Garbage Police

Today is garbage pick-up day in my neighborhood. Last week I put out a bin full of loose pop cans and the recycling people refused to pick them up because they were loose instead of in plastic bags...so much for reducing plastic in our garbage!

So I dutifully put the cans in a separate plastic bag along with another plastic bag full of newspapers. There were 3 small cardboard boxes so I added them to the recycling bin but they're so picky about things that I'm not sure they'll take those little boxes unless they also are in plastic bags. Next they'll want us to work for free at the recycling center!

I just happened to look out the front window and saw a man with a clipboard, yellow jacket with the huge "X" on it checking out my garbage. Could we now have a garbage police force? Did my dreadful error of not putting my pop cans in a plastic bag last week mean that I'm on their hit list? Are they taking note that there was no separate bag of veggie cans which could mean they're illegally hidden in my regular gabage? They're not because I seldom cook. Are they going to inspect the inside of my regular gabage bag and discover my credit statement showing I spent a heck of a lot of money last month?

I know we have to be more careful about what goes in landfill but having garbage police is going a little too far. I'm thinking that the sanitation department just might be getting too much tax dollars if they can afford to send workers ahead of the trucks to see if our garbage is 100% legal.

Update: I just found out that the "inspector" was checking to see who deserved a gold recycling box. I must have failed the test because of those few cardboard boxes that weren't tied together because I didn't get a gold box. It's a silly (and tax dollar expensive) way of applying guilt to us losers in the neighborhood.