My new project: getting rid of stuff

This is not exactly a NEW project, just one that I keep going back to when I need  opportunities for some small sense of accomplishment. First, of course, I have to make a list so I have something to check off. Then I have to update my voluminous notes files. I have a lot of notes on how to get rid of stuff, which probably tells you how often I start and restart this same project. Then comes the not so fun part, pulling things out of closets and back rooms and garages, vacuuming off the dust, and sorting it into boxes. Then matching it up with the notes. Is this:

1. Something that somebody else might conceivably want? 
2. Recyclable trash?
3. Ordinary trash?
4. Hazardous waste?

Today was Hazardous Waste Day #2. You'd be surprise how many things turn out to be Hazardous Waste. Old landline telephones, for instance. NOBODY wants them, even electronic recycling places. I found one electronics recycler online (Techdump, not recommended) that would take them (reluctantly) for a purportedly small fee ($.50/lb). But it was a bait and switch - when I got there they wanted $10 PER PHONE, and I had a box of 5 or 6. So I drove to the nearest Hennepin County Hazardous Waste Dropoff facility, which was Brooklyn Park because I was already way the hell up in the northwest corner of the metro, and they took them for free. Once I got there, it was quick and easy - no line at all. And kind of attractively located in the midst of a pretty patch of prairie, so that was nice.

But that was actually Hazardous Waste Day #1, a week ago. Today I was focused on the most dire of all hazardous household waste, fluorescent light bulbs. There was a box of 4-foot fluorescent tubes in the garage when we bought the house 35 years ago, and today I finally got rid of them, along with 2 or 3 burned out Compact Fluorescents (CFLs). BTW, did you know that you can't throw CFLs in the trash because they contain mercury? Somehow that aspect is rarely mentioned when eco-activists are urging you to replace all your lightbulbs with CFLs. Even LED bulbs have something sinister in them and are supposed to be recycled as hazardous waste. Just in case you didn't know. Anyway, the amazingly accommodating Minneapolis Residential Recycling Program (which takes old CRT TV sets!) will not take them. And not even the South Transfer Station (which takes tires!). So it's off to the Hazardous Waste Depot with the light bulbs.

I also dumped about 5 lbs of old alkaline and lithium batteries, 2 swollen phone battery cases that had semi-exploded when the batteries wore out and were probably a fire danger, 3 expired fire extinguishers (sadly no longer in condition to put out the potential battery fires, which fortunately didn't occur), and a box of random cans of toxic substances from the garage. 

The Bloomington site is much closer to my house than the Brooklyn Center one, but OMG the traffic! It wasn't even 3pm, but southbound 35W was already impassible. Note to self: try to get out of the house before noon on the next trip. Anyway, that's done.