The pink bottle is dead. Long live the pink bottle!

It's the end of an era over here in Princess world. I have retired my pink Nalgene bottle. Please, no flowers.

Honestly, my pink bottle has more air miles than most people I know. I got it in a shop (a mercantile, if you will) in Hicksville, just a day or two before I went to Korea for the Conference. It came with me. It came it home and then to Singapore. It lived beside my computer in my classroom and travelled daily to the staffroom for refilling. It's been around the world (aye aye aye...), been in more meetings that it would care to remember, and last week it was in Serbia on its last mission in keeping me hydrated.

But the time has come to put it into retirement. I'm a little bit sad about it, so many memories and good times we've had together. It was still going and still so strong.  But alas, it is not BPA free. That's a bad thing, they say.

So I got a new one. In exactly the same shop I got my last one. It proudly displays its BPA free-nees. Hurrah and huzzah.

There wasn't a coronation or anything, but all hail the new pink bottle.

I like using a refillable water bottle. It makes me feel like I'm saving the world. Plus I save money. If Coke, or that Tesco Tropical Juice that I'm so partial to, came out of the tap for (close to) free, would I buy it? Heck no.

This is my blog; I can say what I like (so long as it's legal), so I'm just going to come out and say it: buying bottled water is ridiculous. Bottled water uses two of the earth's most precious resources, oil and water, creates CO2 emissions in the delivery and most of the bottles end up in land refill sites. Yet, in the vast majority of cases, we have clean, safe drinking water at our disposal. How many people in the world don't have that luxury? So many that 'luxury' is the right word to use here. 

But we buy bottled water because we've been marketed to. We've bought into the myth that drinking bottled water is better, cleaner, healthier and heck, even cooler.

I know, rant, rant. But really look into some of the facts for yourself. Try here, here, or here. Or use the mighty power of the interwebs for yourself.

And why not get yourself a reusable bottle? BPA free, of course.

Well this is just embarrassing now

Here I am getting ready for another trip and I never even mentioned the last one...two months ago. Eek. I even said last week I would write about it 'tomorrow'. And worse still I talked up my travelling tales before I even left for that trip. Don't worry, I won't make such a stupid mistake this time. I don't want to be the boy who cried wolf, as it were.

So where am I off? Well, I'm glad you asked. It's time for my annual reminder as to exactly how crap my French is. This time I'll be all shades of rouge in Belgrade. No, honestly. And as a special bonus lesson this year I'll find out just how abysmal my Serbian is! Two for the price of one!

But I am kind of excited too; I think Serbia will be my first new country since Cambodia in 2009. That's pretty exciting if you keep score of your new countries like I do. (What? Doesn't everybody have a mental tally of their countries?! Probably not the pot of flags though...)

And after a day like today in the homeland, what better time to go off and get some eastern European sun?

Don't worry guys, I'll take this one for the team.

While I'm away I might try and actually write about what I got up to in Colorado and why I'm moving there next. That last part is a joke. I think.