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Jenks's Journal

jenks
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08/08/2010 11:01 #52393

I want this
Ugh, I wish I did not always want everything gadgety and expensive that I see.

So this town always used to just have private trash collection. You paid monthly or yearly, not a lot I don't think, and the garbage truck came to your house.
Then some town council people or whatever decided that wasn't fair to low-income people.
So now the town picks up trash, for free, but the catch is they will only pick up what you put in these special yellow garbage bags. And the bags cost $3 each.
But they gave every house, for free, three big plastic wheelie garbage cans. A gray one for trash, a blue one for recyclable cans/bottles, and a green one for paper recycling. And they made recycling mandatory.
Buying the bags is a pain, but at the end of the day it's probably cheaper than a monthly fee.
And the good news is, it makes people really try to reduce their trash. People are recycling more, composting more, etc.
So, it's a small bit of cost/effort, but with a good payoff.

BUT

My building has found some sort of loophole. They are NOT using the town trash pickup. Since they count as a commercial account, not residential (since it's more than 4 units), they can still pay for private trash pickup. which is nice- it means I don't have to buy the yellow bags.
But there's no recycling.
I even called the company about it, and they were like 'yup, your building is not signed up for our recycling service. you should talk to the condo association about that.'
So I'm sure they're just being cheap and didn't want to pay for recycling and got the bare minimum trash service. (But then why not just use the free town system?)
But since we're renting, we're not on the condo board, and they don't meet often... I don't know what to do.
We have 5 giant green trash cans out front. Which i thought meant paper, but for this company it means trash, which is confusing.

Anyway, so for now we are just stockpiling our recyclables and storing them. Even tried taking them to the dump ourselves the other day, but they wouldn't let us. So the options now are 1- just throw them in the trash. 2- store them up and take them to my parents' and put them out with their recyclables, 3- ask our neighbors if we can put them in their bins til we get it sorted out.

But so in the meantime I wanted to find a nice way to divide them up and keep things neat and not destroy and stink up the kitchen.

And I found this.

image

I want it.

It has separate compartments for paper and cans, and it has a built in compacter to smash cans and plastic bottles.
But it's $300.

seriously, only I could find a way to make a garbage can an expensive gadget that I suddenly really want.

tinypliny - 08/08/10 22:56
Or you could just set an extra alarm on your smartphone to the recycle sound! :-)
jessbob - 08/08/10 12:36
First, that gadget is pretty freakin cool.

Second, you may have already looked into this, but the town may have some type of ordinance requiring recycling for commercial buildings even though they don't have to participate in the town's program. I had a similar problem at my apt building and I called the city and they told me that the building had to provide recycling or face fines. After a couple of letters from the city, we now have recycling. It is worth a try.
libertad - 08/08/10 11:39
I'm having a recycling crisis right now. I am also stockpiling because I need a new place to put my recycles out. My building does not recycle and the one time I put my own can out someone took it because my friend promised me he would retrieve it when they did the pick up but he went out for coffee instead of waiting. I really need to figure something out soon because it is starting to get to be a bit much. I have to carry my recycles all over looking for other peoples boxes I can stuff them in.

I'm sort of thinking that the gadget you want probably is not as environmentally friendly as it appears. I kind of doubt that it would last much longer than a year. It also looks like it would be hard to clean?

I really like this brand but they are expensive trash/recyling bins.
:::link:::

Good luck!

08/04/2010 11:02 #52362

misc
A few misc thoughts...

Sunday was our 1 year anniversary. (awww). Though i'm in the middle of studying, and my sister was in town, so I think we're going to celebrate after my exam- I'm thinking a couple days in Block Island. We can even do it during the week to avoid weekend rates/crowds.

But after Steve Martin on friday, we saw Louis CK on sunday- who is very funny, but perhaps a little too heavy on the masturbation jokes.

Chris gave me a funny little tote bag that says 'Rhode Island. 3% larger at low tide'
heh
And a little hipster tshirt with a picture of a bridge in providence. Now I feel very local and trendy. ;)

It's so nice to be back home. I love this little state. :)

But, the cell reception is crap-ola... the AT&T guy told me it's because there's some town ordinance (or something) that won't let them put up cell towers, because they might block peoples' view. Grr.

