Thursday, December 13, 2007

free advice

If you are at home with your young children and you feel like your house is never going to get "completely" clean, or the laundry is never going to get "entirely" finished, or your To-Do list is never going to get "finalized", or you are never going to make a "gourmet" meal again ... don't sweat it.

It really is more important that you take your children for a walk, or build a fort with them, or teach them how to mix blue and yellow for green, or that you just sit and contentedly hold your infant because although your chores will always be there - your children will only be little once.

You might have heard that advice before.

But here's some advice you might have never heard.

If you move in to a neighborhood and plan on operating a carpet cleaning business out of your garage - just make sure that you don't live down the street from a woman who is employed as an environmental engineer and happens to be home from work on maternity leave. Because when she sees you illegally dumping your untreated water from the back of your big yellow carpet cleaning trucks in to the street and storm drain, she's going to go Erin Brockovich on you.

She would be the lady with the four small children and a zoom lens on her camera that was taking pictures of you, this morning. She would also be the one that considered, just for a moment, collecting an influent sample of discharge water in an empty baby food jar before it poured in to the storm drain.

And she'd also be the one that spent the better part of her children's nap time contacting the Homeowners Association, the City's Permit and Engineering Division, the County's Department of Environmental Health, and the State's Environmental Protection Agency.

Tomorrow, you might want to plan on a visit from the Regional Water Quality Control Board.

They can't wait to meet you.

22 comments:

  1. WHOO HOO! You GO girl!
    As a Homeowners Association Manager I want to THANK YOU for being involved. Wanna volunteer for a Board position? I have several Associations that could use a good citizen like you.
    : ) Ruth

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  2. .....singing in my best bratty voice......someone's gonna be in trouuuuuubllllllleeeee!

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  3. oooohhh, can't wait to hear wait tomorrow brings. Super Jen, protector of the envirnoment!

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  4. Good for you! I can't stand people who don't think rules apply to them. I just hope he doesn't know it is you who turned him in. Be careful!

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  5. EEEEWWWWWWWOOOOUU. I'm glad you were there to see it and document it. Yuk. I can't believe what people do sometimes (okay, most of the time).

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  6. I'm looking forward to reading some interesting blogs in the near future once he finds out who his neighbor is! I'm sure you'll have some great comebacks for whatever he throws your way!

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  7. This is so great. I hope you also get photos of various official vehicles outside their house tomorrow.

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  8. Jen, I love you! You go girl. You know I'm not this "enviromentalist" but I clean the house naturally and so when I'm dumping my mop water of white vinegar, baking soda, a couple drops of lemon essential oil and water down the driveway I love that it's OK for whoever may touch it. I wonder though if the neighbors think I'm dumping chemicals out there. :(

    Please update us on what happens. Good for you to keep a watch on the neighborhood. And yes, I love that I am sahm and get to savour my 2 boys all day. If something is not done, I have tomorrow to do it. My boys are always first. I got tears in my eyes when dh asked about my 4 1/2 yr old and what are we doing with school. You mean I can't keep him home for another 12 yrs? (well I could if I homeschooled). :) LOL

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  9. LOOK...UP IN THE SKY... IT'S A BIRD... IT'S A PLANE..
    NO, IT'S SUPER MOM - fighting rodents, poo, spit-up, and environmental hazards!

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  10. You better be quick with the updates now, girly!
    Go you!

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  11. Hmmm - please do share the fun tomorrow brings - pics too.

    Big brother is indeed watching.

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  12. Excellent work! I bet that is giong to be a very special visit that he gets...

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  13. Oh. MY. GOD.
    Good for you.

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  14. Good for you! I have a neighbor who has a HUGE bull mastif who freely roams the neighborhood day and night, and craps on my lawn. The other day he crapped on someone elses lawn, she picked up the poop in a shovel walked over to said neighbors house knocked on the door and when he opened it she ploped the crap down right there on his door step. Said if his dog does it again, she will report him. The dog is nice most of the time but has chased his share of UPS guys, about time one of us in the neighborhood grew a pair!

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  15. We are a manufacturer of equipment and products for the professional carpet cleaning industry.
    We teach our professional carpet cleaning customers to NEVER dump into the street or down a storm sewer. But, some in the industry don't seem to care.
    We've even heard of some cleaners dumping into retention ponds!
    We have an article about this at http://www.baneclene.com/articles/dirty-water.html.
    I hope the cleaner you spotted gets into BIG trouble!
    -- Don Terry, Chemist, V.P.
    Bane-Clene Corp.

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  16. That's awesome. You're awesome. :)

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  17. you ROCK!

    i'm an acoustical engineer and do the same thing re: sound... you go girl!

    jen (fourjmh)

    btw.. my son will be 1 next week.. can you believe it?

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