A parody about loving and hating the recent WM strike.
For most of us Eastsiders, the strike was a complete inconvenience with reminders of missed pick-ups lining the streets in colors of blue and grey bins. By the end of the strike the bins lids were wedged up high with a surplus of recycling and cardboard boxes were spilling out the sides. While the value of this strike was shown for the workers, do we have any indirect value that came out of this strike beyond a newfound appreciation for someone regularly taking our trash away. These hypothetical characters will draw it out and you can decide.
Resident 1: I recycle and food scrap so much my trash didn't even need to be taken out. What strike? I didn't notice a thing.
R 2: Yaah, well you are not the one who had to walk by the yard waste/ compost bin all the time! Did you see what was growing in there and oh man, the stink. Sheesh I mean, I heard district composting is the next thing on the horizon, but does that process have to take place right here in the neighborhood bin!
R3: Rats about that!
R4: Let's just dump the compost bins in the trash so we don't have to deal with that "fact of nature."
R5: We could if we had any room in the trash, those workers are on strike this week too!
R1: Recycling is the same, it just keeps piling up. Glad I don't have the household job of having to stuff the next lot in there. Although, I'm amazed how much could fit!
R4: Wow, we could actually save money if we only needed things picked up every other week. Maybe this strike is not such a bad thing. If we sort all the stinky "compostable" trash into bins that are picked up every week - for free - the rest can be picked up every other week.
R5: The other recycling would still need to be picked up every week because everyone knows that as "Northwesteners", we are awesome recyclers.
R1: I have heard that too, but last week I was sure glad to reclaim a whole bunch of cardboard that was just sitting there for weeks. It ended up being used as liners for the rows in between the pea patches. The crew that normally picked up garbage had some extra time on their hands and filled in the mulch on top. Less weeds between rows and a very nice look all with "reclaimed" resources.
R2: It may look pretty, but I still can not get those images out of my head of what the food scrap bin looks like right now. The looks of that would even scare the rats away!
R3: I can imagine it now, the rats go on strike, compost bin not emptied in a month.
What do you think? Any indirect value from the strike?
A: Just a realization of how much our household/community accumulates in a couple week period.
B: Ready to downsize my garbage or have less frequent pick-ups, It wasn't so bad.
C: My one-way ticket has been purchased for next time the "s" word might come up.
D: I'm in the wrong profession.
