I have some time off now and want to know if there is anything I can do to help you? Let me know. If I can help, I would love to.

I spent the better part of today going from one recycling center to another.  My garage was filling up with items that were not picked up by the City of Phoenix weekly recycling program and it was time to get rid of them ... the proper way.  Recycling isn't always as easy as filling up the big blue bin and walking it to the curb.  Many municipalities don't even have a pickup service and most of them make you separate three to four types of material before pickup.  It takes time and a want to do the right thing.  I did drive all over town to make it all work but I mixed in other errands and with everything included, I didn't have to go too far out of the way.

My biggest discovery out of everything I had was my battery usage.  I started saving my batteries about a year ago and the amount accumulated was disgusting.  Do you throw your batteries in the trash because, "there's only two of them, how much can that hurt anyway"?   Or, " What the hell am I supposed to do with these things?"  I've done it, many times.  Two at a time doesn't seem like much but after looking into my collection bag after a year, I won't do it anymore.  These babies add up quickly.  The volume of my annual "AA", "AAA" and 9V battery usage took up the same volume as 30% of a car battery.  You wouldn't throw one of those out would you?  I didn't think so. 

I have been using rechargeable batteries but I have either not had enough of them or not enough chargers for the demand.  You know how it works.  You don't need any "AA"'s for weeks at a time and then, all at once, you need two for your remote, four for your keyboard, two for your camera.  Whatever the mix for your needs, chances are, you have experienced the need to purchase the 36 pack of "AA" batteries to accommodate your needs.  This one time usage with heavy expense and waste, is just killing me.  

Rechargeable batteries have been around for quite some time now and I know they are a lot better, I have started my research.  Do you use rechargeable batteries for everything?  Most likely not but if you do, I would like to hear about it.

1. What brand have you chosen to use?
2. How many do you have?
3. What battery types are they ("AA"...)?
4. How long have you had them for?
5. How well do they work?

You have a rechargeable battery in your mobile phone that's for sure but don't get me started on standards.  All these new devices have proprietary power storage units and some of them are not removable.  We are way out of line here.  Have you been to a battery store like Batteries Plus?  I went there today and it made my head spin.  All formats of temporary storage and many of them have a slight difference, many times by a millimeter or two, just so you have to buy theirs when if you want a backup or if it fails.  It will fail, you will need another one.  Power, reliable power, is a major part of our daily lives.  Any disturbance from what we have been accustomed to and it's a problem.

• Hard Drives need a little conditioning before turning them over to someone else.  That was fun!
• The mini propane tanks were the biggest hassle of the day.  Nobody wants these things unless they have a hole in them!  Are you freaking kidding me?  That's not something I'm going to do.  I'm sure most of these end up in the weekly trash.  #fail.
• Printers, scanners, speakers and shredders.  None of these work anymore.  They have more than paid for themselves but in reality, they didn't last as long as they should have.
• Batteries, my biggest failure of all this collective junk.
• Plastic bags full of plastic bags.  Our recycling company doesn't want to touch these things.
• Miscellaneous bag of tricks.  Cables, power strips and other items with a circuit board.
• The last three photos are of the electronic recycling facility.

(download)

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My_Overdue_Recycling_Trip_tag_.zip (1.51 MB)

My second discovery is the amount of products that are more like disposable or temporary items instead of workhorse products built like tanks.  This will be a subject of a future post.

I have wanted to do this for quite some time now but I will say it was easier to do it all at once but a bit of a pain to "collect" this much stuff over time.