Say what you will about city government...
but today I am very impressed. I made my annual trek to the Christmas tree recycling event at North Park Village. Not that I have a tree to recycle (we bought a new artificial one, choosing underaged Chinese labor over pesticides), but I took in a bag of cans and bottles that we've been saving up. For every tree, people could take home a bag of mulch, plus everyone got a roll of blue bags (Chicago's nearly-defunct recycling method, which we still adhere to out of habit), a weatherizing kit, and a baby spruce tree. I thought about driving back through the circuit and trading my baby spruce for a bag of mulch, but I didn't think they'd see the humor in that. Anyway, I just opened the winterizing kit, and let me tell you! Besides the nice canvas bag, they gave me enough plastic to seal 6 windows, 2 insulating door sweeps, 4 rolls of weatherstripping, a pack of outlet insulators, a roll of insulating tape, and 4 60W CFL bulbs ("Perfect for homes and restaurants!"). Everything I need to seal up my house except the nice burly man to come and install all of it for me. (I'm not trying to suggest that I, a modern, capable woman, couldn't do it myself... I just like nice burly men.)

A profitable day! Also, I am happy to report that only one of my neighbors was clueless enough to leave a plastic-wrapped Christmas tree in the alley this year. I consider that progress. They missed out on the free stuff; too bad for them.
- posted by Diane @ 2:04 PM