'Twas A Typical Day...
...with a routine that will remain a routine for a very short time, which I suppose makes it more of an aberration. Wake up, inhale oatmeal, and haul Large Items out to the curb in preparation for that most blessed of days, Large Item Trash Pickup Day. Ordinarily this happens every September, but last year the village moved it to Spring, which meant that they didn't have to pay for a Large Item day in 2005 and left us on tenterhooks, wondering if we'd get the chance to get rid of all of the Large Items that we didn't want to haul with us when we moved. And, if you're wondering just what a tenterhook is (I know I am), look here. Such hooks were, of course, used to secure cloth to tenters, which these days look like this. The whole idea was to prevent shrinkage as the cloth dried.
So, while we waited to see whether the village would indeed take away our expired Large Items at no cost to us, we were very uncomfortable, but also unshrunk, which would be a fair trade-off except for the tetanus.
We have one of the more impressive piles of Large Items on the street: two televisions, a dresser, a two-drawered nightstand, two single-drawered nightstands, two beat-to-crap Bucky-built screen doors, a weight bench, a weight rack, a freestanding metal closet, the last few slaughtered remains of a gas dryer that I didn't manage to sneak out with the regular trash and am now attempting to sneak out with the Large Items, three smashed bookshelves, a sewing table, and a strange purple plastic-and-wire gizmoid wobbling toy that I bought three years ago at the same time I bought some exceptionally bad sausage and onion pizza from the shop next to the toy store, which has ever since reminded me of said pizza, and which, furthermore (thereunto) has already been nicked from the Large Item pile by someone who is free to enjoy it without such unpleasant gastronomic associations.
There will be more added to our pile, as we have a large quantity of wood and other home-repair style items that never made it beyond the planning stage, plus two couches on Death Row that may or may not get reprieves. Soon I will pop popcorn and watch them take all of our Large Items away, and I will be glad.
After adding to the pile it was off on a trike ride, the long, stop-and-go sort of ride that happens when your leg muscles would really rather be at home watching television. Ride a few miles, stop and eat a banana while wondering about who lives in that small, run-down farm-style shack across the road that has roofing shingles for siding and looks like it will melt into a bubbling puddle of asphalt in the summer. Ride a few more miles, stop in a barn's driveway, drink some water, watch the clouds. A few more miles, stop beneath the shade of a pine tree in a church parking lot and fuel up on wholesome Mi-Del graham crackers. Then slog it home, with the small reward of legs that feel like they might go another ten miles if you really needed them to, but you don't, so it's time for pasta and Icy Hot.
Tomorrow: repeat, until leg muscles are transformed into steel cables and lungs are suitable for zeppelin storage.
