Tireless Street Sweepers

When the car passes its last gasps where even bacon grease and a leash won’t motivate my wagon’s wheels to move I sometimes have to venture TIRElessly out on foot for repairs. Since small smart-phones are not yet Yeti-friendly and overt stimulation from music or talk-radio overloads my beanie baby brain, I slog silently with little but the fat on my pratt to keep me company. So it’s no surprise that whenever I travel trike-less, I choose random roadside refuse to ‘count’ and keep my gnat-sized noodle from focusing on both the corns on my feet and the ones stuck in my teeth. 

Since counting over ten is not my strong suit I avoid all common twigs, rocks, and gutted gutter road-kill along my chosen boot route. Instead I have a knack for tracking trash or other stand-out street-leavings which are easy to spy with my bloodshot eyes and can dutifully tally fast with or without an abacus. If I can snag a bag or un-holey rag I will collect the parkway prizes to shuttle back to our hovel but usually the neighbors complain that our dump already has enough yard art at our disposal.

In many places that I have lived, soda cans and rum bottles are ordinarily good ‘objet d’ cART’ for my way of highway ciphering and, if I am REALLY lucky, an occasional drop of hobo-hydration. However, local recycling rules near me now put bounties on such items making them slim-lickins during my current treks and frequent sole searching. Too bad I can’t earn some clean cold cash for dirty hot butts since lip-flicked cigarettes along with their flat-mashed cello packs are probably the most rampant refuse to cross my tracks and fill my sacks.  

My record trash total for a 3 mile hike to retrieve my wheels is forty-five little mini-bar sized liquor bottles left curbside full of air and an occasional inquisitive ant. Clearly the walking dead near here must have a lot of frequent flyer miles to choose those tiny liquor hits over the better valued quarts of Thunderbird offered up at our local 7-11. In fact our bums are so well off you’d think they’d have the decency to leave a bottle drop for posterity or at least thirsty street sweepers like myself.  I have troubles to drown too you know since I’m disheartened by frequent car repairs and past lapses in my synapses from a lifetime of nutrition-less Wonder bread and un-recycled abuse of addictive Diet Coke.