Don’t Read This.

I realize that I’m overdue for a post. But, for once, I’m rather at a loss. So I’ll William my way through it, and see what gives.

Here’s my observation of the week: in many smaller American towns, garbage is picked up, curbside, once a week by a strange, automated vehicle with an arm that reaches out, grabs the trash can, dumps the contents of the trashcan into the truck, replaces the trashcan on the curb, and then drives away. (Meekyung, I’m sure, would be eager to add that Whitehall, MT, is one of these elite-trash-disposal towns!) The arm is operated by a single man sitting inside the truck, who then drives to a waste transfer station, where the trash is dumped into a bigger container, then dumped into larger trucks, and eventually driven out to one of those wonderful byproducts of a modern, consumer driven society: a landfill. (as a side note, go hang out at a landfill some time. bring your friends for a jolly good time. Despite a dozen showers, you probably won’t feel clean for a week, after wading through the trash-dirt-birds-mud-trash-up-to-your-knees refuse, but you’ll probably think twice before you throw away that perfectly recycle-able sheet of paper next time) Simple, effective, and sanitary.

Just for fun, let’s follow a empty Coke bottle through its afterlife.

An American Coke bottle has the assurance of quick, impersonal and sanitary disposal. After the excruciatingly cold days in the refrigerator, our Coke bottle actually finds itself quite relieved to be removed and unthinkingly guzzled. He understands that his purpose in life is to sate the thirst of … a thirsty dude. And everyone likes to feel purposeful and fulfilled, which is exactly how Cokie feels, despite being emptied.

But now our thirty dude’s thirst is sated (or rum is mixed, as it were), and Cokie finds himself suddenly empty. “Now what? Is there an afterlife?” he wonders, as he sits, derelict, on the counter. The next morning, in the flury of the infamous morning after, Cokie finds himself hurriedly shoved inside a cramped plastic bag, with all his other friends. The crammed bag becomes even more suffocating when shoved in the trash can, and then unbearably hot when left to sit on the curbside, inside layers and layers of plastic, on a hot summer morning.

Aarfy is whistling. It’s a good day, since it’s a Thursday. On Thursdays Aarfy drives the Mustang Ridge route, which is his shortest route of the week. Right on time, he expertly guides his shiny new garbage truck up to the curb, where a city-issued garbage can, filled with the remains of last night’s party (which Aarfy has no idea took place). It’s hot outside, but Aarfy doesn’t notice from within the air conditioned cab, where he controls the mechanical arm that picks up the trash can, dumps it in the back, and replaces it on the curb.

Aarfy drives from house to house for another hour until his truck can hold no more. Then he drives to the transfer station, and pushes the “dump” lever, and hums along with the radio while the contents of his truck dump into the larger truck parked below. Aarfy completes his route in two more trips, and then heads home, takes off his shoes, and opens up a nice, cold can of Coke.

Cokie, meanwhile, realizes that it’s getting cold again, and concludes that the sun must be going down. It’s been a tumultuous day for him: first being dumped from the trash can into the garbage truck with MORE garbage, and the being dumped from the garbage truck into the semi trailer at the transfer station with even MORE garbage, and then finally being pushed out into the biggest pile of trash of all, before being rudely ran over by a huge, spiky-wheeled tractor, and partially buried. All of these things Cokie has been vaguely aware of, from within his after-party-clean-up-plastic bag. Cokie doesn’t like his new surroundings very much: it’s crowded and filthy; the stench is awful. And, feeling strangely tricked, he muses to himself: “so this is it, eh? This is the afterlife.”

(Actually, if I believed in an afterlife, I would expect it to be something like that a landfill. Or a dark, dusty room, surrounded by black eternity… that’s a heaven–an afterlife–I could believe in. I don’t know where all these notions of paradise come from–no sorrow, no sadness, and apparently a shortage of virgins, that has helped spawn an international crisis…)

Unbeknownst to Cokie, his 2nd cousin, thrice removed is going through a very similar process in India (which has also been colonized by the East India Coca-Cola Company). Excerpts from Spritie’s Diary: (oh god, somebody shoot me):

4:00PM
This refrigerator is nice and cool. Any other country in the world, and being in a refrigerator would be a cold, uncomfortable experience. Thank god I’m in India where everything’s cool (and, consequently, nothing is cold) except what’s hot.

