Saturday morning I got a call from Neighbor D, who wanted a run to the landfill. D&L are going through one of their now-common periods where they’re simultaneously having mobility issues so (though it wasn’t mentioned) he needed the help, and also by tagging along I could empty one of my garbage barrels. I don’t generate a lot of non-compostable garbage, but what there is does tend to pile up so I was happy to tag along.
And on the way, as always I was struck by the wisdom with which this particular landfill was located. Landfills are usually unfortunate necessities, basically destroying large tracts of land that could otherwise have been put to more pleasant purposes. This particular one is set in a veritable moonscape…

…of literally no use to man or beast. And I’ve never seen one more busily managed – it’s constantly being dug up, re-terraced, filled by trucks from all over the county, and enthusiastically re-buried. It’s like they have a very detailed 3D map of the same few thousand cubic yards of regolith and they’re determined to use every inch in the most efficient manner possible. I’ve been here over sixteen years and they’re nowhere near filling it up.
Meanwhile, (much) closer to home…

Yesterday there was one mouse frozen in the porch’s very busy bucket trap. I determined to wait till it melted in the afternoon to get it out, then the chore completely slipped my mind. This morning there were three drowned and frozen bodies there.
Which means two separate rodents climbed the ramp to the inviting liquid in the bucket, looked down on their very dead cousin, and each of them said to itself in turn, “Wow, look how well that worked out for him. Can’t wait to try it myself.”
This is like the third time this has happened – since cleaning the bucket trap is not my favorite chore and easily forgotten. And every time I am struck by the apparent fact that I have actually located and identified a species of creature stupider than a chicken – which is quite a sight to see.