This morning when I was standing in the shower I heard a garbage truck banging around at the mental hospital across the street. I suddenly realized that I had no idea what day's garbage days are. My house is located on a corner lot
on one side street is a long fence and across the street is an empty wooded lot. As a result
there is no one to care if I leave my garbage can sitting out there all week long.
Now I have lived in slightly more decent neighborhoods. Even if I did not have a homeowners association
I would still bring in my garbage cans every night. When I had a rental house in Orlando
I had to. I was at the end of the garbage man's route or something
and by time he got to my garbage cans he was angry or tired or pissed or his medications had worn off (or kicked in) or SOMETHING
because when he got done emptying my cans he would fling them away like it was the Scottish highlands games. I would come home and find my garbage can in the middle of my yard or down the street or in the neighbors yard across the street.
The garbage men in my current location seem to be a lot mellower. Now only do they empty the garbage
they often set the can back nice and neat where they found it. They have probably been doing it for a long time too
because that can came with the house when I moved in. As a result
when I take my garbage out and dump it in a can
I promptly forget about it. I have no idea when the garbage men come and take it away. It's like some magical fairy.
It's bliss.
I had some awful pizza last night. The last time I dropped in on my folks my mother pulled it out of the freezer and gave it to me. Apparently the pizza came from some sort of school fund-raiser. It was a 'pizza' kit and it came with some round-shaped dough
a little packet of sauce and a little packet of frozen sausage chunks. No cheese. I have no idea why they did not include cheese.
So I put the pizza on my old battle-scarred pizza pan. Dribbled the sauce out of the packets
and tossed on the frozen sausage chunks. They made a dull 'thunk' as they hit the pizza
except the stray one that hit the metal pan. That went 'dink'. I then tossed the entire thing in the oven.
Have I had worse pizza? Yes. Would I ever try this again? No. Sorry kids
your fundraiser sucks. You should have stuck with cheese and sausage.
When I was a kid I had to do the whole school fundraiser thing. We sold cheese and sausage. My friend and I would wander all over neighborhoods banging on doors and trying to sell some. I really cannot imagine sending little kids out to do that today. Too many weirdo's out there who's bravery has been fueled by the internet. It was some pretty damn good cheese and sausage
though.
The weekend is here. I am not sure what I have planned. I need to bottle my mead
get some foam to fix my hottub cover and clean it and refill it. See if lowes has any discount concrete so I can get to work with my outdoor shower. I also need to clean my front sun room of all the junk I have sitting in there. I'll keep myself busy.
2026 Update
Twenty years back, and Ed is losing track of garbage day while praying for cheese.
Ah, 2006: a man could hear a garbage truck from the shower and realize he had no idea what day pickup was, because nobody had installed a camera on his bin or sent an alert to his phone. Ed's world was loose municipal magic—cans parked all week, a 'mellow' garbage man restoring them to their spot, and no app blaming a 'truck fire' for the delay. That fund-raiser pizza is the fossil that really gets me: dough, sauce, frozen sausage chunks, no cheese, all from a kit his mother had guarded in the freezer. I'm sure it deserved that 'thunk.' And the old this-is-how-kids-sold-things economy? Banging on doors and selling cheese and sausage door-to-door. Now it's a fundraising link forwarded to relatives and a Venmo request from a parent, with the 'weirdos' Ed feared safely converted into conspiracy comments on local Facebook groups. The mead, the hottub, the discount Lowe's concrete—it all sounds pleasantly 2006, before every outdoor shower became content and every hobby became a brand.
“2006 Ed, when the sausage chunk hit that pizza pan with a dull 'thunk' and the stray went 'dink', did you consider the possibility that the cheese was late, or did you just accept your no-cheese fate and pray the mead was ready?” — Beelzebubba the Third
2006 Ed: Well, Beelzebubba, I gotta say the thought of cheese being late never crossed my mind. That pizza kit came with exactly three things: round dough, one sad packet of sauce, and frozen sausage chunks. No cheese was ever scheduled to arrive. It wasn't a delay, it was a fundamental breakdown of the whole operation. The 'thunk' and the 'dink' just confirmed what I already knew—this thing was doomed before it hit the oven. So I accepted my no-cheese fate, ate it anyway, and yes, I prayed. I prayed the mead was ready, and I prayed the garbage men would keep being my magical fairies. The mead's almost there, though. It's gonna taste like victory over a school fundraiser that let us all down. Take that, lukewarm cardboard pizza.
