Another sensless victim of a drive-by recycling

It's quite hard to be environmentally responsible while living in Los Angeles. At least the part of LA that we live in anyway. It's hard for the city to find a common vision of how to deal with problems like these because LA is comprised of many different communities fused together across three different counties. Yet I don't believe this is an excuse.

Other than the fact that you pretty much have to use a car to get to anywhere you want to go, there are other issues as well that stem primarily from the attitude of the general public. I believe I posted a picture here of how bad most grocery stores are with their overusage of plastic bags. Starting right....now, Dayna and I are going to do what we should have been doing all along and bringing our own bags because currently we end up playing an awkward game with the bagger. After he puts one orange in a plastic bag and puts it in the cart, I then grab nine other pieces of fruit, before he can grab them and stick each in it's own bag, and put them in the bag that he had designated for one orange. It's a race that we realize when we get back to the car the bagger always wins. I seem to remember a few places in Canada that at least ask you if you'll be needing bags, which is a great thing. Of course I would probably be an idiot and say "Ummm, actually I forgot my own again so I'll be needing about 30 bags today."

Then there's recycling. Although I've heard that many other communities in LA have the blue box recycling program, we sure don't have it for our apartment building in Van Nuys. So we must resort to storing up our recyclables in a big container then driving it to the depot which, as you can see here, reminds me of a Vietnamese POW camp. The worst part is that they used to only be open Monday to Friday 8-4:30 so Dayna and I tried to just leave it on the sidewalk after hours. This was justified in our minds because you actually get money for bringing your stuff in so technically whoever shows up for work the next day gets some money.
But I'm sure it was still illegal, leaving crap on the sidewalk. It went something like this: (and remember what we're trying to do here, and that is mainly to RECYCLE.)

It's late. Really late, like past 9pm. We pull up to the compound. Through the mist we can see the barb wire sillouetted by the moon. A dog barks. In the distance a baby is crying.
Me: "This looks good. I don't see anyone around let's do it."
Dayna: "Ok. I'll pull up and pop the trunk, you deliver the package and we're out of here....I love you."
She pulls up to the curb. I spring into action, stepping out of the car and grabbing the lid of the trunk. It doesn't budge, my heart begins to pound in my chest.
Me: "Dammit! It's not open!"
Dayna: "Yes it is!"
Me: "No, you pulled the gas lid thing! It's right beside that. You always do that!"
Dayna: "Oh.
The truck pops open, I grab the container, throw it on the sidewalk and frantically, but ever so neatly, stack the recycling in front of the main gate. I throw the container back into the trunk, close it, close the gas lid thing on the side, and dive back into the car. Dayna punches it and we speed off into the night.

Now that the depot is open 7 days a week we can do it safely and legally during the day on the weekend. Today, dressed in my Sunday best before church, I walked into the depot with the recycling in hand only to realize that around here, the only people who bring recycling in bring it in stolen shopping carts and do it for the money they get back. Everybody pretty much stopped what they were doing and stared at me with my "shave" and my "pants" when I walked in. Ok, that was mean, but I have a right to feel out of place when I obviously am.

I think the root of the problem is that the modern city and especially this modern metropolis are so completely separated from nature that it takes quite an active imagination to correlate our actions with effects on the environment. Nature, being literally out of sight, is out of mind.

On a less serious and far less important note, with each passing day we realize how you can get anything in LA if you want it. You may be thinking "Surely you don't literally mean anything.", to which I reply "Be quiet because yes, if you want it and have enough money you can get it. " Any sort of gun, sex, animal, kitchen utensil, vehicle, furniture, butler, and entertainment you can think of, you can find it. A friend of ours told us that she actually managed to buy a midget telegram for her friend's birthday because she thought it would freak her out. Apparently when she called the agency they informed her that for an extra fee the midget would stay at the party for anywhere from 1 to 2 hours of "shenanigans". Shenanigans? It's the sort of thing that you know is definitely wrong, but still hard to not laugh at.

Ho hum. Hey Ryan's coming out! That should be fun.