Today’s featured question from the community comes from user Josie Maran, former Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, I am not even joking (you can see for yourself, and then I am going to sit back and watch a flood of teenage boys sign up for the dooce® community):
This isn’t necessarily a direct answer to this question, but something happened earlier this week that sort of coincides with it if I wedge it in there, sit on top of it, and staple the box shut.
One of Katey’s responsibilities as our assistant is to manage all the recycling that goes on in this house, and let me tell you, it is a total recycling party up in here. We’ve got cardboard boxes, plastic containers, and scraps of paper climbing the walls like kudzu, and that there was a shout out to my Southern contingent. KUD. ZU. I remember the first time I referenced kudzu in front of Jon, and he was all, you are totally making that up. And I was all, no, for real. It will eat you up:
(photo credit to The Science House)
The problem is that there isn’t really a recycling program for glass other than these huge dumptsers up the road that say “BROWN GLASS ONLY” or “GREEN GLASS GOES HERE” and I guess they are routinely emptied by the Glass People. Or maybe by magic. I don’t know. I have no idea where that glass goes or who picks it up, but it happens. And that last sentence pretty much looks like my explanation to Leta when she asked how Santa was going to get through the grates we had installed on the top of the chimney to keep out the raccoons. MAGIC! Or maybe he’ll use a screwdriver. His elves have tons of those lying around.
Tangent: Leta and I were at the mall on Sunday and passed this really sad and depressing corner where Santa was sitting, just waiting for the kids to show up, the photographer perched awkwardly on a chair next to him. Except, there were no kids to be found. No line. Nothing. I found myself avoiding eye contact with him to spare him the shame, because it was just so pathetic and I was afraid he’d be able to tell that I was thinking, dude, you’re like a New Kid on the Block who tried to strike out on his own and no one showed up to the CD release party at WalMart.
(frowny face)
(okay, full disclosure: I saw New Kids on the Block in Jackson, Mississippi in 1990. They were HAW-SOME. I had naughty, repent-worthy thoughts about Jordan Knight, baby, I believe in you.)
Instantly Leta seized my leg and tried to climb up my body. Under no circumstances was she going to go near that man, and I kept going, Leta! It’s Santa Claus! And she kept shaking her head, no, no, no, and when I asked why she said, “I think the letter I wrote him will get the job done.”
Seriously, why has no one pitched the show where you stick a dozen neurotic five-year-olds into a room, feed them raw sugar and energy drinks, and arm each one with a sharp fork. I would pay good money to see that half hour.
ANYWAY.
In order to recycle glass here you have to get into your car and burn precious fossil fuel while driving to the dumpster. The irony here is not lost on me, but we go through so much glass that it’s worth that little bit of carbon dioxide. We’ve got beer bottles and pickle jars and pasta jars, and let’s be honest, maybe a bottle of liquor or ten. What can I say. Marlo likes her martinis dirty.
So we collect all the glass in a plastic bin, and when it gets full one of us, usually Katey, will drive it up to the dumpster. And this last time there was so much glass that it was almost overflowing, and she’s trying not to drop any of it because, you know, GLASS. And as she tosses a couple of bottles into the green dumpster some woman pulls up behind her, jumps out of her car and starts yelling at her THAT SHE’S DOING IT WRONG. And holy crap, I thought that only happened on the Internet!
So Katey is all, what? And the woman is going on and on about how she just saw Katey throw a brown glass into the green glass dumpster, doesn’t she know? THE FATE OF THE EARTH DEPENDS ON THAT COLOR CODE. And Katey goes, no, pretty sure that was a dark green bottle, and the woman will have none of it. So Katey finally goes, FIRST OF ALL, I’M RECYCLING. And as Katey is telling me this story she and I simultaneously yell out, SECOND OF ALL, THERE IS NO SECOND OF ALL. I’M RECYCLING.
Seriously, someone getting all up in someone else’s business because they aren’t recycling the right way. IN REAL LIFE. It wasn’t even an anonymous comment! It’s like, I’m sorry, but the phenomenally generous check you just wrote to our children’s foundation is nice, but your penmanship really sucks. You’re going to have to write us another one, you turd.