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Reduce, reuse, recycle.

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Owen loves garbage trucks. Whenever we put our car in reverse and back up, we hear from the back seat, "Boop, boop, boop." Fortunately for our little sanitation department aficionado we're staying in Waikiki, which is apparently garbage-pick-up central of Oahu. Trucks drive by every day except Sunday, and FOUR different kinds of trucks come by Saturday morning! Oddly, not one of them is a recycling truck. You'd think a community living on an island would be particularly interested in a single-stream recycling program. If you were thinking about Hawaii, you'd be wrong.

Owen's love of garbage trucks is not too surprising. When I was his age, I'd make piles of toys around the house and push an old suitcase from pile to pile. I'd then throw the toys onto on half of the open suit case and then dump the toys from one half into the other. "MMMMMMrrrrrr mmmmmmm RRRRRRRRR, buuhhhhssshhhhh!" Memories of my own experimentation with a career in trash removal inspired me to build a trash truck for Owen. So Erin and I took an old Costco diapers box (Super Couches, which we call "Super Coochies."), and an old wipes box ("Booty wipes"). Since we don't have any tape, we attached the boxes together using a plastic bag. Talk about recycling! Talk about ghetto toy!

Here's a couple videos of Owen the Garbage Man in action. In the first one he's figuring things out. By the second video, he's mastered it.



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Comments

mq said…
Dude, it looks like you need to order a bunch of these.

When I have kids I'm gonna buy me.. err buy THEM a whole bunch of these fasteners to build stuff with.
August 13, 2007 at 5:33 PM
JohnJohn said…
OMG, we are so getting some of these to connect all of our moving boxes after our stuff gets here. It'll be the best toy ever for Owen's new room. Thanks for the link, Quinn!
August 13, 2007 at 8:50 PM
Anonymous said…
Ask Erin to tell you about the cardboard box village we had in the living room one summer. I think there was a hot water heater box, refrigerator box and washing machine box...many markers...many nights camping out in our own little 'houses.' Oh wait, I just told you...MAN those were F. U. N.
August 13, 2007 at 9:51 PM
mq said…
Reminds me of that Far Side cartoon with the two scientists standing next to a giant missile. Next to the missile is the giant cardboard box it came in. Caption is something like "Hey, your kids got the last one."

JJ: glad I can help. All that screwing around here at work paid off for SOMEBODY. Too bad I can't get a Ph.D. in cardboard box. "Cardboard Box Construction... for... Distributed Camera Networks" - just doesn't work. Dang.
August 13, 2007 at 10:13 PM
Anonymous said…
If I were ever on a game show where I got to call a friend for help...that person would be Quinn...I don't know anyone else who knows as much random stuff as he does.
August 14, 2007 at 9:38 PM
lehpve said…
Erin & John,
Just got home from a visit with the MN duo and enjoyed reading your blog so much! Brings back memories of Jerry's and my hippie days in Hawaii from 1972 to 1976. Yeah, we're old! Have you had hot malasadas yet? I'm assuming they're still around - they used to be made by Leonard's. Wait till Owen starts to talk pidgeon - you'll be ready to hightail it back to the mainland. Just wanted you to know how much we're enjoying your news.
Cindy Hey
August 20, 2007 at 3:32 PM
lehpve said…
John & Erin,

I just got back from a visit with the MN duo and enjoyed reading your blog. Brings back scary memories from our hippie days in Hawaii from 1972 to 1976 - yeah, we're old. Have you had Leonard's hot malasadas yet or gotten food from an Okazu Ya? Of course, these may no longer exist. Keep the entries coming - I love it!
Cindy
August 20, 2007 at 3:34 PM
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