Organizing Week: Getting Trashed

This post is all about storing 300 bottles of booze!! Naw, I'm kidding. This post is about trash/recycling/compost and all that smelly business that comes with homes large and small. I get SO annoyed when I am watching House Hunters or For Rent or something on HGTV and whilst touring the kitchen they say "Where can we keep the garbage? It is too small!" NO! Ok? No. It is super easy to store your garbage, if you plan it out. In my tiny kitchen, I manage to store garbage, recycling, AND compost. Go environment.

As I have shown before, I have a garbage/recycling caddy installed under the sink:

 Neither of them are very large, but when you live in a condo, you have this wonderful contraption called a garbage chute that means you can empty as much as you need to before the garbage man comes to pick it all up. I probably empty my garbage and recycling one every two to three weeks. I don't eat a whole lot of packaged food, so I don't create a lot of waste. If I have larger recyclable items, I store them beside the counter in the hallway and walk them out to the chute when I have time.

I used to also store my compost under the sink, but it was crowded under there and I kept getting fruit flies/ decomposed bags, and other grossness because I never remembered to take it out. Then I had THIS genius idea:

PUT THE COMPOST IN THE FREEZER!!

As you can see, I do not use my freezer. hahaha. I have ice, two boxes of chicken, and a bag of freezer burned veggies that I have been using on my sore hand. Those colourful stick things are actually ice sticks that you put in drinks and then wash and re-freeze (so your drink won't get watered down). Now I can go over a month without taking out my compost and there is no stink, no fruit flies, and the bag stays intact! In Toronto, they supply these bins and you have to buy special compostable bags for them. If you don't have this, you can always use a large jar or tub. I know a lot of people have packed freezers, but trust me when I say this is worth it!

Now, when it comes time to throw out my garbage etc, I am lucky enough to have two chutes on my floor (which is good because someone always tries to shove a party size pizza box down the chute and clogs it). I am also VERY lucky because my building chutes allow for garbage, recycling, AND compost, which is rare.

The garbage room near my condo looks like this:

You can see my sexy pale legs in the top photo. Ya, I walk around in my shorts and flip flops taking photos of garbage chutes....

I like having two separate chutes because the recycling one often jams so then I at least still have garbage. You can see in the top photo that there are two buttons. You simply press blue for recycling or green for compost and toss 'er in!

There is another chute on my floor, down near the gym which is a little different:

This one has only one chute, and you use buttons to change the direction to where you want it go.

If you have anything bulky to throw out, there is a giant garbage room on the main floor. You can even leave couches and stuff down there and the building will remove it. It is damn sweet! People also leave perfectly good things down there like empty bottles, lamps, and small furniture. I have no intention of touching any of it, but I have often left my stuff down there too and it does seem to go missing.

Oh, it is also worth mentioning that I used to work at a municipal recycling plant and I learned SO much and I am that annoying person who can spout on and on about why some municipalities accept styrofoam and others don't. I am not the best recycler, but I do try and you should too! In fact, because I am posting this next picture, I think you are obligated to recycle so that you can keep stylish outfits like this around:

On my way to inventory your trash!!

Anyway, so I hope this will help people in small condos and apartments realize that they can store trash, recycling, and compost! I know not every building has compost, but I love it just for the fact that my garbage never gets stinky, even if I don't take it out for weeks. One person doesn't make that much trash!!