At my family’s lake house in New Hampshire, there is no pickup at all. There are certain days and hours the dump–excuse me–“Transfer Station”–is open and you take your stuff there. There are different dumpster sized bins for glass, metal, plastic, paper, cardboard, and a big compactor for household trash. There is also an area to put things that other people may want to reuse. A friend of mine got his guitar there.
We live in a very rural location. For us, recycling would be a waste of time and energy.
Perhaps he’s seen the Penn and Teller Recycling episode. I for one won’t be recycling paper any time soon.