My Adventure at the Recycling Depot

Well, my plans to set up a proper recycling program here at Creative Wonders finally bit me in the backside as it was made clear that it was I who must take care of the heaps of pop cans, pickle jars and cereal boxes overflowing from the blue box and heaping up by the door at the end of the hallway. So I packed it all up. Then I headed to the recycling place under the Second Narrows there.

It is a strange place the recycling depot. But it taught me a lot. Actually there was a watchful guardian who made sure the green glass stood apart from the clear glass, that paper ended up in its place and that tin stayed separate from aluminium. He pointed out a thing or two in his rather brash and impatient way.

You don’t get any money for pop cans and beer bottles at the Recycling Yard, those you must save for the liquor stores and supermarkets respectively. This is a huge pain and if anything needs to be done about the recycling system in this country, that is it. However, I did find out that you do get money for Tetra-packs, such as Sun Rype apple juice containers, who would have known?

The surly guardian of the recycling heaps explained many things to me. You can tell the difference between tin and aluminium lids by their magnetic properties. Tin sticks to a magnet. They have one set up there for you to make it all the easier. They don’t like it when you leave lids on olive and pickle jars. Labels neither. There are also numbers on the bottom of just about everything so you can tell what bin to throw it in. This comes in handy. You can’t recycle soy milk or paper milk cartons. Apparently soy is considered a cooking product and not a beverage, so it slips under recycling laws, who would have thought?

Either way, the reckon the recycling adventure proved to be quite eventful and if it taught me nothing, it taught me to put out separate piles for paper, glass, metal and lids for the future, so it doesn’t have to be me doing all the sorting all by my lonesome next time in the white hot sun. Me and the Guardian of the Recycling Heaps, that is.