This, dear reader, is the inside of my trash can. Here's my story. When we moved into our house just a few months ago, we got a brand-new, shiny trash can, which was identical to our next-door neighbors' can, except for one thing: theirs was filthy, inside and out!

A few weeks ago, Lisa said "I think the neighbors took our garbage can, because the one we have now is a lot dirtier than the one we had." It was true. The cans stand next to each other by the street on garbage day, and maybe by "accident" they took our nice pretty, clean can, leaving us with the dirty one.

We waited for the right time to make the switch to get our can back. The next week it didn't work because they beat us to the cans on pickup day. The following week they were obviously home, and we didn't want to swap cans in broad daylight. Finally our time came the next week, and like thieves pulling off the heist of the century, we looked around and quickly pulled our nice, new can back to the house! And this was inside!

I don't know how they could have gotten this much gunk in there in just 3 weeks! What's that sticky stuff all over the sides? Why is there a big white sticker on the bottom? How can it smell like this after just three weeks of somebody else's garbage? With a little TLC, I think I can clean and shine this baby back to life. But I'll never be fully comfortable on garbage day again.