I like taking pictures of normal things. Stupid things. The stuff you see everyday but give little attention, as it rightly should be. I find insignificance interesting: the things people use on a daily basis, the language they use to relate to each other, the customs they’ve developed to make things easier, it all hints at what makes people and cities function as they do. Mostly you notice the small things when you travel, like the coin-operated meters that dispense heat in some London flats, the communal cooking clubs in the Basque country, or how friends were surprised (but appreciative) when I whistled for a faraway cab in Glasgow. I’m not usually interested in the museums or the other fancy buildings most cities use to promote themselves, I want to know about that green sauce you poured on my mash!
So even in my own hometown, its useful to pay attention to the little things. But trash cans? I haven’t lost all my canicas (yet) and I know it’s kinda stupid, but I like how they look so orderly before the pickup (like the pic above) and the bin disaster left by a hurried worker is even better! If you consider it a weekly parade of plastic helpers doing our dirty work, even if nobody comes out to watch, maybe you’ll have a better appreciation of the task they fulfill. Or maybe not. Oh well. Pa’ los demas, siganme los basureros!
Another set of orderly cans, even after the pickup. Two facing forward, three slightly askew.
The black cans are for the trash, blue is for recyclables, green is for grass and compost-ables. Here’s a fallen comrade of the recycling wars.
All empty now. There is a constant battle between can and bottle collectors to get to the valuables first, I’ve even started to save mine for my preferred collector!
“Oye tu! Pa’que chingados estas tomando fotos de basureros? Ponte hacer algo.” I’m sure that’s what this truck driver was thinking.
A careful balancing act.
Looks like not all the trash fit into these cans!
Six cans, all nice and orderly. A careful trash truck driver shows off some skills.
This can got missed, it’s still full of trash. Someone is going to be pissed!
Sharp! Gold and orange painted wheels. Put on some spinning hub caps and I’ll really be impressed.
Trash can massacre on Workman Street!
Plastic bodies strewn everywhere! This is a fine example of hit and run trash collecting. Some TLC with a water hose and they’ll be back in business. See you next week, mighty stalwarts of refuse!
Bonus! Bonus!
Eventually, some succumb. This trash can was spotted outside the Arroyo Seco Library in Highland Park. If even after multiple layers of duct tape your cannister still leans over precariously, physically begging to be laid to rest, then it might be time for it to be replaced. What better place for a trash can than another trash can? Chuck it in the bin!
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I always think it’s fun when I have to call in for a replacement–and the city leaves off a brand spanking new one, almost glossy, in fact, and takes the broke one off to trash can heaven. I kind of wonder what they do with them.
My guess is that they go off to skid row for L.A.’s very successul “housing for the po” campaign. Rumor has it that a lot of people fight over the old recycling trach cans, as they create a colorful extension to the cardboard houses. Everyone’s gotta have some feng shui in their lives.
matt lucas
Trash day, the smelliest day on a morning commute (and I mean guácalas, disgusting especially on these hot days).
I also keep my beer/wine bottles on the side for the collectors going up & down our street.
basura.. a-a- basura.. i hate trash day on my street.. parking already sucks but the night before, trash cans take up mad space then in the morning you have to move at least 3-5 cans out of the way to get your car out. I hate touching them!
I hate trash day because it means all my neighbors put their trash cans in the bike lane so they can park their stupid cars. Sometimes I lose it, and punt the cans into the cars as I ride by. I haven’t done it in a while, but it is hard to be nice when your life is endagered by some jerk taking up the public right of way with their garbage.
About the “recylcing” bins – I heard that the stuff doesn’t actually get recycled! it just costs less to dispose of because it is “clean”, and doesn’t contain all the other crap that is in normal trash. The dunps charge less for the stuff in the green and blue bins. It doesn’t actually get recycled. Urban myth? I don’t know. But I put my cans and bottles on top for the bums who live in the hills. They make a small liviing off of collecting those and turning them in at the recycling center on Pasadena Ave. and Figueroa.
Wow se parese a mi barrio! en Guerrero!