My wonderful trip to the Orange County Landfill

While Judy was on her solo bike trip across eastern Colorado and Kansas she lent me her truck. I had an ecstatic visit to the dump with Zed, who can't understand why I enjoyed it so much. I'm not going to try and justify my glee, nor am I going to parse my ability to compartmentalize and thus temporarily disregard the bumpersticker that warns dolefully, "Don't throw anything away, there IS no away" - I'll just say it was beyond enjoyable to get a bunch of rusty/useless things off my property - including a rug the kids and I bought for $10 about seven years ago from a college kid (imagine how bad a rug has to be if a college kid is unloading it) and installed in the studio to protect the floor from Hannah's riotous dance parties (which were so spectacular they featured a disco ball).

It's like running a gauntlet to achieve successful unloading at the dump. Not just anybody can dump. It's almost as hard as getting a passport or a replacement social security card.

• First you have to pass the test to be considered worthy to get a dump ticket - reputable citizens of our county can dump household items for free, but only under very strict and narrow provisions;
  
  
• Then you have to pass under the eagle eye of the guy who sits next to the scale. Woe to you if you haven't tarped your load sufficiently - the guys ahead of us in line had to pull over, unload all their trash, dig out a tarp from someplace, and start all over. Also, you are also subject to "random spot inspections" to see if you are trying to dump disallowed items. Finally
  
  
• After wending your way over twisting dirt roads to the one tiny slope where dumping is permitted, you have to dump while the on-site sentry/enforcer watches every single thing you eject. He would, I'm sure, have insisted we put something BACK in the truck if it weren't deemed worthy.

Then we got back in line at the weigh station and paid for a load of mulch. As you saw above, there is lots of mulch, no danger of running out. I was delirious with distress to see that our truck was too small to hold the entire scoop - some spilled on the ground.

I thought about asking the guy to save it there and I'd come back for the rest, but I knew he'd think I was a crackpot.


We drug it home and I unloaded the first load and it was all so much fun I went back and got another scoop (minus the same tragic overflow) and then Zed unloaded that one.

And then I washed the truck, out in the yard, and then I did this painting of it (my second still-life) and then we took it back to Judy's house and went out to dinner. What a satisfactory situation.


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