I hardly know where to begin. I knew it was going to be bad. I really did. With as much dog shit alone (all tied up in neat little bags) that I had dumped into the trash cans, along with the desert heat… I knew it was going to be bad. And really, after contemplating the dog poo bag filled can, the rest of the trash was hardly pinging my radar. I really did not want to do it but it had to be done and I try to be brave in my approach to living life so... there I was. It was Sunday morning and I, alone, was going to tackle getting RID of the garbage.
But, as bad as I was anticipating it was going to be, it was so very much worse. There was no possible way I could have psychologically planned for the chore. I was too ignorant. Oh, I knew enough to wear gloves and put a face mask on to protect myself a little from germs and the smell. I knew to get an old sheet to protect the back area of my Precious Automobile, (which incidentally is a sports type SUV….NOT a hauling garbage type SUV). Did I mention I was in living alone in the California mountains? An off the grid, beautiful, mystical, gravel roads type of place that was located in the center of the mountains.
I had a system all planned out to tackle the job.
Step 1. Take all the garbage bags out of the cans in the wooden bin trash area and tie them up. Put new bags in all cans.
Step 2. Organize bags into a ready state for transport to dumping area (about 2.5 miles away)
Step 3. Come inside, wash my hands and arms, drink some water, smoke a joint and get car keys, fresh gloves, old sheet and water bottle to pack in Precious Automobile prior to loading trash
Step 4. Put all that stuff in Precious Automobile and install old sheet in the back. (I found I prepared for this step extremely well as I had a queen size fitted sheet. This allowed me to hook the corners over the folded down back seats as well as under my tuff rubber thingy in the back. The sheet totally stayed in place and considering the task at hand, I really wanted that.)
Step 5. Load all the garbage bags into the back of Precious Automobile leaving the bags of dog excrement until the very last.
Step 6. Jump in and, as quickly and safely as possible with all the windows down as far as possible to spare me the smell yet avoid totally dusting the interior of Precious Automobile, drive the 2.5 miles to the Dump.
Step 7. Dump the trash.
Step 8. Come home and leave Precious Automobile open to air out and put old sheet into washing machine to sterilize for next the time it must serve
Step 9. Take scalding shower to try to wash all the horrible nastiness off myself
Step10. Put all clothes into washing machine and close up Precious Automobile so it doesn’t get filled with dust.
And the system actually worked pretty well. I felt good about that.
What was just really totally awful for me was the unforeseen situations that came up along the way. They totally freaked and grossed me out and just left me with such an overall YUCK feeling that I am now writing this account in the hopes of dispelling the nasty feeling or at least documenting my plight.
I started with what I thought would be the easy stuff, leaving the dog dung bags for the end. I figured I would deal with them at the end, put them in Precious Automobile last and out first. ( A little sub step to the main ones above.)
The first garbage can went great. I pulled out the lining bag, tied it up and staged it for packing in Precious Automobile. The second can went not so great. There was no big black bag lining the can and I had to pull little individual bags and miscellaneous items out of it to hopefully pack into one of the big black bags with extra room. As I neared the bottom, I realized I was not alone.
Either a giant mouse or, more likely, a rat, was in the bottom of the can and obviously had been for some time. There was no way out and it couldn’t climb the sides. I have no idea how it got in there but it had been living in its garbage can cage surviving off the garbage we had thrown in there. It freaked me out so much that for a few minutes I had to ignore it and work on a few other cans. Then it came to the point where I only had the mouse/rat can and the dog feces can left to deal with.
I had no choice but to figure out how to free the trapped mouse/rat. So I gingerly picked the can up and lifted it out of the wooden bin that keeps the cans safe from predators and wind. I very carefully carried the can to a “better” area and then threw the can on its side (yep, I may have squealed a little) and ran away far enough to not get “caught” by the mouse/rat and yet stay close enough to see if it exited the can. Which by the mercy of the Universe, it did. (But I am pretty sure it ran right into the garage…WTF…?). So then I only had to pick up the gross stuff which was at the bottom of that trash can and had also came out. Of course there was a dead baby mouse/rat carcass in there. Of course. And as I mentioned before, how could I plan for that?
Then I got to that big bad boy…the dog poop bag. I went to lift it out and nothing happened. The MF bag was so freakin heavy I could not get it out of the can much less the wooden bin the cans sit in. So I thought that maybe if I turned the can over and dumped the bag out, after securely tying it up, I would be able to lift it. So freaking gross. I dumped that giant bag of dog waste out but I still could not lift it out of the wooden bin. I had to climb into the bin and squat down and really grab the big bag of dog defecation and heave it out of the wooden bin onto the ground. Which after much effort and being deeply grossed out, I did.
But then I just had a huge heavy bag of dog deuces that I still could not lift or move. Much less get in and out of Precious Automobile and lift into a big dumpster at the dumping area. So I had no choice but to get another big black trash bag, untie the existing big bag of dog manure and try to dump about half of it into the new bag. Hopefully ending up with two smaller manageable bags filled with “gross me out to the bone” bags of dog crap. But of course I had tied the dog discharge bag very tight to wrestle getting it out of the can and wooden bin and it didn’t want to untie. It was about 100 degrees outside and my hands were soaked with sweat inside my rubber gloves. It was a nightmare. But I managed to end up with two bags filled with smaller bags of dog feculence that I could actually lift and move.
The rest of the story is anticlimactic. I loaded Precious Automobile with the nasty bags of trash, drove down the hill to the dump and finally, got RID of the garbage. I am not sure what happened to the mouse/rat. I have every reason to believe it is living safely somewhere either in my garage or storage shed. Also, to spare Precious Automobile a garbage hauling existence, I have invested in a small ancient truck that is suitable to hauling trash and use it weekly to do just that which also ensures there is no build up of garbage. I guess the only moral I really have is: don’t put all your shit in one bag. It gets really heavy.