bookmark_borderhow about a poem?

I took creative writing courses in university. Some people in that class were trying to write novels and a few went on to be real writers.

You had to submit work to get in and I was of the people picked. God knows why, as I could not write a good story story to save my life. I wrote mostly poems and microfiction.

I still have all those typed poems somewhere. I also have all my high school newspapers from the time I was the editor and some sappy-ass stuff I wrote in my twenties.

That stuffs no longer is (very) embarrassing to read. It is now just funny to think about how young I was. (I was also a much better speller and had better grammar then — a fact which I can’t explain.)

I never wanted to be a creative writer, I thought it would be better than an essay course or something with a lot of hard reading. (I did well in school but I budgeted my mental resources.)

So why I am thinking about this? Primarily because I got nothing exciting to talk about today and yet for some reason, I feel I must write about something.

I want to write. But I don’t want to write the kind of stuff I write during the day.

I don’t want to do any hard reading either and I’m not about to research and write an essay.

So, how about a poem for my next post?

bookmark_borderEveryone can see your junk

This weekend I was in Guelph. I love that town, but I have decided I can’t ever live there.

They have very serious rules for garbage. Guelph has a ” Wet-Dry” recycling program. What’s a “Wet-Dry” recycling program? Oh, let me tell you!

Okay, you know how you have a garbage bag for garbage and how you collect your cans, plastics and paper products for recycling?

In Guelph it you have to collect your various wastes in special clear plastic bags and you must be certain that your wets and drys don’t mix.

So what’s wet? (Isn’t all garbage wet to some degree?) Food wastes (including meat) and other compostable materials such as diapers, dryer lint and pet feces are considered wet.

And this can’t be near the dry stuff: paper, cans, glass, plastics, clothes, shoes and styrofoam.

So you have to put all this stuff out on the curb in clear plastic bags! No cheating there. Everyone on your street can see your wets and drys. Wet stuff goes green-tinted bags and dry stuff in blue-tinted bags.

I think there is a third bag for real garbage (what’s left I have no idea but that must be the point) that can’t be recycled. And this is a transparent bag too. No cheating there. You can’t hid it.

How do I know this? I could not figure out why my friends had three garbage pails in their kitchen. Seemed a bit odd but they are new homeowners so maybe they had some special new system. Anyway, curiosity got the better of me and I asked. It was explained.

And then I ran home and looked it up.

This really is a great program. About seventy per cent of Guelph’s household waste is now diverted from landfill. So kudos for that but I could not get used to the clear bags showing off all my junk.

I am garbage shy.