7/11/11, Groton Long Point Lagoon, #43

 My amazing friend Sally did a facelift for me around the lagoon at Groton Long Point, Ct.  Seeing as I am coming down the home stretch, I am incredibly grateful!  As a child, I was very lucky to be able to visit Sally and her family nearly every summer at Groton Long Point, and those memories are highlights of my youth.  I can close my eyes and put myself right back on the beach, the hot sun sizzling the baby oil slathered all over my body, listening to the tinny sound of "Beach Baby" blasting out of my red TootaLoop transistor radio.

7/10/11, HV Quarry Baseball Field, #42

When Julie and I did our facelift along this portion of Route 31, I had noticed that the driveway leading up to the Quarry field was peppered with litter.  But first, I cleaned around the traffic triangle at the intersection of Route 31 and Pennington-Hopewell Road.  The triangle looked a lot tidier without abandoned drink containers and the large, heavy truck tire tread that had been abandoned there.


I was afraid to reach into any of the foliage to pick up pieces of trash.  Call me a baby, but I'm not eager for a repeat of yesterday's ant incident or another bout of poison ivy.


Not surprisingly, most of the garbage was snack bar related.  

7/09/11, I-95 Ramp to Route 31, #40 & #41

Although a facelift was done here on December 4, 2010, it was time for another.  It didn't look too bad from the road, but I single handedly collected enough debris to fill two black garbage bags.  


Our town doesn't look as litter strewn in the summer as in the winter.  This is why: mowers shred garbage up into small pieces that are more easily swept away by wind.  But there are shards of soda and beer cans left behind, and whatever fast food containers have accumulated since the last mow.

The hot, humid weather and difficult glove situation continue to make facelifts less pleasant than usual.  During this facelift, I felt a crawling sensation on my un-gloved left hand and when I glanced down it was covered in small ants.

Small ants sting.

7/03/11, Shop Rite Parking Lot, #39

I know it's crazy, but we can't stay away.  We needed a fast dependable facelift, so we headed back to Shop Rite and were very pleasantly surprised by how oddly ... neat? ... the parking lot appeared.  Seriously, it seemed to be pretty much devoid of it's usual collection of plastic bags, store circulars, and general trash.  We were impressed by someone's efforts to tidy up.


However... there was still plenty for two experienced trash collectors to collect.  I focused on all of the disgusting debris that gets smushed against the turtarriers.  Isn't "turtarrier" a great word?  A turtarrier is the cement block used to mark the end of a parking space.





It was still really hot and humid, and to complicate that, Julie and I found it extremely difficult to get our plastic gloves onto our hands.  (Note to self, keep baby powder in car for those moments).  


It was a successful, but kind of gross, facelift.

7/02/11, Shop Rite Stormwater Basin, #37 & #38

After months of noticing debris in the stormwater basin on the left hand side of Shop Rite, Julie and I just had to clean it up.  I know, we are supposed to avoid Shop Rite.


It started out to be a gorgeous day, but it quickly got hot and humid.  Hot and humid weather make facelifts much less fun, just let me throw that out there.  


We decided to leave our garbage neatly bagged up next to the outdoor garbage cans instead of dealing with the dumpster scene.  We know how that can go...

June?

I am not quite sure where the month of June went.  It was obviously a very busy month.  Perhaps there was a lot of bad weather on weekends?  Was I overwhelmed by the end of the school year and the beginning of Art in the Park?  I do know we did travel one weekend.  Whatever my very good reasons were, the result was a month without a single facelift.  

5/29/11, PEAC Health Club, #36

I wanted to do a face lift in a place I visit frequently, PEAC Health & Fitness.  The landscapers there do a terrific job and it is clearly well maintained.  But, sigh, it is my cross to bear that my eyes are constantly drawn to those little bits and pieces of trash that are missed by most. 

It was an interesting face lift because the trash was so "healthy" compared to every other spot I have cleaned.  

A sampling of the most common items discarded in the parking lot:

those little plastic single use teeth flossers 

pieces of energy bar wrappers

chewed gum or gum wrappers

socks or footies (just one of each) 

Power-ade or water bottles

I was there super early in hopes of avoiding attention, and to my amazement a small group of obviously dedicated gym rats arrived about 5 minutes before PEAC opened to hang outside the door.  I received some good natured ribbing and invitations to clean cars and homes!