No Thanks

In Calgary, if you want to return your empty beer bottles for a refund, you don't take them back to the place you bought them. You have to schlep them back to one of the "Bottle Depots". Or "Derelict Depots" as I've been known to call them.

When I first got here I made the mistake of taking my bottles to the Downtown Bottle Depot. [pictured here. The sign says Uptown Bottle Depot, but don't let that trick you.]

Holy moley, it was like a scene out of Blade Runner. Everyone had their own shopping buggy, shredded (and smelly, I must add) clothing and generally with one limb or eye missing.

So I wheel in in my late model car, golf shirt and penny loafers carrying two cases of bottles. I know how a gazelle must feel on the Serengeti during a prolonged drought. All eyes (or eye, as the case may be) swung towards me. I felt I should drag one leg behind me as I went in. However, I got in and out, but no more bottle recycling for me.

So now I just throw them in the river. After I've taken a poop down there, of course.