Fridays are highly anticipated in this house but not because of the normal TGIF crap that everyone usually feels on the way towards the weekend. In this house, Fridays are treated as a national holiday because Friday is GARBAGE DAY!
The progression of the week is marked by its relation to garbage day.
- Is it garbage day today?
- When is it going to be garbage day?
- It’s going to be garbage day soon.
- It’s only Monday. It’s going to be garbage day on Friday.
- It’s going to be garbage day tomorrow.
- It’s garbage day TODAY!
- It was garbage day yesterday…
Dan has been enthralled with garbage days since he was 2 1/2. He can hear the garbage truck coming down the street from the back of the house. He will then fly into action and stop whatever he’s doing and proudly announce that a garbage truck is here. He then makes his way to the front window where he gawks and talks about the garbage truck at length. He’ll even sing songs about the garbage truck (or the dog as she never leaves his side) while he watches them take our trash away.
And boy are we are in for a treat if there ever happens to be TWO garbage trucks on the street at the same time – which does happen especially if they are working both sides of the street or if both the recycling truck and refuse truck show up together or if its free garbage day (where you can throw out anything and everything without paying for $2.50 stickers). I don’t know what the fascination with garbage trucks is. With Dan it’s not really about the “truck” part. He’s not into trucks as much. It’s all about one special truck – the “garbage truck”.
In fact, the highlight of yesterday came on the way home from the grocery store. There was a garbage truck in front of us. In front of us! Dan of course got all excited. At some point we passed the truck which ignited a hailstorms of “Look momma, we’ve passed the garbage truck.”, “Look momma, its now following us.”, “Drive faster momma so we’ll win!”. Yes, it’s not every day in the life of a boy where you can race a garbage truck down the highway. LOL!
Not shortly after, we came to a stop light. We were on a highway with 3 lanes and by the way the traffic was lining up, I could tell that the garbage truck would end up right next to us if no one cut it off. I announce this to Dan who has twisted around in his seat in order to keep his eye on the truck. As it pulls up next to us, he can see the driver inside the front cab and starts waving excitedly and announcing to the world “Momma!!!! There is a GARBAGE TRUCK next to us!! and it’s a GREEN garbage truck!” The driver looks over and has this confused look on his face like “What the hell?”
I’m sure firefighters and policemen are used to being adored as celebrities by little 4 year old boys… but garbage truck drivers? hmmm… usually not. I hope it made his day.