me: “Here’s the thing, HOA covenant: If I’m only allowed to put out the one garbage can—that is, if the waste management folks will only take what I can fit into that single, subdivision-specific plastic trash bin—then all the broken down cardboard boxes and crap-stuffed Hefty bags from our move are going to have to sit there on the side of the house until such time as we stop accumulating additional trash at a ratio that allows us to dispose of the old trash in conjunction with inevitable new trash…”
HOA covenant:
me: “…which—while I can’t, off the top of my head, come up with a detailed formula for what is essentially a complex mathematical problem—means that, well, we’re going to have a ton of shit on the side of our house for the forseeable future.”
HOA covenant: “I see.”
me: “Good.”
HOA covenant: “Quite the puzzle, isn’t it?”
me: “Indeed. Like something out of a Joseph Heller novel, almost.”
HOA covenant: “Well, here’s the rub, homeowner: covenant bylaws won’t permit you to keep ‘big piles of shit’ on the side of your house ‘for the foreseeable future.’ Nor will they allow you to employ extra garbage pails to dispose of those big piles of shit. So our official position is, you’ve got a bit of problem on your hands.”
me: “Right. So what’s the solution?”
HOA covenant: “Well, officially, I can’t offer any advice. But off the record –?”
me: “Sure, whatever.”
HOA covenant: “Were it me, I’d probably move.”
me: “You know, I had a feeling you were going to say that.”
HOA covenant: “Hey, just doing my job, pal. You’re the one who got himself into this mess by accumulating all the shit, remember?”
The solution is simple. Put your unwanted stuff near your neighbors garbage cans.
So now we know what those guys in the “We Haul Junk” trucks do for a living. We also had some bit of luck on our last move by finding a nice neighbor with a pick-up who also had a land fill permit for the county dump. A single yearly fee for unlimited household hauls to the dump. You need to find one of those.
Barbeque pit?
If I were you, I’d ask the Quagmire Guy.
Landfill or Drive by Dumping about your only choice. If your thinking about drive by dumping I suggest dumpster beside or behind business with easy entry and exit.
PS
Don’t get greedy one bag at a time.
Find the local landfill, load up the stuff into your biggest vehic, and roll up there as many times as it takes to dispose of the rubbish.
Do you have any video for your last conversation? I’m thinking about the last reply… though, maybe not. Paper cuts might’ve been involved.
Try calling the trash hauling company and see if they’ll Just This Once come pick up the whole mass of it.
It couldn’t hurt. I mean: what’s the worst thing that can happen? They’ll say “No”? Well, no. Maybe they’ll say “Hell no!” and laugh a lot. But you won’t hear the echoes of their laughter in your mind’s ear forever.
Nah, try calling to see if you can arrange something.
Put all the shit you can fit into the biggest box and mail it to the HOA. Postage due, if possible.
Then it’s THEIR problem.
I’m guessing a huge bonfire isn’t within the HOA covenant either.
I guess you gotta do what we do; we call it “the garbage fairy.” After everyone has put out their huge, ONE, container, my husband sneaks around and puts “gifts” into the neighbor’s trash can.
O, god. Don’t get me started.
When I lived in San Francisco, I was forced to sneak out around at midnight once a week to hide my excess trash in other peoples’ garbage cans. You run through the neighborhood looking here and there for someone with a little spare space in their can.
And people run past you in the dark doing the same thing. Often, I’d come home to find some asshole had abandoned a whole bag of his garbage next to my can, so I’d have to go back out again and find another place for it. You could sit up all night guarding your can. The alternative was to have to haul a can of someone else’s smelly garbage back into your house and keep it for a week.
And try getting rid of an old car. Just try.
1. top off your neighbors’ cans after sunset
2. large item pickup, usually limited to a few items per year, may be available. I’m sure you have a few large boxes you could convince the pickup guy is an old dishwasher.
3. there may be a free dump day for your city at the local facility. Or you could pay for a regular deposit. Fees are probably reasonable for a single trip if you can fit it all into one vehicle&trailer combo.
Are you trying to get rid of an old car, ahem? Because Jeff could park it beside the garage and use it to store his shit, can put alot of shit in an old car, especially if you rip the seats out and use them for lawn furniture.
I am an idea man, that’s what I do.
B Moe:
My friend placed the keys in the ignition in hopes someone would steal it, but no one did. Ultimately, she had to sneak out to the countryside and dump it over a small cliff and walk back to town. Before she dumped it, she had to move it every three days so the old ladies wouldn’t complain about an abandoned car.
Hey, that’s not trash! It’s modern art. Proudly display in in the middle of the yard. If they want it down , they can buy it.
TW:hard69, they screw you, so you screw them. (And i thought the numbers were ruining the TW)
Jeff,
Welcome to owning a home . . . . the other hidden costs.
Well, couldn’t you keep the big piles of shit inside your house? See, I knew there could be an easy solution that would please the HOA!
