Wednesday, March 31, 2021

What to wear while rooting through your neighbor's garbage

First of all, if you're wondering if I wear these outfits all the time, the answer is yes.

If you're further wondering if this is the outfit I was wearing while rooting through the neighbor's discards, the answer is also yes.

These suipersuits are improving my pandemic. My goal is to wear them as much as possible while it's still cold because once it's DC hot these will turn me into my own personal sauna.

(Which is pronounced SOW-na. So there.)

Anyway.

On Monday I bought this charming monstera that was just starting to fenestrate from a very nice guy in a plant group I joined a few months ago when I decided that plants would also improve my pandemic. I also bought homemade moss poles from him.

I'm currently considering a worm farm. Nick thinks this may be a bridge too far, much like putting one's penis though plantation shutters to greet the day is, in his opinion, insane.

So.

So I bought this monstera in a very nice pot, and it had a little plastic water-catcher under it in just the perfect size.

Which I accidentally left on the floor in the backseat of our car. I meant to go back and get it out, but I forgot.

And then that night Nick and I had a fight. And he drove the car yesterday.

Since I wasn't calling him and he wasn't calling me, I couldn't say oh by the way there's this plastic thing on the floor of the car that fits the pot of my new plant perfectly.

So last night when we were all back to fine, I mentioned it. And he said, "Oh. I got the car washed yesterday and I put it in the recycling."

I knew, I just knew, he did this maliciously. I didn't say this, however. Till this morning.

This morning Nick was being all lovey and I said, "I know you threw out that container at the car wash on purpose."

He was all, what?

I went on to explain that he clearly threw out the perfect-sized plastic water catcher thing because he was annoyed with me. 

And he said, "I was cleaning out the car. I also threw out a bunch of your mom's tissues that had wound up on the floor. There was no ill intent."

Betty always carries around no fewer than 47 tissues at any time, just in case. And...what he said made sense.

And he added, "They're just in the next door neighbor's recycling."

Oh!

There's a group house next to use which, when we first moved in, was full of mean girls, but it's gone through many iterations since then, and the inhabitants I've so far met there now are nice.

So I traipsed down and began rifling through the giant blue cans that DC uses for recycling. It wasn't on top. Or near the top. I had just decided that maybe it wasn't worth it to me when I heard a voice behind me say, "Hi, Lisa!"

I turned to see our across-the-alley neighbor smiling at me. He and his wife are great.

But I don't know either of them well enough to not seem weird in the neighbor's garbage.

So started to explain about the planter thingy and how Nick threw it out and it was the perfect size and seemed like a waste and...uh...it was starting to seem less worth it since it wasn't right on top and their recycling was kind of disgusting.

As I did this, I closed the bin and sauntered cheerily away from it, to show that I really wasn't digging in it anymore.

Our neighbor said, "Yeah. Digging in refuse can be kind of gross...That's a nice bright springy outfit!"

I thanked him and told him I was trying to cheer things up. It occurred to me that it was probably the perfect outfit, in fact, for trash rifling, because who would go out of their way to do something sketchy in so obvious a getup?

Once I'd thought of that, I felt a little better. Although still weird.

I wished him a nice day and hustled inside.

When I got in Nick asked if I'd found it and I said no, so he went out to look. He came in with it and said that actually, he realized after looking in the neighbor's that he'd put it in our recycling.

He was scrubbing his hands with very hot water. He said, "Our neighbors don't have a great grip on recycling. They had some broken china in there."

"We should totally tell them."

I mean, I do feel like we should, but how do you even start that conversation?

"So the other day I was picking through your recyclables..."

I think that's my bridge too far.

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