1-800-Got Legal Pad Folder

In my never-ending quest to get the local 1-800-GOT-JUNK franchise to stop illegally littering the public right-of-way, I’ve come up with an irresistible new incentive.

I’ve concluded the 1-800-GOT-JUNK? people, based in Vancouver, B.C. (yes, you read that right. Canadians!) are a lost cause. Incorrigible.

And the local authorities, who, alas, have far worse (or is it "better") things to worry about, do zilch to enforce roadside littering laws.

No longer, dear reader, will I appeal to some goody-goody civic pride in taking back public space from irresponsible, corporate litter-bugs.

No, this incentive rewards you. Yes, you, personally. It's almost, but not quite, like money in the bank.

All you have to do is pull over, yank out these mini-billboards, and for the price of a strip of duct tape and a matter of seconds. . . .

Well, you'll see: the rewards are great!

Trust me on this.

I’ve always believed that the hard-plastic, corrugated raw material of your basic 1-800-GOT-JUNK? sign held huge recycling promise (Roofing shingles? Mortar boards? Floor tiles? Pizza platters?).

But it wasn’t until today, while out on my trusty motor scooter, that one of my frequent encounters with the nefarious signs led to a discovery with massive promise.

As with most great discoveries, this one was utterly serendipitous.

Because I was on the scoot, I draped the sign’s flimsy wire standard over my rearview mirrors. A bit awkward, but I had only three or four miles to scoot.

The sign itself would be impossible to carry unless — and here’s the key — I folded it. I decided to do a tri-fold and, by chance, got a perfect fold the first time. The corners lined up exactly. The package was close to being a tidy little square. It fit snugly in my bulbous, rear-mounted helmet carrier.

Once home I took a closer look at the tri-folded sign. A legal pad happened to be nearby. In our litigious society, it’s always good to have a legal pad handy. I have several scattered around the house — just in case.

Then it hit me. With a box cutter and good ol' duct tape, I could make myself a nifty 1-800-GOT-JUNK? legal pad folder.

The first folder took all of three minutes to make. That corrugated stuff is easy to slice.

I whipped out the second folder in half the time.

At the top of the photo (above) is the raw material (with dotted cut lines). The finished product, with white legal pad in place, is at the bottom.

So next time you spot one of these intrusive slabs along the roadside, think, “Wow, here’s my chance to make a great legal pad folder! I can't have too many of those!”

“1-800-Got-Junk?”

Not really.

Try 1-800-Got Legal Pad folder!