7:30PM – Plastic Personality
I feel rather empty. Probably because I’ve been offhandedly thrown on to the street. Or maybe I feel empty because, well, I was drank before being so callously discarded, and now my liquid personality is gone.

7:30PM – Liquid Personality
Oh the wonders of the small intestine!

…

9:00PM – Liquid Personality
I’m flying! Wee! Look! A wall!

7:00AM, the next day – Plastic Personality
Was awoke this morning rather rudely by a stooping woman with a reed broom, who pushed me along the street with the other trash into a big pile. I felt important and wanted again when I was picked up and put in a small barrel on a push cart, but the feeling quickly faded when more trash was piled on top of me. This barrel is so dirty and dusty…

8:00AM
After being pushed in the barrel, with much bumping, bouncing and effor, up the narrow street between the apartments, I was again unceremoniously dumped on to the street. This time into an even bigger pile of trash.

12:00PM
The sun is blistering hot. I think I might be melting a little.

7:00PM
Narrow escape! A roaring rattletrap of a dump-truck came by some 15 minutes ago, and a half dozen men threw most of the trash in slatted-boards back of the truck. Luckily, I rolled out of the way just in time, and they left with a ground-shaking roar and plume of black smoke.

8:00PM
My escape no longer seems so lucky, as I’m once again being swept by a reed broom down the street… but this time things don’t look so good. In fact, I’m getting closer, and closer to a smoldering fire of other trash, putting out blackish, caustic fumes… closer… aaaaah! I am melting…

If I actually post this, I really should be shot. =)

My point was simply to draw out the contrast: in America, we produce 20 times more trash (because we consume 20 times more stuff…), and after we drop it in the wastebasket, it’s whisked off the dump without ever being so much as lifted by human hands again. One man runs the $85,000 garbage truck with the mechanical arm that dumps the trash. In India, $85,000 would buy at least a dozen of the dump-truck cum garbage trucks that they use, and leave plenty left over for the salary of the 8 men that accompany each truck as the mechanical arm.

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Actually, I did have something to write about when I sat down to it, and it wasn’t Coke bottles and garbage men. I wanted to take a few paragraphs to complain about the Grammy’s.

Well, no. Not complain. Just reflect. Actually, I don’t care about the Grammys at all, any more than the rest of the top-40 industry ilk, but I happened to see the results

The fact that U2 is doing nothing new and still winning Grammys is indicative, in my opinion, of the advancing age of the Grammy selection panel. While innovative artists like Franz Ferdinand and Coldplay (ok, well, X&Y was a flop, I admit…) went home empty handed, U2 received their Best Album for a record that, to a casual listener, sounds substantially similar to … The Joshua Tree. Which was released in … 1989? It’s like Sagar says: “Yeah, U2 is great. It’s just a damn shame they peaked with their first album.” Heh. I’m not sure that I completely agree, but in general he’s probably right.

It’s not that I don’t like or appreciate U2: I most certainly do. And sure, he helped put together Live 8, and sure Bono is an outstanding human being, and has a great voice, and blah blah blah… But How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb didn’t bring anything new to the table. Nor was I particularly impressed by it. Yeah, there’s a few good tracks. But on balance, there’s too much airy opera vocals about love and miracles, some of which strike me as really clumsy…a lot of the tracks seem a little scattered, lacking focus or theme…

But, then again, U2 won best “Rock Album.” So sure, maybe it was the best rock album. But who’s making rock albums these days? The industry has moved on. It’s not the 1990s any more, after all…

I was pleased to see that Kanye West won Best Rap Album, but that pleasure was tempered by his failure to win Best Album. Late Registration has a fresh sound, clever rhymes, and pointed lyrics. U2’s rhymes aren’t half as good. =)

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This has been a powerfully stupid post. Ug. Oh well. I guess I should note, in closing, that anonymous comments have been re-enabled. Ya.

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I warned you!