Trash, trash, everywhere

My family generates one 33-gallon trash bag filled with trash every two days. We don't toss in food scraps because we have chickens, but when you think about it, that's a lot of trash coming from a house with only two and "a half" people living in it.

One year ago I saw an add in the classifieds for a trash compactor, in new condition. Boy was it. I scored. It still had the stickers on it. Well, it didn't fit in my small kitchen without taking out a cabinet and I didn't want to give up my storage space. So out in the garage it went. I figured I would be putting the empty food boxes in it, like cake mix boxes and cereal boxes.

Well, it was too far away and too inconvenient, so six months ago we moved it into the laundry room. I was pretty good about using it for bulky items, but found it was easier for me to flatten the boxes and step on the milk container rather than walk to the laundry room to use the compactor. I know, I sound lazy.

Three weeks ago I cleaned out the pantry and moved the trash compactor in there. My husband thought I was nuts. He pointed out that if we wanted to access the crawl space under our house to drain the sprinkler system, I'd have to move it. I insisted it would save him dump trips and be worth it.

How did we ever live without one? The first bag took us seven days to fill up. The second bag took us five days to fill up. The third bag took us six days to fill. Well, last week my aluminum can container was full and I decided to put them in the compactor. What a brilliant idea. I was able to crush all of the cans without the assistance of my can crusher that uses my arm muscle and only crushes a single can at a time, or my shoe for which the wind blows over the can right when I am ready to stomp on it.

What I am trying to say is that every household should have a trash compactor, not only to save space with your trash, but to crush your cans for you.

-- The Ice Cream Social is Friday night. It should be really fun. They will have class baskets with a different theme from each class, lots of games available, of course ice cream, popcorn, chips, hot dogs. You can call the school for more information at 267-3622. What more could you ask for?

-- Lisa Welch is a Johnson Lane resident and can be reached at 267-9350.