Throwing a Trash Can Away

Have you ever tried to throw a trash can away? I once tried it and found that it can’t be done. I had signed up with a trash company that was one of the more premium trash companies in my area. They gave premade Roladex cards and refrigerator magnets to prospective customers. When you signed up you got a 96 gallon rolling trash container to put trash in (Old 96). The trash company had a policy that if you put trash in those special see-through blue recycle bags that they would take those bags out of the regular trash and take them to the recycling center. Our kitchen trash can had seen better days. It sort of resembled a banana peel in that it had several sections very loosely attached at one end. It had held its last piece of trash. I took it to the street on trash day and left it beside the big trash container since the container was already full. The garbage company had told me that, on the rare occasions that I had more than 96 gallons of trash, I could simply place the overflow beside the trash can and the company would pick it up. They gave great service.

After time for the trash truck to have come and gone, I looked out the window and saw my discarded trash can still there. I thought that was odd. Why was the trash truck so late? I went to the big 96 gallon container and checked. It was empty. I picked up the old trash can and put it inside Old 96 gallon and rolled it back to the side yard where it lived most of the week. I figured that maybe the trash company didn’t see it.

Next week, I rolled Old 96 out to the street with the discarded trash can safely in the bottom of it. There is no chance they will miss taking it this time. It is at the bottom of Old 96. We leave to run a few errands in town and come back to find Old 96 standing there at the street with his new-found buddy “Boomerang.” That’s right, the trash company had seen “Boomerang” at the bottom of Old 96 and decided that I must have accidently put it in there. Being a professional trash company, they decided to go the extra mile and return my “mistakenly-discarded” trash can to me.  Thanks guys, why didn’t you do that with the 2,493 dustpans my kids mistakenly threw away last year?

I called the trash company and explained that I had a trash can to throw away and what had happened. The man explained to me that it would be a good idea to tape a note to the trash can that said it was trash and to take it. Okay, I printed a sign up on the computer that said “I am trash, please take me.” I taped this to Boomerang and put it back in Old 96.

Next week I roll Old 96 with Boomerang inside with his note securely taped to him out to the street. The trash truck comes and goes and I go outside to find, you guessed it, dear old Boomerang. The trash company had taken the sign I made.

I finally got the trash company to take Boomerang though. I took a utility knife and cut him into smaller pieces and distributed the pieces between several different trash bags.

For weeks I expected a regenerated Boomerang to show up on my door step looking to haunt me for the rest of my days. So far, so good.