when tragedy happens.

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Kudos to the heroes who had 90 seconds to save lives in the Key Bridge collapse

The loss of 6 lives is tragic, but the dispatch recording shows it could have been so much worse.

Representative image by Gustavo Fring/Pexels

The workers who responded to the Dali's mayday call saved lives with their quick response.

As more details of the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse in Baltimore emerge, it's becoming more apparent how much worse this catastrophe could have been.

Just minutes before 1:30am on March 26, shortly after leaving port in Baltimore Harbor, a cargo ship named Dali lost power and control of its steering, sending it careening into a structural pillar on Key Bridge. The crew of the Dali issued a mayday call at 1:26am to alert authorities of the power failure, giving responders crucial moments to prepare for a potential collision. Just 90 seconds later, the ship hit a pylon, triggering a total collapse of the 1.6-mile bridge into the Patapsco River.

Dispatch audio of those moments shows the calm professionalism and quick actions that limited the loss of life in an unexpected situation where every second counted.

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Yale's pep band had to miss the NCAA tournament. University of Idaho said, 'We got you.'

In an act of true sportsmanship, the Vandal band learned Yale's fight song, wore their gear and cheered them on.

Courtesy of University of Idaho

The Idaho Vandals answered the call when Yale needed a pep band.

Yale University and the University of Idaho could not be more different. Ivy League vs. state school. East Coast vs. Pacific Northwest. City vs. farm town. But in the first two rounds of the NCAA basketball tournament, extenuating circumstances brought them together as one, with the Bulldogs and the Vandals becoming the "Vandogs" for a weekend.

When Yale made it to the March Madness tournament, members of the school's pep band had already committed to other travel plans during spring break. They couldn't gather enough members to make the trek across the country to Spokane, Washington, so the Yale Bulldogs were left without their fight song unless other arrangements could be made.

When University of Idaho athletic band director Spencer Martin got wind of the need less than a week before Yale's game against Auburn, he sent out a message to his band members asking if anyone would be interested in stepping in. The response was a wave of immediate yeses, so Martin got to work arranging instruments and the students dedicated themselves to learning Yale's fight song and other traditional Yale pep songs.

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