In movies or TV shows involving an investigation there’s sometimes a scene where they go through the suspect’s garbage to look for evidence of whatever. The one that springs immediately to my mind is The Fugitive where they go to Harrison Ford’s apartment and the garbage can contains things that he used to fabricate a hospital ID. So what could someone learn about you from your garbage?
From my garbage you could learn my profession. I get an amazing amount of professional junk-mail. You could learn that I’m on a couple of prescription drugs, and that I have a cat. You could learn that I eat too much ice cream and not enough fruits and veggies. Beyond that I don’t think my garbage says much about me.
You’d learn that I’m a coffee drinker, a smoker, eat fresh fruits and veggies, go through the drive-thru more often than I should, a few things about my medical condition and what a couple of my hobbies are from the kitchen and studio trash.
The mail gets shredded, but if you put the pieces together, you’d find out where I work, who I bank with, my insurance carriers, my political affiliation and where my retirement account is.
From my bathroom and bedroom trash, you’d find out when Aunt Flo was visiting, when I was sexually active, figure out my race, general coloration and what fragrances I like to wear.
Shew…maybe I should just put my pic on the front of my garbage can.
My garbage might mislead you. I eat lots of fruit and veggies, but I compost so you won’t find any peels. I also burn up meat scraps and bones. So you might think that I eat nothing but bread.
That we have at least one rodent pet (bedding in the garbage), that we cook a lot (not a lot of prepared food packaging in the garbage and a fair amount of stems and debris from fresh herbs) and that I might have bowel issues (a lot of yogurt containers).
My garbage/recycling says that we either bing eat/drink, or that we frequently have lots of people over (some weeks there is very little garbage, some weeks there is a full bin, pop cans from 6 different kinds of soda, and several wine bottles).
My bathroom garbage would say that I either had or have acne, wear makeup, and have a rag time. My regular garbage would say I buy most things online and eat a lot of vegetables and hard cheeses.
My garbage would say that I have cats. It would look like I don’t eat fresh fruit and vegies because I compost all those trimmings.
I really don’t have much garbage. In fact, I have a hard time filling a large can that gets picked up every other week and am thinking about switching to just once a month garbage pickup.
I re-use what I can, recycle what I can, and burn junk mail and empty dog and cat food bags. What doesn’t fit in my wood stove gets burned in the burn barrel, or in the summer when the wood stove isn’t used. The dogs get some leftovers and the chickens and ducks get some things, too.
I try to produce and preserve as much of my own fruit and vegetables as possible and canning jars are reusable.
Garbage? Mostly that I drink a lot of coffee. And that I frequently like salmon or eggs or bread, and that I never use all my cilantro. I generate about two kitchen garbage bags of garbage a month.
Recycling is mostly junk mail, with the occasional Longboard bottle and condiment bottles/jars.
