Sparkle (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
myownface) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomhigh2018-02-15 08:36 am
myownface) wrote in fandomhigh2018-02-15 08:36 am
Entry tags:
Urban Survival - The Uglier Side of City Living, Thursday, Period 2
"So," Sparkle, who had come in to class today with a flower crown made of yellow and orange roses because why the hell not? smiled as he leaned back against his desk. His desk, which was covered in water bottles of various sizes. "I've got another hands-on assignment for you guys, this week. Here on my desk, I've got a bunch of water bottles. As fate would have it, they're all, you know, empty. I also have a bunch of vouchers for free pizza, because I'm not above resorting to bribery in order to make things more interesting in my classroom."
He grinned.
"Last time I taught this lesson, I gave each student one water bottle, told them to fill it up somewhere that wasn't the school or the dorms, and then got them to bring it back and talk about where they got that water. The catch was that it had to be clean, potable water. The sort of stuff that you weren't going to get, you know, cholera from. None of that idiot white person raw water fad bullshit that is literally going to give you some sort of horrible parasitic infestation if you're lucky. I'm going to mix that one up just a little this time around."
He jerked a thumb to the bottles of water on the desk.
"There are three sizes of water bottle there. There's your basic Gatorade bottle, the kind that you might see a jogger clinging to as they trample people down on the sidewalk. There's your in-between bottle, basically a four-litre milk jug. Don't ask me what the hell that is in gallons. I'm Canadian and I'm going into fashion. So long as it fits in my fridge I literally have no reason to care. And then the big one, the mother lode, the office cooler bottle."
He pointed to each bottle in succession as he listed them off.
"Each one is worth pizza vouchers, today. Filling a sports drink bottle will get you one coupon for a personal-sized cheese pizza from Pizza Planet. Filling the middlest bottle and getting it back here is going to get you a medium pizza with up to two toppings. And filling the big one and getting it back here, before the end of the class period, is going to get you not one, but two extra large party size pizzas with whatever toppings your heart desires. And, I mean, knowing Pizza Planet, you'd probably end up with like a dozen on an order like that, so that's kind of the teenage dream, right there."
And now he was holding up a finger.
"You each get one of each bottle," he continued. "No more than that. You can get them filled in whatever way you possibly can, so long as you're filling them up with clean freshwater, or you can convince me that you have a reliable way to make that water clean and safe to drink without losing like half the contents of the bottle. You can't fill them up in the dorms building, in the school building, or anywhere you might actually be employed in town, and yes, I am bribing the squirrels with rum to narc on you guys if you think you're going to cheat. For each bottle you fill up and bring back here - it has to be back here by the end of class, it's up to you to figure out how to get one of those cooler bottles back to the school over all those stairs without breaking your back or something - you get the corresponding pizza tickets to go with it.
"So you have a few things to consider, here. Where are you going to get that water? If you have to resort to seawater or one of the streams in the preserve, how are you going to make that water safe to drink? If you're stealing water from a garden hose or something, and good luck with that since most people turn off their outside water this time of year so the pipes don't freeze, how much can you get away with before you get chased off the property? A sports bottle might be easy, but someone's probably going to give you problems if you walk into their yard hauling that big cooler number. And then you still have to get it back here. You're probably going to want to make multiple trips. Water bottles are heavy."
He smirked a little.
"Did you get all that? Grab a bottle or three and get outta my face, then, and don't come back before the end of class unless you have some water to show for it and can tell me where it came from."
He grinned.
"Last time I taught this lesson, I gave each student one water bottle, told them to fill it up somewhere that wasn't the school or the dorms, and then got them to bring it back and talk about where they got that water. The catch was that it had to be clean, potable water. The sort of stuff that you weren't going to get, you know, cholera from. None of that idiot white person raw water fad bullshit that is literally going to give you some sort of horrible parasitic infestation if you're lucky. I'm going to mix that one up just a little this time around."
He jerked a thumb to the bottles of water on the desk.
"There are three sizes of water bottle there. There's your basic Gatorade bottle, the kind that you might see a jogger clinging to as they trample people down on the sidewalk. There's your in-between bottle, basically a four-litre milk jug. Don't ask me what the hell that is in gallons. I'm Canadian and I'm going into fashion. So long as it fits in my fridge I literally have no reason to care. And then the big one, the mother lode, the office cooler bottle."
He pointed to each bottle in succession as he listed them off.
"Each one is worth pizza vouchers, today. Filling a sports drink bottle will get you one coupon for a personal-sized cheese pizza from Pizza Planet. Filling the middlest bottle and getting it back here is going to get you a medium pizza with up to two toppings. And filling the big one and getting it back here, before the end of the class period, is going to get you not one, but two extra large party size pizzas with whatever toppings your heart desires. And, I mean, knowing Pizza Planet, you'd probably end up with like a dozen on an order like that, so that's kind of the teenage dream, right there."
And now he was holding up a finger.
"You each get one of each bottle," he continued. "No more than that. You can get them filled in whatever way you possibly can, so long as you're filling them up with clean freshwater, or you can convince me that you have a reliable way to make that water clean and safe to drink without losing like half the contents of the bottle. You can't fill them up in the dorms building, in the school building, or anywhere you might actually be employed in town, and yes, I am bribing the squirrels with rum to narc on you guys if you think you're going to cheat. For each bottle you fill up and bring back here - it has to be back here by the end of class, it's up to you to figure out how to get one of those cooler bottles back to the school over all those stairs without breaking your back or something - you get the corresponding pizza tickets to go with it.
"So you have a few things to consider, here. Where are you going to get that water? If you have to resort to seawater or one of the streams in the preserve, how are you going to make that water safe to drink? If you're stealing water from a garden hose or something, and good luck with that since most people turn off their outside water this time of year so the pipes don't freeze, how much can you get away with before you get chased off the property? A sports bottle might be easy, but someone's probably going to give you problems if you walk into their yard hauling that big cooler number. And then you still have to get it back here. You're probably going to want to make multiple trips. Water bottles are heavy."
He smirked a little.
"Did you get all that? Grab a bottle or three and get outta my face, then, and don't come back before the end of class unless you have some water to show for it and can tell me where it came from."
Re: Report back!
"Melting snow is a good one," he offered, "as is catching rainwater, yeah. In the case of the snow situation, water gets a little tricky, though. Since... if you're stockpiling it outside, there's a chance that it'll turn to ice. Having a way to melt it again is important, if you can't find it in its liquid form."
Re: Report back!
She paused. "What other methods would you suggest?"
Re: Report back!
Because a lot of this was going to boil down to where people lived, too.
Re: Report back!
"I've been to a lot of places and what to do would be very different depending on where you were."
Re: Report back!
"It really would be," he admitted. "Especially because there are a lot of cities that are in areas that are prone to drought, so you can't necessarily rely on natural sources or public water supplies. There are going to be situations where you have to just acknowledge that getting clean isn't an option for a while, or you'll have to find some alternative to bathing. Drinking water is always, always going to be top priority, since it's hard to worry about doing dishes or bathing if you're dead."
Re: Report back!
Which others considered uncivilized, of course.
"Being able to boil the water might help a little."
Re: Report back!
"Boiling water does help, to some degree," Sparkle agreed. "You might lose some to evaporation, but there are ways to minimize that, too."