h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The 'e' of Defra? Ah, now, that's... environment? Elephants? Egg-plants?

"I don't think I've annoyed anyone too much yet..."

Then you're obviously not trying hard enough

And, sadly, it wasn't a fried mars bar pizza, but a prawn sandwich (with prawns that were probably frozen and reheated in a microwave... clever )

E-coli, actually....

Turns out that working there is a bloke-magnet! I was on the tube this evening reading a paper on recycling targets when the young chap next to me leaned over and said, "Do you work for a local council then?".

He then proceeded to chat me up on the subject all the way to Finchley Road, where I escaped with some relief. Not because he wasn't cute, but because it felt weird trying to flirt in lines such as "delivering policy on municipal waste is often hampered by the two-tier nature of local government".

There must be a thread somewhere about 'unlikely chat-up lines'. "Do you work for a local council" would win hands-down!

And you deal in municipal waste, do you?

OOooo yes! And not just municipal! There's industrial, commercial, hazardous, biodegradable, agricultural, electrical, packaging...

Waste is an extremely complex area, actually; there's a huge amount of EU and domestic legislation on waste, zillions of different organisations are involved in its management, and nobody wants to live next to a waste management facility so it's a planning nightmare.

So just think about that next time you take the bin out!

I think you've the makings of a nice little unhealthy obsession there

And 'taking the bins out' involves dragging a black bag down three flights of stairs on my way to work and leaving it *near* the communal bins because they've just put a locked gate around them and neglected to give me a key

Well, that's not the government's fault.

Perhaps they are trying to keep out the Compost Snatchers, a gang that has been terrorising London with its brazen theft of biodegradable municipal waste from innocent households and using it to fund their illegal but lucrative trade in natural fertilizers.

If I want to blame the government for it I shall

And you're joking about the compost snatchers? Mind you, if they're looking for vegetable waste, they're not going to find much in my rubbish, such is the shocking state of my diet at the moment