Living in Toronto the first 32 years of our marriage, garbage days were annoying because, well, you had to deal with garbage. However, you could put out bag upon bag and the garbage people would take it away. Nice.
The first day of living here in Trenton, two neighbours asked me if I knew about garbage tags. In fact, the lady across the street came right over to our door to welcome us (we have not spoken one word since that day) and to tell us we needed to buy garbage tags. I think she wanted a glimpse of the house - probably more like a tour - but we only spoke on the doorstep while she tried to see around me into the house.
Our lovely next door neighbour brought over a local bakery's butter tarts, her hubby helped us move in and they have been the best neighbours on earth ever since. She also told me about garbage tags.
This concept was totally new to me. You mean, we have to pay to have our garbage taken away? That's right. Two dollars a bag. (It has recently gone up to $2.50 bag!)
The amount one pays depends on where you live. In neighbouring Belleville, the cost was only a dollar a bag. The stick-on long strips, imprinted "Quinte West", can be purchased at the supermarket and convenience stores, although convenience stores charge extra, which means if you have to run to the corner in a hurry before the garbage truck gets to your house, you're paying $2.70 a tag.
When we moved here, they still had different tags for different parts of Trenton, or Quinte West, as it is now officially known. We had to get the proper tag for our part of Quinte West, so when the supermarket clerk asked me which ward I wanted tags for, I didn't know! Were we Sydney Ward? Trenton Ward? or something else? The neighbours didn't mention anything about wards! Help!
When we moved here, they still had different tags for different parts of Trenton, or Quinte West, as it is now officially known. We had to get the proper tag for our part of Quinte West, so when the supermarket clerk asked me which ward I wanted tags for, I didn't know! Were we Sydney Ward? Trenton Ward? or something else? The neighbours didn't mention anything about wards! Help!
In Toronto there has been talk of initiating some sort of garbage fee, too; at the mere mention of it people get ugly. And no one is talking about as high a fee as we pay here in Trenton.
We (make that "I") have learned to make less garbage. Recycling is totally free, except for the cost of the bins, and I've been composting for decades. Because not everyone in our house (process of elimination brings us to the hubbub) can be bothered with opening the sliding door in the kitchen in order to deposit cardboard, plastic, aluminum cans, etc. in the recycling containers and banana peels in the compost bin (much less egg shells!), you can find me on any given day fishing these items out of the kitchen garbage can, washing them, compressing them, and depositing them in the proper receptacles.
It's a chore which garners me no accolades from within the house (hub is fed up with recycling - as if he did much of it!), but the recycling truck guys have praised me once or twice - to him! It seems that not everyone follows the recycling rules and that makes the job all the more harder for the collectors.
Only official bins must be used - some folks were putting their recyclables out in milk crates and old laundry baskets - because they're the only ones that hook onto the truck so the guys can sort your items for tossing into the allocated sections of the truck. I do the sort in my bins, as requested, but not everyone does, despite the annual recycling calendar and posters sent to us. I have my poster taped to the inside of my pantry door.
Cardboard goes into a different bin than aluminum, plastic and glass. Smaller boxes go into bigger boxes, all crushed, of course. Containers are washed out before depositing in the bin. Hubbub can't be bothered with that. He thinks they should bow down to him if he gives them anything at all. For the Hub, empty milk containers are tossed in the bin unwashed and uncrushed. Same with pop bottles. Little carboard boxes, like the ones sardine tins come in, go in the garbage pail under the kitchen sink. (I fish them out. Hehe...."fish" them out!)
Early on living here mistakes were made and the recycling guys refused our offerings, leaving a yellow card in the unemptied bin with the reason why indicated with a black check mark - yes, like a traffic ticket!. I learned fast and the following week looked out the window hoping my bin was acceptable to them - I tried so hard to please! But hub got even madder. What kind of police-state are we living in when even the recycling people have such authority over us?
It makes you wonder, actually.
I've been in their good books for years, though. An example to the rest of the neighbourhood, I am. I'm waiting for my invitation to give the keynote speech at their next annual meeting.
It's a chore which garners me no accolades from within the house (hub is fed up with recycling - as if he did much of it!), but the recycling truck guys have praised me once or twice - to him! It seems that not everyone follows the recycling rules and that makes the job all the more harder for the collectors.
Only official bins must be used - some folks were putting their recyclables out in milk crates and old laundry baskets - because they're the only ones that hook onto the truck so the guys can sort your items for tossing into the allocated sections of the truck. I do the sort in my bins, as requested, but not everyone does, despite the annual recycling calendar and posters sent to us. I have my poster taped to the inside of my pantry door.
Cardboard goes into a different bin than aluminum, plastic and glass. Smaller boxes go into bigger boxes, all crushed, of course. Containers are washed out before depositing in the bin. Hubbub can't be bothered with that. He thinks they should bow down to him if he gives them anything at all. For the Hub, empty milk containers are tossed in the bin unwashed and uncrushed. Same with pop bottles. Little carboard boxes, like the ones sardine tins come in, go in the garbage pail under the kitchen sink. (I fish them out. Hehe...."fish" them out!)
Early on living here mistakes were made and the recycling guys refused our offerings, leaving a yellow card in the unemptied bin with the reason why indicated with a black check mark - yes, like a traffic ticket!. I learned fast and the following week looked out the window hoping my bin was acceptable to them - I tried so hard to please! But hub got even madder. What kind of police-state are we living in when even the recycling people have such authority over us?
It makes you wonder, actually.
I've been in their good books for years, though. An example to the rest of the neighbourhood, I am. I'm waiting for my invitation to give the keynote speech at their next annual meeting.
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