Be Excellent To Each Other

I bet it's pronounced like hanger, because the north.

We are on a new bin system, general waste every 3 weeks, recycling every 2, food every week.
I have no idea what bin goes out when anymore.

In positive news, the recycling is now just dumped into the truck, rather than sorted on the doorstep. So no more of them chucking random shit in the bush that they decide can't be recycled that week.

Every three weeks?! That's harsh.

It's very annoying, however the recycling basically takes everything other than plastic film now, so it should be ok.

..

The hero we need

We could have done with one of those this week as we had some "exciting" bin controversy.
While I was fairly sure it was normal bins this week, three people had already put their recycling bins out, and as I'm not popular enough to be different, I bowed to peer pressure and put the recycling bin out.
Fortunately our neighbour came round to clarify it was definitely normal bins and he'd checked with his dad who lived round the corner. He then proceeded to send me an image from his CCTV last week showing his recycling bin.

Who knew life would get this exciting.

Our day has changed from wednesday to thursday, you can imagine the havoc this has caused.

The council Twitter account has been wall to wall photos of the mayor grieving at various picture opportunities next to books of condolence to say we’d have a bin change this week, so our garden waste bins were not picked up Tuesday as the entire road expected, so most stayed out there until they were emptied yesterday morning. The few that moved their bins back in on Tuesday/Wednesday missed having them emptied, so I bet they’re feeling foolish and/or annoyed.

Superb bin content in the Guardian today:

"Who remembers proper binmen?" The nostalgia memes that help explain Britain today

Using bin memes as an example, Dan Hancox discusses the rise of nostalgia pages on sinister Facebook and elsewhere, and what it means for British politics. Well worth a read.

Giphy "bins!":
https://media2.giphy.com/media/hqliRfysiaPRqTMYhS/giphy-loop.mp4

Top content.

Nostalgia porn at it's best

I read that yesterday and it touched upon some of my absolute pet hates. The ‘didn’t we have it tough! But we still survived!’ memes. I think the thing that always pisses me off about it is the line about ‘we just rode our bikes along the street, no helmets, and played football along the road without our parents worrying about us’ because the people that post that are the boomer generation that filled those same streets with so many cars that kids then couldn’t just sit in the street and play. Dickheads.

I'm reading that article now, I was born in 1980 and I remember bin men but I don't recall them being all that friendly... I seem to remember they'd delight in driving past if dad hadn't put the bin bags out for collection quite in time - no waiting if they saw him coming out the gate laden with bags, too late mate.



This was true in our house when we were young, with the glass bottles and the crinkly orange plastic wrap.

I do like a bit of Good Nostalgia (as opposed to Bad Nostalgia, obviously), but that article made me feel a bit annoyed actually.

I remember before we got wheelie bins everyone would put the bags out and the streets would be absolutely covered in rubbish after the seagulls had torn them apart. This was when seagulls were proper men though, not like the ones you get now.

This exact kind of dozy, sentimental nostalgia tinged with bitter resentment for any kind of progress is hardly anything new is it? the only thing new is the internet giving them all somewhere to coalesce.

Yes, I think most of it is just the same kind of performative comment you would give during a pub conversation then forget about it. Very much like how at school and university, everyone would claim to be massively behind and doing no work.

Performative comment is an interesting term/concept. I see that sort of behaviour at the workplace but haven't really had a label for it until now.

I didn't do much work at uni, to be honest. I went to most lectures and took notes but rarely studied outside of that. And ivd leave assignments right til the last moment.

Bin day and my bin is frozen shut.
Will try to open it again later once it's warmed up slightly. Here's hoping for a late collection.

Should just be able to pour water out of the kettle (not even boiled) on to the parts where the lid joins the base, I had to do that the other day.

Good one, thanks!

As it's not made of glass, no risk of shattering it!

Very little risk of shattering glass unless you're using freshly boiled water, or water that was boiled not too long ago.

I don't need to do it any more now that the Leaf can warm itself up remotely, but I used to just take the water straight from the kettle (before it had been boiled first thing in the morning) and pour that over the windscreen.

Yeah, it doesn't even need to be hot, just slightly warm water from the tap will do it, get the engine running to get some heat started then pour some water to unstick them then switch the wipers on and keep pouring until it's clear and dry, also hit the washer jets with some to get them going too. Always found this easier than pissing around with scrapers/anti freeze.

I watched a YouTube video where some blokes were pouring boiling hot water on screens and even that didn't shatter or crack them. Definitely not having to bother with any of this is one of the best things about the Leaf though. Such a good little runabout that thing.

Yeah, it's especially handy that I can just shout out "Alexa, tell my Leaf to warm up!" so I don't even have to faff about with apps and shit any more.

That's a big pile of rubbish!

Got the Christmas tree out through the garden waste bin..super skills.

Do your binmen not take whole Christmas trees then?

Part of me thinks they don't. I cut it up into small bits.

We went away and had some youngsters house-sit and look after the animals.

Everything is for the most part just fine BUT they forgot to put out the red general waste bin on Friday

Your bin is red? Up towards Wednesbury and Wolverhampton they have bright purple bins, and part of me thinks 'purple is a nice colour' though to be honest I'm not actually keen on purple, but it's better than grey, but the other half of me wonders why they want to draw attention to their bins, as when you're going by it's often the most noticeable thing outside the houses, so you just see bin, bin, bin, bin, so on balance I think the grey/brown/green bins that are in most places are for the best.

This reminds me of a bin story. A few years ago, Dudley council advertised the fact that the whole borough would be getting grey bins for their rubbish to replace the bin bags they previously had. Loads of money went into the marketing of the grey bins and everyone was really excited.

When the bins actually turned up from the manufacturers, they were black. Not wanting to look stupid, the graphic designers at Dudley council were told to photoshop the colour of the bins in all the photo's sent to the press, to make them appear grey.

To this day the bins are still referred to as 'grey bins' in any communication from the council despite being very black.

How daft!

Now that you've said it, I'm not sure if our grey bins are actually grey, or black. I'm pretty sure they are grey, but it is foggy out and I can't see any about from the window as they are generally tucked down the sides of houses and out of sight here.

Ours started off black but they're pretty grey now, maybe the council were just playing the long game.

Our brown bin for garden waste will cost £50 this year, and we put it out no more than 2 or 3 times.
I’m telling them not to renew, but I bet if I hide it when they come to collect they won’t follow up on it properly.

So far so good on this plan. Brown bin still in play.

I've also jet washed the recycling bin for the first time in a couple of years. Much biohazard!!!