The cleanup was very successful with huge turnout. There were over 150 people showing up based on eyeball guesstimate of the crowd size at the driver's meeting (and those were the drivers, not counting the family members).
At the driver's meeting, someone in front of me asked if we would be driving alone, and how to get in touch with others in case of emergency. I ended up buddying with him throughout the day. I have to say, it's been a pleasure. I had no idea picking up other people's trash could be so much fun.
Just before we started on our day's work, I went to my KJ to let the air out a little and somebody came by with a video camera and started talking to me. I was asked why I volunteered for the program and what I thought it would do. I talked a little bit about the club. He wanted to film me letting the air out for some reason, man that felt a bit odd
That'd be funny if it showed up somewhere.
Mike (the guy I buddied with) turns out to be an extremely nice fellow. By the way, I think I may have just recruited another member for KJWest --- he wants to come wheeling with us when he has chance. I'm leaving Burchie in charge.
Sneaking in a little bit of fun at the end of the day's work:
You couldn't tell from here what's inside it (this one is a hazmat dumpster), but I can tell you that we put: (a) at least seven containers of various oil (still has liquid inside), (b) glass from two shot-up television, (c) some HUGE tires with wheels, (d) 30-40 foot spool of barb wire. Boy, the barb wire was fun to do. It took about four or five guys to do it. Mike and I were inside the dumpster running the winch cable (hooked up to the spool) as well as giving signal to the TJ driver who found it. He's got a very nice WARN winch and it was powerful enough he moved the dumpster quite a bit when the barb wire caught the edge of the dumpster.
The cleanup was so successful we filled up five dumpsters before the official finish time of 3:00pm. By then there were trash piled up on the ground.
My favourite haul of the day has to be this one:
The Inland Empire guys show up with a portable saw and made short work of cutting it up to pieces.
At the end of the day, the organizers passed out some prizes as well as throwing t-shirts, hats and other stuffs out into the crowd. Mike and I didn't win much but I did catch a hat they threw out into the crowd at the end of the drawing. We had the rotten luck to be standing upwind so most things just got blown in the other direction.
It's been so much fun I have no doubt I'll do it again. Feels good.
Yes, even when picking up some questionable items like underpants, socks, bras, and a bag of dog poop. We left the dog poop alone ...
That's cool.