You probably didn’t notice it, but spring officially arrived on Friday morning, in all its cold, cloudy and rainy glory. The occasion made me think of a spring day 13 years ago when we were still living off of Hatch Rd. in North Penfield. Jack and I would take a walk every day around our neighborhood, and every spring would be dismayed at the number of advertising flyers that were littering the ground.
I actually wrote two blogs about that. The first was in 2012, and this follow-up a year later.
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Let the Litter Games Begin!
(Originally posted March 31, 2013)
Around this time last year I posted a blog about G&G Sealcoating and its marketing literature. Specifically, it was about how their marketing literature was strewn all over our neighborhood. In one two-day period last April, my husband Jack and I picked up almost 30 of the flyers along our regular two-mile walking route through the neighborhood. They had fluttered out of the newspaper boxes where they had been carelessly stuffed, extracted by the strong spring winds.
Since then, I’ve always considered this particular company to be King of the Litterers. I thought their neighborhood trashing record would stand forever.
But on Friday, it was in real danger.
On Friday afternoon, Jack and I were on that very same two-mile walk when we noticed a glossy white flyer at the side of the road. We thought at first our seal-coating friends had gotten an early start on their littering in defense of their title. But we were surprised to see it was an entirely new contender in the litter derby — a lawn care company. A little farther down the road we found a second. Then a third. We began to think that maybe, just maybe, this company was going to mount a serious challenge for the title.
All of a sudden we became much more vigilant as we walked, carefully inspecting lawns and bushes. At one point we split up along two conjoined side streets to cover more ground. Sure enough, by the time we met back up at the far end, we had both collected a handful of glossy white flyers. But we also had collected a handful of glossy green flyers.
Yes, ANOTHER lawn care company had joined the contest. Game on.
Things got serious. We started keeping score. White Lawn Care Company (WLCC) had the early lead by virtue of all the flyers from the early part of the walk. But Green Lawn Care Company (GLCC) quickly made up the deficit. Before long the score was neck-and-neck. There were several lead changes. By the time we got home we’d lost count, and we were honestly excited to see if WLCC had been able to pull it out in the end.
But it wasn’t to be. The final tally was 18 WLCC flyers, 19 GLCC flyers.
So our heartiest congratulations to Green Lawn Care Company. Their total was far short of Driveway Seal-Coating Company’s record-setting 30 flyers, but they CAN claim the title of “Most Prolific Neighborhood Litterer of the Spring” so far. Enjoy that winning feeling, GLCC, for it will be fleeting. Driveway Seal-Coating Company — King of the Litterers — should be rejoining the game in a week or two.
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Fortunately, I haven’t seen this issue cropping up in the village, but I wonder if it’s still happening in my old neighborhood?
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(posted 3/21/2026)
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