Recycling a wheelie tough task

THE ART OF... PUTTING OUT BINS: Not since Franklin D Roosevelt’s “New Deal” has a work creation scheme kept so many people busy.

Where there used to be one bin, now there are three and a bag for paper. Where once there was rubbish, now there is recycling.

If it wasn’t so simple it would be really complicated and it is.

Food in there, plastic in there. No, wait a minute.

It’s cardboard in there, plastic in here.

Even for the most spirited of recyclers, complications abound.

If you leave the plastic window on an envelope, will it contaminate the entire truckload of paper?

Is it true that you can be jailed if you don’t take the plastic top off empty milk cartons? My sources tell me it is.

It’s a well-known fact that peeling the labels off beer bottles is a sign of sexual frustration and the recycling revolution has at least given people in that position more choice.

Millions are now enthusiastically stripping bottles and tins, sometimes after a glass of white wine and oysters.

Once you’ve got the right rubbish in the right bins the next challenge is to put the right bins out on the right day.

They say community spirit is dead but our streets are united over one thing at least, a complete lack of confidence over which bin day it is.

Every week it’s a leap of faith. “Is it brown bins this week?

It is brown bins isn’t it? Yes, I knew that. It was general waste last week wasn’t it. Was it?”

Thankfully, there’s one person on every street who’s kept the chart that the council sent out and in a gesture of goodwill to their neighbours, they put the correct bins out at about tea time the night before.

It’s a brave or stupid person indeed who’ll put a bin out of a different colour to everyone else on the street.

To find out how much esteem you’re held in by those who around you, you could always purposely put out the wrong bins early and see how many people follow you.

Bank holidays add yet more confusion if your bins are usually collected on a Monday.

Do you risk being fined for putting them out on the wrong day? Best to see what that neighbour who knows is doing.

But imagine what kind of nightmare would face Oldhamers if bin collections were thrown into chaos by Christmas and a week of snow either side?

I’ll be putting mine out every day. I’ve got it wrong for the last five weeks so they’re getting pretty full.

Next week…The Art of being Manly.