Warning from the DPW

Like most Americans, upon getting home from work I check my mailbox to see what the mailman has delivered. Last week Friday I was surprised to find a slightly crumpled, grease stained note in my mailbox from the garbage man. It was a standard issue form with various possible options that could be checked off for the resident or residents of the home. I glanced down at the unfamiliar form to see what the problem was. There was a hand-written note indicating that I needed to put my garbage bag in an actual garbage can because apparently some nocturnal critters had decided to grab a late nite snack at my expense.

After thinking about this garbage situation, I deducted that my garbage bag had only been sitting at my curb for a total of 15 minutes in the morning - every Friday morning I put my garbage outside on my way to work @ 7:15 a.m. (of course I'm always running late so the garbage was probably only sitting there for a total of 10-12 minutes). In my mind I'm thinking that there is absolutely NO way that an animal had ripped open my garbage bag in that short amount of time. No way, no how. I was perplexed................

Later that evening I was still thinking about the "not-so-friendly" note from my local DPW (imagine me still ruminating over something that happened earlier in my day?!!! Surprise, surprise!). All of a sudden a monumental light bulb went off in my head......it was not a 4-legged critter that had pawed his way into my garbage bag but rather a 4-wheeled blue Subaru Forrester that had done the damage. In my haste to get to work, I ran over the garbage bag (I did recall hearing an odd sound as I peeled out of my driveway but didn't think twice about it. I blamed the sound on the 4 inch thick block of ice that was at the end of my driveway). All I can say is thank goodness it wasn't that time of the month because there was debris EVERYWHERE! I'm sure the garbage man appreciated that fact as well because if that were the case, it would NOT have been pretty. Gross! There are still remnants from last week's garbage along the curb in front of my house. Needless to say, I'm very grateful that the ice has melted at the end of my driveway because now I can pull straight out my driveway and avoid hitting my poor garbage bag (oops, I mean CAN...I don't want to irritate the garbage men. Who knows what the wrath of the DPW could mean to a local resident).