The Return of the Community Skip

Yesterday, was the day that the Community Skip was due to appear in our locality.  As there is no Refuse Site for public use in our borough, the council very kindly place community skips in various locations on certain dates, so that people can get rid of any rubbish that they have around their houses and gardens.

We knew it was coming as my partner had checked out the schedule, so we were up early and out putting stuff in it.  We had a couple of bed bases we no longer needed, the broken trampoline and some garden waste left over from our efforts the previous weekend.  All of it went into the skip, along with lots of other things put in there by other people and by 11.30 am the skip was full to overflowing.  I took a picture around this time on my way out to my Zumba class.

 
I'm not sure if the system gets abused sometimes, as you do get the odd van or car pulling up and emptying it's contents in there, but they may nearby residents too.  I think it is partly designed to prevent people fly tipping their rubbish elsewhere, so it is preferable for people to put their rubbish in the skip rather than dump it in parks or canals and cause potential harm to wildlife and animals, not to mention causing an unsightful mess.

It is a really useful system once you get used to using it and get a little prepared beforehand.  By doing a bit of homework and getting up early to make sure we could get our stuff in, we have now cleared lots more clutter from our house and garden and having removed our current bed base I have been able to get underneath and hoover and mop the floor before my partner assembled the wooden bed base that replaced it.  It was very satisfying as that is  another part of the bedroom spring cleaned into the bargain. 

In the evening, to reward ourselves for our hard work today, we treated ourselves to a meal out at our local Italian restaurant.  We had a lovely time, it was very busy, full of families from school actually, which was pretty weird.  Anyway, on the way home we came past the skip again and I saw this lovely little basket amongst the detritus spilling over into the street. 

It looks very clean and in very good condition.  Apparently, according to my daughter, it was thrown out by our neighbours, so it came home with me as I am sure I can find a use for it.  Perhaps it will turn out to be one of my future storage solutions.  Who knows!  Waste not, want not is all I can say.