But so having 0-1 bars in my HOUSE sucks. Until yesterday, when I discovered AT&T's "3G Microcell". It's $150 but then there's a $100 rebate... so basically a one time purchase of $50, and you get this box that you plug into your router... and it's like a mini cell tower in your house. Now I have 5 bars in my house. No service contract, no monthly fee, no nothing. LOVE IT!

Also, thinking of having a housewarming party/bbq over labor day weekend, but need to get an idea of if people will actually be available and/or willing to come.

Finally, an awesome little video (it's quick, so watch it!) and the requisite pix of my niece.



image
image

And now, back to studying! Have a good week, peeps!

paul - 08/08/10 12:02
How safe are those microcells?
lilho - 08/05/10 00:29
i love that baby. she's so cute. nieces are the best and cutest. yay for being in love, that's cute too!
metalpeter - 08/04/10 19:57
People in other room so didn't watch the Video.
Congrats!
Glad you liked Louise CK. Heard he is funny but never seen him live
jenks - 08/04/10 13:08
It boosts a signal, or adds 3G signal where there isn't any. But yes, you have to already be an AT&T customer to buy one, and it will only let AT&T 3G phones to use its signal. Though I believe Verizon and others have similar devices.
You have to register phones online in order for them to be able to use the signal- it's not like anyone walking near your house will suddenly get a signal boost. But still for me, it's perfect. My house was a dead zone, and now it's not! And it works out that Chris and my whole fam are all on ATT.
tinypliny - 08/04/10 12:32
LOL @ staying positive but unhinged.

So this microcell thing - does it just boost your signal or gives you extra 3G access? Can you get access to AT&T 3G networks when you don't have an At&t contract to begin with?

07/31/2010 09:28 #52338

King Tut
Well the voice memo in my phone is all screwed up, apparently, so I had to extract it as a .mov file...

There's no video, but hopefully the audio works...

enjoy!

::DOWNLOAD SOUND::


metalpeter - 08/01/10 09:10
thats great
heidi - 07/31/10 12:32
awesome! :-)

07/31/2010 08:44 #52337

recreated journal :(
Ok paul I just typed this long thing out, then uploaded a pic... then I couldn't type anywhere or click any buttons... I took some screenshots in case I lost everything. and then clicked reload, hoping there would be a draft somewhere, but.... there isn't.
What happened to the draft feature??
Anyway, I don't want to retype it all, so I'm going to try to upload the screenshots.

image
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jenks - 08/01/10 12:47
ugh, so many typos up there and I can't fix them. sorry!
heidi - 07/31/10 12:30
Here's a youtube of the Atheists Don't Have No Songs tune :::link::: Thanks for sharing it!
paul - 07/31/10 10:33
Well, the draft feature runs on flash to store the data and if the multi file upload (which runs on flash) dies, my thought is that your flash plugin crashed in your browser, this no draft.

07/28/2010 15:11 #52322

For Keith
This is pretty good. Esp around 0:58, where he does a bit about fixies.
lilho - 08/05/10 00:32
haaaaa! loves it. he's funny and also kinda creepy. i
tinypliny - 07/30/10 15:01
HAHAHA, I loved it. :) I checked out the other gems on his youtube as well - you should listen to the getting dirty song/video hahahaha
paul - 07/28/10 23:44
Its really interesting that he same artist made a serious documentary about organic farms in europe :::link:::
paul - 07/28/10 23:37
That is totally freakin hillarious.
terry - 07/28/10 19:51
lol that's pretty fucking great. I am still struggling to find the benefit of the fixies, I can see it's harder, thus might make you build strength easier, but as far as enjoyment, I just don't know if it's worth it. Of course my overdone mountain bike is kinda overkill mostly too (tho Blo's streets can almost be classified in the mountain trail category), but I love bouncing! We shall see as (e:keithT) and I continue riding, which of the bikes takes the day. Or I suppose we could just both be happy with our own choices, nahhhh...