I got a little card in the mail from the city of Baltimore. It tells me what I should and shouldn’t do in regard to trash and recycling pick up. I’m not sure if the information in it is new or old.
The rule I have the biggest difficulty with is the one requiring me to have an outside trash can. I have several reasons why I don’t want to have an outside trash can: 1) Outside trash cans always stink. 2) After they are emptied by the sanitation workers, the lids and bodies roll all over the street. 3) I don’t have an obvious place to keep an outside trash can. 4) An outside trash can will draw pests of all kinds, including rats.
Baltimore City has two trash days every week. I usually just have one bag of trash each pick-up day. I put the bag out on my way to my truck in the morning. There is no time for rats to dig through it.
So if this is an old rule I’m okay, because I haven’t been using an outside trash can since I moved in and nothing has happened to me. If it’s a new rule, I’m in trouble, and I guess I’d better start shopping for a trash can.
Maybe if you don’t have a trash can you get a pad of yellow Post-Its.
If you do get a trash can, I think you should get a crazy one – maybe one shaped like a can of Pepsi. Or a coffin!
…or a large urban feline, to scare away the rats! You know the kind – three legged with a patch over one eye and a big chink out of one ear. Fearsome! Or:
According to Baltimore City Ordinance Article 23, Subtitle 4, “Receptacles on Collection Days” (I am not making those numbers up, by the way!), I think so long as you are not tossing refuse from the house windows onto the streets and expecting the Department of Sanitation to come scrape it together and take it away, you’re covered with the drawstring bag o’ trash approach. However…
…check out this URL yourself to see what you think, Brad:
http://cityservices.baltimorecity.gov/charterandcodes/Code/Art%2023%20-%20Sanitation.pdf
(Yes, it is obnoxiously long. I Goodsearched “Baltimore City Sanitation Ordinance” to get there in case…)
Or shaped like R2-D2.
…or a Smith and Wesson…
We had critters getting into our garbage – flipping off the lid or even eating through the lid to get the the contents. Last year I bought one of these: http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail&productId=93813-60948-25596-R5GRS&lpage=none
While it was expensive, it turns out it was the best thing we could done. No more critters in the garbage, everything fits, and it rolls to the curb so nice that even when Arron’s back is at it’s worst, he can easily get the garbage out.
They have smaller ones too.
That’s the kind of can the garbage collection companies in Seward actually provide (for a rental fee) to households.
We’re cheap. So we have our own cheap trashcans, and we don’t pay the rental fee for their nice cans.
But we don’t have rats.
Well, we maybe would, but we have Bobbie-the-Wondercat, and she would eat them. After toying with them mercilessly.
Oh. I think you should just keep doing what you’re doing Brad.
We prefer to think of our furry visitors as “critters.” Since we don’t actually see them, we can believe they’re something benign. However, we do have garbage cans with large holes in them. I don’t thing anything benign eats a hole in a plastic garbage can. Matter of fact, I don’t think anything benign eats garbage.
Note to myself: Buy garbage can, call trash company.
Karla, do you secure the lid? I think some of our critters are large (fat – ON MY GARBAGE!!) racoons and they might manage to tip it over.
The lid is hinged on, so it’s a flip top. I think our critters aren’t smart enough to be able to get the lid up from the side, and if they tackle it from the top of the can, they’re weighing down the lid themselves… If they start getting in, we might try a bunge cord.
Maybe you should get the trash can…and maybe you should fill it with dead fish with no bag & leave it outside in the hot sun for days…and then leave the city a little sign of your own…
Or wait ’til a super windy day & fill the can with one hundred billion feathers (in no bag of course)…hehe…that’ll teach ’em to threaten law abiding citizens!
(I might just do it myself…muahhhh)
I’m just thinking of the many uses for this cute slogan in our middle school. We could put up big posters designed like your little card from the city.
1) Get one of these. (picture of a belt)
OR get one ot these. (picture of a demerit with a check next to “Out of Dress Code”)
2) Get one of these. (picture of a well-stocked pencil case)
OR get one of these. (picture of a demerit with a check next to “Unprepared for Class”)
You get the idea! The possibilities are endless! Maybe we can each make one over the break.
How, though, do we address the oh-so-loquatious middle school mouth? Their problem is they already have one of “those” (picture of pair of lips) and scream even louder with them when they do get one of “these” (picture of demerit for not following class procedures/class disruption/name your offense checked off). Neat idea, though, Michele – and if we hang one such notice on the inside door of every washroom stall, we’re sure to hit the majority of the populous before lunch time rolls around.
“Thank you, Baltimore City!”