There is a large dumpster next to the Enterprise Rent-A-Car on East Colfax right around Grape Street. It served me well when I moved out of my house there. There’s also a lot of alleys in that neighborhood, and lots of dumpsters…..
Yeah, that’s what garages are for.
[…]
Oh wait—you need to park your car(s) in there, don’t you?
Got a basement? Or an easily accessible attic?
I sure hope the previous owner didn’t leave all his excess shit up there.
Just put it at the curb in bags the morning that the trash truck comes. Your trashmen haven’t read your HOA. I any of your neighbors complain, that’s early information about someone you’re going to have trouble with sooner or later anyway.
Oh crap that is the best story ever Ahem! I could even picture the people sneaking around at night playing musical chairs with the trash cans LOL I’m so glad I don’t live in San Fran (for many reasons – but now I can add “trash situation” to the list)
thats what you get for buying a home with a HOA, you yuppie fuckstain.
I warned you about HOA’s.
That’s a funny story you got there, not least because it isn’t MY story. Wouldn’t be so funny if it were.
Are you home when the trash truck comes by? A few bucks to the guys on the truck ought to take care of the problem and it’s easier than hauling to the dump yourself.
This is only tangentially related, but it’s a true story.
Last night I dreamt about Jeff. He was having a housewarming, and the whole blogosphere dropped by. For some reason I ran into Larry King, who lived across the street from the new house. He knew Jeff’s real mother, who’d never met her son. Larry was very eager to introduce them.
So I went over to Jeff’s to prepare them for the news. Jeff wasn’t there, but I told his wife, “You’re going to have company.” I looked around the house—which, what with just moving in, and all the company, was looking pretty lived-in—and said, “Might want to straighten up a bit.”
Muahahaha! Because, children, Jeff’s real mother was—Martha Stewart!
Then Jeff’s wife asked me to help her make noodles, and I got a big bowl of egg yolks out of the fridge, and they had this greenish-gray powder all over them. Ewww, is that mold?
I swear this was a real dream, one of those dreams that’s so vivid it stays with you for hours after you wake up. Now either: 1) The most astonishing bits of gunk stick to your subconscious, like sidewalk gum. OR: 2) I got Jeff’s dream by mistake. Could you rein in your psyche a bit there, bub? Thanks.
‘Cause I don’t want to have to climb on top of Larry King’s buffet table ever again.
Put the stuff in your trunk/backseat, find the nearest apartment community with a big communal trash dropoff and unload it all there. At night. Been there and done that.
Just when we thought that fascism had been defeated, someone came up with homeowners’ associations. My advice: find proof that the head of your homeowners’ aasciation was in the SS (the all were at one time) and use it to blackmail him.
Angie:
Jeff was missing last night because he was next door, in my dream. We were doing mushrooms while his wife wasn’t looking. Keith Olbermann tried busting into the dream, but we beat him away with sharp sticks.
HOAs are the biggest fucking pains in the ass ever invented by man. And watch out for anyone who wants to be the President of the Association. They’re only in it for the power. Figure that out.
Fucktards, the lot of ‘em. We’ve been through tons of shit with our Presidents. Little fish in even littler ponds.
One interesting note that you may find useful: HOAs are uninforceable. The Supremes ruled against them about a dozen years ago, I think. We’ve been able to push back on several occasions against our Association, because they’ve not been willing to go to court and lose. If you really want to make a stink about something, yours’ll probably fold. But pick your battles. It’s not worth the stress to continually fight over little shit.
Also, check with your city/county. If you are actually on city or county streets, then those rules usually hold sway over HOAs. We won that battle in our neighborhood because our driveway goes out to a county road, instead of the cul-de-sac. County road, county rules. We can put as many trash cans out as we want, and we don’t have to put them on the designated platform.
It’s when you win the completely meaningless shit-storm battles that you really start to feel like a man!
Angie–
Phew! Fortunately, I don’t have a subconcious, because I’m a guy.
Put it on the market before you get too attached. Move to America.
Jeff was missing last night because he was next door, in my dream. We were doing mushrooms while his wife wasn’t looking. Keith Olbermann tried busting into the dream, but we beat him away with sharp sticks.
Ahem—Again, absolutely true: Jeff came back toward the end of my dream. He and another male blogger had been doing something I can’t quite remember, but it made them all sweaty and sticks were involved. I think they said they’d been chopping wood.
(I grew up in the country, where moving often meant having to clear land. Maybe that’s more sidewalk gum.)
Fortunately, I don’t have a subconcious, because I’m a guy.
Guys get everything.
Owning a home is the best thing that has ever happened to me. Having a landlord spoils ownership. A renter can move, a HOA victim can only grab his ankles.
Bazookas. And slinkies. Slinkies solve everything.
But I prefer bazookas.
I’m not telling what Jeff was doing in my dream. I don’t know if Mrs. Jeff is the jealous type.
1. Obtain a 50-gallon steel drum, a can of gas, a long stick, a plastic lawn chair and a case of beer.
2. At midnight, begin burning garbage bag by bag while sitting in chair consuming beer and occasionally poking can with stick until a helpful neighbor comes to complain or garbage is reduced to ashes, whichever comes first.
