0246 – Dealing with Christmas Trash Safely

The Christmas Season is a time filled with family, friends, joy, spirit, good food and of course gifts under the tree.  As with everything there must be balance in life and with all that good can come some evil too.  We talked about making sure our mindset is squared away around Christmas time in one of our recent podcasts, but in addition to our head being right, we have to make sure that our actions are squared away as well.  The last thing we want to do is to encourage scum to spoil our holiday believe me, dirt bags don’t need any encouragement.  Today we are going to talk about dealing with our Christmas trash safely.

Your Trash Sends A Message to Everyone Around You

Card board boxes tell a story.  Too much of a story.

Boxes are designed for marketing.  They market equally well to the customer in the store as they do the dirt bag crusing the neighborhood trying to figure out which house to rob.

Plain boxes from Amazon speak as well.  First and last name are readily apparent by taking a look at a label as may be the retailer that sold you the goods.

Cardboard Solutions

Layer in your Garden

Fast and easy solution

Keeps weeds down

Kills grass

All that is required is to break the boxes down flat.  I cover with a layer 1 flake thick of left over straw and then in the spring I put compost on top of that.

Keep in mind you only have so much garden area to cover

Could break cardboard flat and then store it for when you need it.  Could be a fire hazard.

 

Shred for Compost

I have access to plenty of cardboard.  What I don’t layer right now, I shred.

Bulk of our cardboard goes through the shredder along with all of our junk mail and sensitive documents.

Takes some time

You have to have a shredder

Take to your local recycling center

Load it up, unload it and be done.

Make sure it is in the container and the container is inaccessible to others.

Burn it

Outside

Inside as a starter

Bag it

Can be a good option if the others don’t work

Remember, once your trash is on the curb, it isn’t yours.  I don’t care about legal matters.  Once you put it outside in an unsecured area consider it like an email it is there for the world to see.

Wrapping and Tissue Paper

In general, wrapping and tissue paper in the trash at Christmas don’t present the same kind of invitation to crime that your empty boxes do because your wrapping paper is anonymous.  If you are careless, however, it can be a problem.  your wrapping and tissue belong in the trash, or tightly bound in an outdoor fire.

Low density + high surface area +Loft = DANGER

Tree and Other Greens

Shred and compost

Leave it at the curb

Drop it off

Burn outside with care