Recycling

I did not throw away the empty toothpaste tube this morning because I really didn't know how to and after prolonged thought I decided worrying about it was an inefficient use of my time.

The tube is basically metal, isn't it? Always used to be, anyway. But surely that was a plastic covering to the metal? and the top was certainly plastic. But the small amount of remaining toothpaste content (how small? in percentage to the overall weight? or to the overall volume?) was surely consumable - I have often swallowed some - and therefore organic waste.

There is another bin marked 'non-recyclable'. How am I supposed to know what is or isn't recyclable? Cobalt may have a half-life of 4,000 years which is, I suppose, a little long for our purposes but I haven't got cobalt, I've got Colgate.

I suppose I am in favour of recycling but I can't help feeling it should be done by someone other than me. There are machines which have recorded into their sophisticated memory banks the exact composition of a toothpaste tube, even one which isn't squeezed right to the last spot, and are capable of breaking it down into its component forms. Why haven't we got any?

In the modern world we practise division of labour. I haven't asked the dustmen, or refuse executives or whatever they are called, to do any writing for me and I don't want to do rubbish separation for them.

I hear that in England there are hidden cameras next to rubbish bins to record who is being naughty. In Rome this would probably be popular - Italians like being filmed - and you would get housewives dressing up - hairdos, high heels and fur coats - to put the dustbins out. A definite improvement.