3. Offer the neighbor beer. Or the stick.
4. When the police show up only offer them beer.
I would also suggest reading “The Association” by Bentley Little. You will either count your blessings or begin to watch the members of your HOA more carefully…
Love those HOAs. I have one, Jeff, and you’ll learn to live with it. Make sure to go to the regular board meeting. Should be very entertaining. Mine certainly are.
The trash experience you’re discussing with Mr. HOA reminds me of when we moved into our home, and I had to load my Yukon XL time and again with “stuff”, and then scout trash dumpsters in the late hours of the night to dispose of it.
If you live in the county I think you live in, there’s a free pickup service (well, not free since our tax dollars still pay for it, but there’s no immediate charge)for boxes after moving in. You schedule a date with the pickup service, haul all your stuff to the curb the morning of or the night before.
The same county is also pretty free with their big junk days and landfill days, but since we’re approaching winter it’s a while til the next one.
As I’ve said time and time again, there are very few problems in this world that can’t be solved with a flamethrower. Just move the shit away from the house some.
Set it out at the curb and string some orange and black lights around it. Plop a jack o’lantern on top. Happy HOAllowe’en!
The officers of your HOA should be known to you, as are the locations of their homes.
If they’re going to be PITAs about how your moving garbage is disposed of, then I would suggest a deposit of equal quantities in the front yards of each of the HOA officers, with a double dose for whichever proto-Nazi serves as the enforcement officer.
Just two things:
1) Attempt as best you can to redact any personal info (addresses, phone #s, copies of the SWPaw RO, etc.).
2) Decorate liberally with ‘dillo droppings.
As a bonus – after it’s done, take photos and bring their sorry asses up before the board for violation.
For every problem there is a solution.
Patriot Electric Chipper-Shredder-Vac:
Product Description:
Stop worrying about burning bans or curbside restrictions! The Patriot Electric Chipper-Shredder-Vac is your solution to waste reduction. This corded model features an industrial class 1 1/2 HP electric motor, which has the ability to chip branches up to 2 1/2” diameter with its high carbon knives. The patented high efficiency “Y” hammers shred evergreen boughs and damp leaves in a blink. For mobility in the field, you can safely work up to 100 feet from the nearest dedicated circuit (12 gauge cord not included). This low noise unit may even be used inside a garage or greenhouse when inclement weather prevent operations outdoors. Each unit comes with a collection bag and safety goggles.
If I understand correctly, you’re in Denver. I only wish you had settled in the neo-downtown area like me. It’s a bit ghetto, but coming up big-time, and I can put an inverted bathtub of an Our Lady of Guadalupe shrine in my yard any time I want. And, I walk to work downtown.
I raised a kid here; and while it’s a challenge because the neighbors are a bit more in your face, you’re in their face as well, by virtue of the open porches in your front yards. So there’s an equibrium because anyone can call anyone else out at any time. And it’s all mediated by the other nosy neighbors. A bit rough, but couldn’t be sweeter. Plus, the art galleries are nice.
I would never tolerate an HOA.
Jeff,
Just use the New Jersey Solution…fly dumping.
I live in a condo, which means I deal with HOA². We have a very nice pond with a fountain, stocked with trout and a haven for ducks, swans and several brigades of Canadian Geese (which means lots of Lincoln Logs all over the grounds, argh!) Our board decided that the dam/roadway which creates the pond needs to be “upgraded.” The pond was drained (no idea what happened to the fish) and now sits as a huge, fly infested mudhole in the middle of the grounds.
Within a week, letters began to circulate amounst the units bleating about some kind of “conflict of interest” between 2 board memebers, the engineering firm and the environmental company. As a result, the stinkin’, fly infested mudhole remains like an Antrax abcess on a giant’s green hairy butt while letters and accusations fly back and forth.
We are up to 8 weeks. And counting.
Some things are worse than trash.
BJTexas,
No doubt the EPA declared it a navigable waterway. Move. No one reading this blog will be living when that gets sorted out.
Gee, thanks, MarkD for that life affirming take on Operation Mudhole. The good news is that the frackin’ geese are gone…
No, Bobby, don’t play with the Lincoln Logs!!
PLEASE SOMEONE HELP ME!!!!I been having trouble with this old lady because when i fiirst moved in i didnt put my dogs on a leash any way shes been out to get me ever since.yesterday i recevied a certified letter stating i HAD A BEER IN 1 HAND AND HAD MY SIDE ARM IN THE OTHER UNHOLSTERED RUNNING AROUND FLASHING IT AT PEOPLE!!!its the old lady she called the mang.(hoa)but didnt call the police ….if i saw someone in front of my place waving a gun i would not hessatate calling the 5-0 also it says as soon as I noticed someone saw me i ran to my car and took off!!!LIES LIES LIES my girl was there and this never happened SO HOW OR WHO DO I CONTACT TO PRESS CHARGES?????