Ten True Confessions From a Year of No Garbage
November 17, 2020 § 7 Comments
- I’ve flushed used staples down the toilet.
- I’ve asked visiting friends to take their garbage back home with them. I am nothing if not a gracious hostess.
- I’ve donated ketchup packages to the food cupboard. KETCHUP IS FOOD, PEOPLE.
- At an art reception I’ve let a friend go off looking for a real wine glass just for me and then taken the plastic cup anyway because, oh look! It is “recyclable.” Also because: oh look! It’s wine!
- I’ve returned two pants hangers to the dry cleaner that had missing or broken clips. They may or may not have been repairable. I am counting on the existence of a clothes-hanger fairy.
- I’ve let my husband burn a dish sponge in the outdoor fire that, although significantly worn, probably/definitely still had some plastic scrubbie bits attached to it. In my defense, it was either that, or name it Fred and knit him a tiny Christmas sweater.
- At any given moment I have an inadvertent damp paper towel collection in my purse. This is the result of occasional times when I’ve been on automatic pilot in a public restroom. Nothing says “Yessir, I’ve got my life together!” like dropping wet accordion towels on the floor while fishing out your wallet at the bagel shop.
- I’ve given up on saying “No receipt, please.” First of all, it makes everyone hate you. Second of all, and this is weird, you do occasionally need receipts to prove you paid for the things you are removing from the store. Apparently.
- So that piece of tin foil with burned-on fish-skin? That I couldn’t manage to scrub entirely off, and then I tried to recycle it anyway?— Because how bad could that little teeny-tiny micron of fish really smell? It turns out the answer to that question is REALLY. REALLY. BAD.
- No one wants my stuff on Freecycle. I can’t imagine why not. What’s not appealing about someone else’s half-used hair care products? And, honestly, they hardly smell like fish at all.
