Our garbage is supposed to be collected on Monday mornings.

You�ll note the use of the word �supposed� there.

On Sunday evenings everyone pulls their wheelie bins and recycling boxes out on to the footpath to await collection in the morning. Sometimes the trucks have already been by when I leave for work, other days they don�t come until later in the morning. Either way the bins generally sit out until Monday evening when the street returns from work and searches up and down the street to find the right bin and the right box and drag them back in again.

Which is exactly what was happening as I walked down the street on my way home from work on Monday. Expect that as the guy a few feet in front of me on the street went to pull his bin in he discovered it disconcertingly full. This caused both of us to glance around and notice what we hadn�t up until that point: the garbage and recycling had not been collected.

The bins, boxes and stacks of newspapers were all still sitting in neat little rows, instead of having been emptied and discarded all over the road and footpath by the garbage trucks.

Hmmm. The guy and I looked at each with pursed lips and equally puzzled expressions that indicated that neither of us had received notice of a change in the collection day, or a strike or dispute of any kind. Maybe they were just really really late.

The next morning the bins were still there, full, when I left for work. Once I got into the city proper, which is governed by the same council as my house, it became apparent that our neighbourhood wasn�t the only one suffering from a lack of garbage collection. A single weekday without the regular collection had left virtually every bin in the city over-flowing with garbage. Not to mention all the wheelie bins that businesses had put out to be collected.

It was unattractive first thing in the morning. It was much more unattractive by the time lunch time arrived, and the temperature hit an unseasonably high 30 degrees (celsius).

Having still heard no mention of any strike on the news, I went to the Melbourne City Council website. I was mildly surprised to discover that the information I sought was instantly accessible on the front page of the site. And yes, I do tend to be cynical, why do you ask? I was led directly to a press release (which clearly had not been picked up by the press) that confirmed a dispute and strike. It also contained the following fabulous advice:

�The City of Melbourne has a contingency plan to cope with events of this nature to ensure public health and safety are not compromised in any way. The City of Melbourne will implement this plan if the dispute remains unresolved.

If the contingency plan is implemented, plastic bags will be placed over public litter bins when they are full. The bags will carry a label asking people to take their litter home.�

That�s right, if the strike goes on too long, we have to take our garbage home with us!

In my case to a house which is also subject to the garbage strike.

I might also add that as of half an hour ago the strike still wasn�t resolved and the garbage bins on the street in front of my building are overflowing completely, but are not yet covered in plastic bags, which makes me wonder how far they intend to let this go before deeming it necessary to implement the �contingency plan�. Particularly after yesterday�s warm weather.

The whole city doesn�t quite stink yet, but I think we�ve only got another twenty-four hours before everything ripens sufficiently to bring us to that point.

The pungency has already started in my street, where we�ve have been advised to leave our bins sitting on the footpath to gather flies until they�re collected. They�re not overflowing yet, but coming into a long weekend where there will be many foil wrappers, colourful boxes with oval holes cut in them, and the proceeds of a long weekend�s boozing, er, celebrating various religious holidays and/or cable TV marathons, to throw out, I imagine it�s not going to be long before my entire walk to work is going to be accompanied by stink.

I wonder what �contingency plan� is going to be implemented then. Taking our garbage into the office perhaps?