Burn Barrel

As the bags of rubbish piled up, we kept wondering when the garbage day was. We’ve always lived in an urban area where there was a least one pick up day a week, and even a recycling day. When we asked our neighbor, he was polite and didn’t laugh. He told us if we wanted to have our garbage taken away then we would have to sign up for a collection service. His advice was to use a local recycling center for everything recyclable, start a compost for food scraps, burn paper products, and what is left you can dispose at a local dumpster (which shouldn’t be much).

In order to do this, though, you have to start separating your trash. This requires a new mindset and you have to think twice as you toss something in the bin. Plus you need bins, which we left at the old house. So for now, old laundry baskets and moving boxes will have to do.

Our neighbor also gave us our first burn barrel. And he even brought it over the other evening on his “mule”. So yesterday we had our first go at burning trash. It gets very hot and smoky.  We decided that it needs to be moved farther away from the house next time. We also need some sort of grill for the top to keep ash from flying out. Gloves, a poker, and a mask would also be helpful.

While we’re out today, we’re going to try to find the recycling center which is about 10 miles away.