How to make your little obsessions presentable

Published 2025-09-21

tag(s): #random-thoughts #pic#pic

A couple days ago I took the recycling to the garage and realized I finally managed to complete my masterpiece.
We don't drink that much soda, so it took a few weeks of not getting this particular bin out to have enough cans to do it:

Cans of soda neatly arrange at the bottom of a trash can. Only one of them is unopened.
(direct link to image)

I took the picture because I found it funny. Or rather, slightly funny. Amusing?
Amusing. 👍

For a couple weeks, this was my private recycling project. I would forget about it, until I headed downstairs and I was like "oh right! I wonder how much longer until I finish it."
Once, earlier in the project, either the kiddo or my wife took some cans to the recycling bin. I had to repair my work. In their defense, this was early enough that you could see it and not realize there was a deliberate effort going on.
Or maybe they didn't even look, because who takes the time to arrange the garbage? (Not that it was much time, a few seconds once or twice a week, but still).

After taking a first picture, I had a stroke of genius. For a very low bar definition of genius.
I realized I could turn this really dumb thing into a work of modern art, and went ahead and replaced a single can for a unopened one.
My initial instinct was to put it right in the middle, then I figured it was more interesting[1] to have a random can replaced.

As for how to sell it, I have a few ideas. They all revolve around the obvious fact that the single unopened can is hard to tell from the others.
It could be about having little acts of rebellion and individuality in a society of "sames".
Or something about consuming and wasting too much, like, in a sea of waste, there are drops of useful things that we don't even look at.
Could it be about mental health? Like, the one that feels left out...?

To wrap this up

This was a waste of time. Unless you happen to want me to arrange cans for you.
Then I am a specialist in can sculpture.

Footnotes
  1. Yes, I really used in my internal speech the word "interesting" to refer to my made up piece of modern art.

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