Dumpster Diving

Last Friday, one of my coworkers spotted a crazy old man climbing a cardboard recycling dumpster outside of my building. This behavior is not only gross, but it's dangerous, as the dumpster's walls are over seven feet high. I asked him in a tactful way what he was doing. He claimed that he was moving to Florida and needed boxes. I offered him some intact boxes from inside the office, as all the boxes in the dumpster had been flattened. "That's okay," he said, dismissing my offer. "I'll come back later." He drove away in his big honking SUV.

This morning I was again alerted to the cardboard dumpster. This time, there was a mattress poking over the edge of the dumpster. "It must have come from senile old Skeletor," I thought. I also had to get the trash out before the base recycling center could take it away. I scaled the dumpster wall and began my precarious dance across the flattened boxes. It was very tricky, as you never know when an uncrushed box is going to collapse under your weight. I had to grab for the edges of the dumpster a few times to prevent myself from drowning in a sea of refuse.

The mattresses were literally the tip of the iceberg. There was a lot of trash inside, including plastic tool cases, a hockey stick, and several pieces of lumber. I hurled as much as possible over the side while trying to maintain my balance.

There's no way that a single man could have gotten those heavy mattresses and all the other trash into the dumpster. Given the height of the walls, and the fact that the dumpster was overflowing with cardboard at the access hatch, makes me suspect that there are at least two crazy dumpster-divers out there. Next time I see Skeletor in my dumpster or driving around in his big honking SUV, I'm going to give security forces a call. Hopefully they will hunt him down and send him to the psychiatric care he needs.