5/12/11 – Can you believe it’s Thursday? That sentence might seem a little odd to some of you because you may be living for the weekend and Friday can’t come fast enough. I had this realization today while at work. I tend to lose track of the days of the week, so I was reminding myself that it was Thursday. I realized the week has seemed to go by quickly. Tomorrow is Friday. I’m not ready for Friday. I would like to hang on to this week a little longer. It has been lovely. In the past I would never have said that. I was a “can’t wait for the weekend” person. The weekend was my time to do what I wanted. No waking up early, no traffic unless I wanted to be in traffic, no responsibilities except for the ones that I chose. The weekend was the pinnacle of the week. It didn’t get any better than that. Now, I relish a boring Tuesday of a good week. Friday comes too fast.
As I was driving home today I had another random observation. No, I did not see any teenage girls walking around in bathing suits, thank God. What I did notice was trash. I turn on to this small road to get to my subdivision. It is filled with a variety of houses from mid to low income level. They are all relatively well maintained homes regardless of the size or type of house. So, I’m cruising down the road and notice that house after house after house has piles of garbage lying on the side of the road awaiting pick up. As I pass the 2nd pile of junk I start to look at what is being trashed. It is important to note that this trash is not in bags or in trash cans. It is simply laid out on the side of the road. I’m looking at each pile I pass and I see a theme – mattresses. Mattresses. House after house after house (maybe it skipped one or two, but not many) has some form of a mattress laid outside for disposal.
Interesting. All these mattresses got me to thinking. “Why are there so many mattresses outside for pickup?” “Where did they come from?” “Did all these people just have stacks of mattresses lying around their house that they did not need?” “Why are they all getting rid of them at the same time? Is this some special pickup?” The sheer volume of the mattresses really bothered me. I feel like I need to know what these people are doing and why they all have these extra mattresses. Am I supposed to keep an extra mattress handy for some reason? Was there a mattress sale that I missed out on? Seriously. I must know.
Now all this garbage – let’s just be honest here, it bordered more on the “crap” designation if I were the judge of it – was not in bags. Zero bags. This leads me to another point. Why is it not in a bag or a trash can? Who is their trash company? Where I live (a few miles down the road) we have a designated trash company. We have huge trash cans along with a similar size recycle bin – Todd and I are avid recyclers. (Like how I use the term “avid” like recycling is a sport?) We can’t just place random crap out on the road. Our trash company would refuse to pick it up and our neighbors might send us a dirty letter. We have to call for a special pickup and can only place one item outside a week. I do not understand. What trash company just picks up garbage on the side of the road? Isn’t that what community service details do, not trash companies?
I find it fascinating how much I can talk about the subject of garbage. What does that say about me? That I’m trashy? Nah. That I don’t put up with trashiness? Maybe…. Maybe that’s what it is. Is “trashiness” even a word?
On that note, I have one more trash story to round out the day. As I mentioned earlier Todd and I do a lot of recycling. We weren’t always so green. I don’t know if I would even say that I’m a green person today. I just figure why NOT recycle? No excuse, so I do. When Todd and I first started recycling we were given this little tub by our trash company. Todd and I easily filled the tub and had even more recycling. We didn’t have enough room to recycle everything each time and were developing a recycling overflow – not acceptable. Todd spoke with the garbage company and they said “Oh, if you have a bin of your own you can place that out at the road too and the recycle truck will pick up those items.” Perfect. In our kitchen we have 2 trash cans – one for trash and one for recycling. When our pick up day came we placed our designated bin out by the road along with our plastic trash can filled with recycling. When I came home that day I noticed that the garbage company had picked up our trash can as well as the recycling in it. I guess the recycling sign on the side made them think to take it? Maybe they are avid recyclers as well and thought they had totally scored with a whole trash can being recycled? Todd called the trash company and explained what happened. They said they would replace our trash can and give us an additional bin. Fine. The following day I came home and found a huge trash can (like the ones that go out on the street – huge!) in my driveway along with another bin. Um… I’m NOT putting a huge black trash bin with a hinge top in my kitchen. Nope, not gonna do it. I have an image to maintain, plus it would not coordinate with my kitchen colors. Todd and I decided to buy a new trash can for inside the house and we now use the huge trash bin for our recycling pickup. We fill it almost every week. Back to the recycling being like a sport for Todd and I, if you were to look through our neighborhood (and probably your own) most people have the bins and that’s enough. Todd and I have a recycle can slightly smaller than our trash can – that’s pretty large. We would win the recycling challenge hands down, if it were actually a challenge that is.
Enough about garbage and on to lighter topics. I felt great today. Another good day. If I could have anything to eat I would still like frozen yogurt from Yogli Mogli. On my cheat day all I’m going to eat is pizza and frozen yogurt. The whole day. My song of the day is “Take Out the Trash” by They Might Be Giants.
Night y’all!
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