[347/365] I'm very normal, this house is very normal

[cosmolinguist]

At first I thought "I was only out in daylight to go to the bin, that's not much of a story!" but then I realized it is.

I was out in the drizzle, dragging armfuls of cardboard out of the recycling bin, shaking the shredder confetti off of it, taking it back into the house...

I did it because we keep some kinds of cardboard, at the suggestion of the dog behaviorists we saw about Gary as his cognition is declining. They suggested we hide treats in the boxes and toilet paper tubes and stuff for him, like little puzzles for him to solve. It's good enrichment for his old brain, it keeps him busy when he's full of beans and his humans are tired...

...but I forgot that other people don't know this, and to them our carefully curated egg cartons and the good boxes and all the toilet paper tubes looks like actual trash. The cleaners tossed them all out!

I wasn't going to fish them out of the bin once I saw the shredder had been emptied on top of everything, but then I realized that the entire bin was full and we always need more paper recycling than we have room for, so I wanted to free up some space.

So there I was, sliding around in the mud, trying to get stuff inside before it got soggy. I didn't salvage everything but many of the classics of Gary's Cardboard Chaos are back where they belong.

Comments

[otter]

One person's trash is another's treasure ;) Cardboard Chaos Classics :)

We have to put our shreddings into paper bags and staple them shut and write "Shredded paper" on the bag in order for the recyclers to take them.

[cosmolinguist]

Ours just upend the bin into their truck, they don't seem to care what's in it. :)

[momentsmusicaux]

Gah! This is why I am super reluctant to get a cleaner! Surely basic rule is don't throw anything in the bin!

[cosmolinguist]

In their defense, this is literal cardboard recycling, and it is stacked up next to the kitchen recycling bins which they also emptied. It would have looked to any reasonable person to like it was just overflow from the paper bin.

But yeah I don't think a cleaner would be good for you, they do sometimes move stuff into confusing places or do odd things and I don't think you'd like that at all. :)

[silveradept]

Ah, yes, remembering that not everyone has your context is jarring sometimes. But also, I live in a place where if that happened, by the next week we'd probably have been able to replace most of the Cardboard Chaos with new models, so.

[cosmolinguist]

Oh yeah, there's no shortage of egg cartons and toilet paper tubes and whatnot. But there were a couple of favorites that are rarer as well as taking up an inordinate amount of space in the recycling bin, so I was glad to rescue those.

[silveradept]

Oh, yes, good, favorites that also happen to be bulky in the bin. I didn't understand the size of some of the pieces.

[jesse_the_k]

10/10 you are the right person to have around in every situation!

[cosmolinguist]

Haha, such effusive praise for such a silly thing! Thank you!

[jesse_the_k]

It may be small, and it's also important for Gary and the rest of the household.

(I erased then retyped that twice. I'm trying to articulate any of my daily wins, in aid of making it through to the beginning of the sun's return. So of course my anxiety brain chides me for being argumentative and projecting my junk onto your brain. Welp, I'm hitting "post" now!)