half an hour down and 30 cents behind...

Yesterday went to Ames Redemption again. I don't know if you all are as fascinated by the recycling conundrum or lack thereof that exists here. The saga and so forth.
Well, the recycling place started charging $2.00 a car for using their recycling facility.
We decided after putting off our recycling for the last month or so, the pile had built up quite high in our closet, so we should finally take care of that.
Now due to the craptastic bottle/can exchange facilities that exist in the supermarkets, we decided to just wait til we returned there to get our precious nickels back.
Last time, if you'll recall, we wound up being dissuaded by the lines and not feeling like dealing with the wait, what with the people who bring in their $20-garbage bagfuls of Icehouse and Bud Lite, we did not get to see all that action.
However yesterday we were there much earlier and the smell factor was considerably reduced.
I was surprised to see however that all the can/bottle counting is done by hand. Nothing too sophisticated about this operation!

Well, we got into line, feeling a bit out of place with our paltry dozen or so wine bottles and a few assorted soda cans to show for our efforts. Compared to the garbage-ful people.
The line went surprisingly quickly (only about 15 minutes) even with those folks who had to have their hundreds of cans counted and sorted.
At the end, our grand total netted us: $1.70

Then we went to the other building to deposit the non-redeemable plastics and glass containers and recycle any newspaper.


And pay $2.00.

So, at the end of us this, figured we spent half an hour, and were down $0.30!

Smells like teen spirit...

Okay, not really. It's sort of a mix of stale beer and ??? I can't quite place what the rest of that lovely cocktail is but it's the smell that permeates the recycling/redemption "center" at the Hy-vee. I can see how this alone could be a deterrent to returning those bottles and cans. Cuz let's face it... unless you're already going shopping and you've got a respectable pile of bottles and cans to return, is the prospect of a few nickels (or nickels off your grocery bill) really worth facing that tantalizing aroma? Something about the smell of stagnant beer puddles...Yum.
Plus, I know I've mentioned it before, but the machines suck. They work for about 3 cans/bottles and then nope, they just stop working. This has happened every time I've tried using them. It doesn't matter if you follow the directions and use the right machine for the right type of bottle. They just don't like it and make you take your bottle/can, which has now gone into the machine and been rejected and spit back out at you, back. It's gross. I can easily see how people are discouraged OR wind up at Ames Redemption on Saturday mornings with garbage-bagfulls of cans.

But the alternative is landfill, which makes me sad. I talked to someone today who works with school recycling and asked about the city recycling and was told the city garbage will burn some of the recyclables for energy? but the temperature isn't high enough for glass to burn.

Recycling

Another weird thing is they don't really recycle here. Well it's more complicated. First, they do have a deposit on cans and bottles, including wine. So I guess this is supposed to encourage people to bring back their beer, soda, and wine. Which I don't mind doing, except I wonder if it really works. It's a good idea but it's a little annoying in the implementation. There's a little room/foyer in the outside of the grocery store where all those can/bottle recycling machines are set up.
The only thing is usually if you go in there: 1. at least one or more of the machines is out of order
2. the machines don't seem to accept certain bottles (I dunno, maybe I'm feeding them in wrong),
3. it usually smells pretty rank- imagine all the nasty beer bottles, etc. crap pulled from the trash, whatever smell, yuck
4. there's usually someone with like 2 giant garbage bags full of beer cans hogging up those machines.

But fortunately, you can just bring the stuff to the customer service counter and they'll give you back your 15 cents or whatever.

So this is all well and good for your glass and soda cans. But what, you may ask, about plastic and what about newspaper and cardboard?
In this city brochure thingee we picked up somewhere, they say "materials that are traditionally recycled (such as paper, tin cans, plastic, etc) are not separated from garbage in Ames. Instead, they are separated at the Resource Recovery Plant. The burnable trash is used as a source of fuel in place of coal....etc. Metals are separated and sold for recyling.

Wait, what??? So, the city of Ames does NOT want me to separate recyclable items because first, they are going to pick out the most profitable ones from my trash and sell them themselves? I don't know...this sounds weird.

Luckily there is another option. You can take your stuff yourself to the Ames Redemption Center. Save your soul and your recycling. Kidding... It's just for the recycling.
It's sort of like Construction Junction but much better maintained. Thankfully. CJ made me sort of aggravated and sad, because people would f- things up and throw all sorts of crappity crap in the wrong bins and just plain out crap. For example, last time I went there someone had thrown a LAMP in the paper recycling dumpster. I hate people like that.

The place here is pretty cool and it's all indoors, so no rain getting everything a mess.

So, YAY Ames redemption.