Trash Situation

I want to start off by saying I like the idea of being environmentally conscious. I think it is our duty as stewards of this earth to take care of it and our natural resources and not just consume everything like gluttons. But sometimes the "green" movement drives me crazy. It is the hip thing right now in Portland and the rest of the Northwest I'm sure to be as sustainable as possible. Everything I see on t.v. is about being green and Eco friendly. You can't escape it. Its like the AIDS awareness movement of the 90's those of you who remember that (red ribbons on everything that moved). Does anyone remember the figure skater who wore an insane outfit that had a giant red ribbon on it? Here's a fun pic I found to remind you of it... I couldn't resist.



Nothing against any of these causes but really I just get so annoyed when a cause becomes the "trendy" thing to do and be a part of. What about when a new trend cause comes along? What happens to this one? Okay, that was a tangent from my original rant...

Let me explain what I like to call the "trash situation" right now. To sum up... they've stopped emptying our trash at work. It is now our job to sort our trash into recyclable bins in the break room. I'm cool with recycling, really don't mind it. I always drop my plastic bottles and cans in the bins. I was even excited to see that they switched all our to go boxes and cutlery to be recyclable materials in the cafeteria. But here's where I get annoyed with the trash situation... They sent us all this nice, and what looks like a very non-recyclable glossy, paper to explain the new bins for recycling and to let us know they would no longer empty our trash. Why not just give us the bins and encourage us to use them, why stop emptying the normal trash? There will ALWAYS be trash.

Maybe I'm lazy and too used to being spoiled, but I really dislike emptying my trash at work. For one I'm busy, and I forget, and then the trash doesn't get emptied gross! It was one of the constants in my life I could rely on. Every few days my trash would magically disappear. It was like breathing, you don't even notice its happening, but if it stops its quite painful. I already have to remember to take my trash out at home which is hard enough. I miss my trash being emptied. I miss other people's trash being emptied too... You know that was one standard we could hold every one's cube to, at least their trash would be emptied. Now its up to them, and let's just say not everyone is as clean as we would hope.

My biggest issue has been... The compost bin in the break room. Call me old fashioned but I think compost should be something that only happens outside in gardens! Luckily it's emptied nightly so it doesn't get too gross if people keep the lid down. And the one lone trash can now left in the break room is way too small for a floor full of people and is often overflowing. Probably because no one feels like sorting through their trash so they just chuck it all when no one's looking instead of sorting. Not that I've done that or anything.

The perfect solution to this... Some magical machine that sorts all trash as required and does it in an air tight vacuum sealed container. Now that is worth our investment. Really I suppose its good if even 1/2 of the people I work with sort their trash we'll have a lot less waste a year. My guilt is kicking in I guess. It just came too fast for me and with no choice. I need some warning people.