Thursday around the Watchdog household is the best day of the week. It doesn’t get any better than Thursdays, because that’s trash pick-up day. It’s the day I anxiously wait for, knowing that I can wheel my trash can down the driveway to the street, then sometime during the day, the contents in my trash can will magically disappear, and then the whole process starts over again for the following week.
It’s one of the few things you can bank on, or at least I thought so. June 2 was Watchdog’s scheduled pick-up day, but because of Memorial Day on Monday, trash that week was moved to Friday June 3. No problem, one day is as good as another. Friday night rolls around and my trash can is still sitting there undisturbed, along with all my neighbors cans, lined-up neatly along the curbside. I figured it must have been a busy Memorial Day week for the trash guys and they’d surely be there on Saturday.
Normally I’d hear the sounds of trucks, rolling through the neighborhood early in the morning, like German Panzer tanks in the movie ‘Saving Private Ryan’. However, Saturday was eerily quiet, except for a few of my neighbors ringing my doorbell, to see if I had ‘offended’ city officials again, this time with Watchdog postings about the trash pick-up fee being increased 617%.
Over the years, occasionally our circle has been forgotten with snow plowing, leaf pick-up, street cleaning, and brush pick-up, and that was before Watchdog existed, but this was a first for trash.
I called the city Saturday morning, just to see if anyone might be around who would know what happened with trash pick-up, and as expected, nobody was there except for the one fellow who is always there. Every time I call the general number, he always answers; never takes a day off. He gave me the number to Waste Management, and to no surprise, nobody was there either. I left a message, just to see if anyone would call back sooner or later, and it was later, much later when they called mid-week.
To his credit, Dick Dublinski, Director of Public Works did return my call on Monday to let me know somebody would be out to empty the cans on Monday, and he apologized, which I told him wasn’t necessary. Mistakes happen, and if this is my biggest problem, then I’m living a good life.
I truly did not want to get the garbage truck driver in trouble, because anybody can blow by a street (circle in my case) by mistake. I’m guessing he’s a Cub fan, and simply wanted to get home sooner to catch the end of the Cub-Arizona game.
The trash business is not easy, however one thing is for sure, their business is always picking-up.
Now if only they could have a special trash day to pick up smart meters and combine it with the sale of the electric company and their interest in IMEA we could really have something.