{"id":19093,"date":"2017-10-17T16:26:00","date_gmt":"2017-10-17T23:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/a-note-from-a-garbage-bear\/"},"modified":"2017-10-17T16:26:00","modified_gmt":"2017-10-17T23:26:00","slug":"a-note-from-a-garbage-bear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/life\/a-note-from-a-garbage-bear\/","title":{"rendered":"A note from a garbage bear"},"content":{"rendered":"

Grrrrr.<\/p>\n

I heard you try to shoo me off the first time. And I said “grrrrr,&rdquo; all right? Now, I don&rsquo;t mean to be rude, but please let me do my job. Grrrr. Thanks.<\/p>\n

Okay. Do I bug you at your place of business? Do I hover over your ergonomic workstation shouting and clapping and threatening you with my kid&rsquo;s whiffle ball bat?<\/p>\n

So, if you don&rsquo;t mind, I&rsquo;ve really got my work cut out for me, here. You guys produce a lot of trash. Grrrrr.<\/p>\n

Can you not hurl your empty La Croix can at me? I&rsquo;m trying to establish a system. Glass. Plastic. Aluminum. Your garbage isn&rsquo;t going to sort itself — and obviously neither are you. Frankly, you&rsquo;re a disgrace to that Patagonia fleece you&rsquo;re wearing.<\/p>\n

What kind of garbage bear am I? Um, the kind who actually cares about the environment?<\/p>\n

What do you mean “what do I mean&rdquo;?<\/p>\n

Forgetting, for a moment, your flagrant disregard for Urban Bear Ordinance 2004-11, which governs the proper handling and storage of putrescible waste. Guidelines clearly state all residential trash must be placed in a bear resistant container and kept inside a bear resistant enclosure. See the definitions section for what, precisely, constitutes “bear resistant container&rdquo; and “bear resistant enclosure&rdquo; — but I can assure you it&rsquo;s not an un-cinched Hefty Cinch Sak® next to a pile of broken down junk at the curb marked “FREE.&rdquo;<\/p>\n

Just look at what you&rsquo;re throwing away: aerosol cans, toilet paper rolls, Amazon Prime packaging (I hear Jeff Bezos is a real jerk, by the way), Greek yogurt containers, empty jugs of eco-friendly cleanser — ironic, don&rsquo;t you think — Prosecco bottles — a shocking number of prosecco bottles — take-out clamshells, a stack of old Atlantic Monthly magazines…<\/p>\n

You know, for Hillary voters, you guys don&rsquo;t recycle for crap. By the way, all these old crumpled-up “I&rsquo;m With Her&rdquo; signs? Cardboard. I also found of bunch of pink hats — ever hear of Goodwill?<\/p>\n

You&rsquo;re right. Bears don&rsquo;t usually talk, you know, aside from the occasional “someone&rsquo;s been eating my porridge.&rdquo; But these days, especially, I feel like I can&rsquo;t stay silent anymore.<\/p>\n

For instance: see this plastic grocery bag? It&rsquo;s going to sit in the landfill for 10,000 years. At least use it to pick up after your dog. In fact, you can start in your yard. And while you&rsquo;re at it, you might also want to beef up the latches on your chicken coop. Lucky for you I just watched Food, Inc. — totally off poultry.<\/p>\n

Where&rsquo;d I learn such good English? NPR. It&rsquo;s blaring from every house in the neighborhood.<\/p>\n

Grrrrr. I can&rsquo;t believe what I&rsquo;m finding in here. K-cup pods. Single-serving organic hummus. Come on. You can&rsquo;t buy the giant family size tub? Oh, dude! These batteries go to household hazardous waste. By the way, it&rsquo;s 2017. Why are you still using disposable batteries?<\/p>\n

And while we&rsquo;re on the subject, when are you going to trade in that gas-guzzling Prius parked in your driveway? Me, I drive a Nissan Leaf with a “Bears for Bernie&rdquo; bumper sticker… Or at least I would if the State of Alaska ever decided to issue me a license. Although, the governor recently designated April “Bear Awareness Month,&rdquo; so, you know, I think we&rsquo;re finally starting to see some major breakthroughs in Ursine rights.<\/p>\n

Am I serious?<\/p>\n

Let me put this way: do I [bleep] in the woods?<\/p>\n

That&rsquo;s a rhetorical question. Of course I [bleep] in the woods. I&rsquo;m certainly not going to [bleep] in your yard. Like I said before, it&rsquo;s disgusting back there.<\/p>\n

But listen, I like you (and invite you to follow me on twitter @wokebear). After all, we&rsquo;re on the same team… You know, mammals — hairy vertebrates rule! #warm-blooded!!!<\/p>\n

Point is, you need to exercise your human privilege. Smokey put it best: “Only you can prevent forest fires.&rdquo; Know what I&rsquo;m saying? I mean, you&rsquo;ve got opposable thumbs and a 1350 cc brain. Do you know what I could accomplish with opposable thumbs and a 1350 brain? I&rsquo;d crush at iPhone Tetris, that&rsquo;s for sure.<\/p>\n

No, I don&rsquo;t think you&rsquo;re doing your best. The #MAGAs across the street totally compost. Think about it.<\/p>\n

Speaking of which … if you&rsquo;re going to toss your leftover Brussels sprouts in the regular trash, would it kill you to throw out a little duck confit on top of it? Maybe a side of black truffle aioli? When I eat garbage I want to taste a complex flavor profile.<\/p>\n

Oh, man. I&rsquo;d maul for a kombucha right now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Grrrrr. I heard you try to shoo me off the first time. And I said “grrrrr,&rdquo; all right? Now, I don&rsquo;t mean to be rude, but please let me do my job. Grrrr. Thanks. Okay. Do I bug you at your place of business<\/a>? Do I hover over your ergonomic workstation shouting and clapping and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":7,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-19093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19093"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19093\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19093"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=19093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}