To pick up rubbish outside my house?

[zippedyzzzzooo]

I'm genuinely confused here re whether I'm crazy.
So, if there's rubbish from someone else's recycling or just random wrappers in my front garden/on the drive then I'll pick them up and put them in the wheelie bin.
Was at the in-laws on Saturday and as I was going into their house I noticed a dominos pizza leaflet on their front pavement. I picked it up and when they opened the door I said "this was blowing outside" and went to hand it to them.
They responded with "well it's not ours. We don't want it" and just stared at me holding it. I said "well shall I pop it in the bin?"
They replied "no. It's not ours" and told me to put it back where I found it.
I felt uncomfortable throwing litter back onto the floor (especially in front of my children) so I ended up putting it in the car and disposed of it when I got home.
Please tell me I'm not going crazy, and that normal people put other peoples rubbish in their own bin rather than let it blow down the street?!

I only handed it to them as I wasn't sure if they wanted it in their kitchen bin, or if they had a wheelie bin somewhere. I was expecting them to say "stick it in the wheelie bin, it's down the side path" for example.
They also don't recycle a single thing, which blows my mind. They do an extra 2 tip runs per week to get rid of their bin bags as they won't all fit in the wheelie bin.
And all sanitary towels and nappies get bagged and put in the dog poo bin down the road so they don't have to have them in their bin. Very strange.

YANBU. I bought a litter picker for the specific purpose of picking rubbish up outside our house. We live on the curve of a long road, so when it is windy or someones bin explodes we get a lot of litter/leaves getting trapped in our front garden. I use it to get under the shrubbery to get out all the plastic bits etc. We have on occasion had masks and stuff get trapped up in the bushes, so I don't fancy handling them.

I also see a man walking his dog and litter picking. It makes the whole road look nicer and cleaner.

Is their house generally a bit unkempt? Usually the houses I see with litter and stuff in the front garden are either obviously owned by elderly people, empty or just a bit scruffy (sorry no better way to put it really).

I don't understand why anyone would criticise you for clearing litter @Justanotherobserver but some people are just weird.

I used to join group litter picks and most people were delighted to see the place looking nicer but we did hear "You're doing someone out of a job" now and again. We weren't - one of the group was a local Councillor who freely admitted the Council wouldn't pay for any more street cleaners (smile)

I do it.
I do my road and Ibdo the little Green near me.
I fill a bag every refuse day.
I have a picker too, which I picked up in Lidl, which makes the job so easy.

Litter gives me the total rage.

No, their house is immaculate.
Although they do outsource all jobs, such as cleaning, gardening, handy man to change light bulbs, ironing lady, painter and decorator, seamstress etc etc.

We always did around our house, not more than once a month but it made a big difference. I wouldn't do it at someone else's house though - but their reaction was odd.

I am lucky that there is very little litter on my road, touch wood! However during storms and so on sometimes the recycling (paper, cardboard, cans etc.) spills out of upturned bins. Those who own the bin are quick to fix it up, but the neighbours will do it if no one else is around. All quite normal, and every little helps keep the road tidy, a joint effort!

I admire you OP. Keep on doing what you are doing and ignore the ILs attitude.

YANBU, I always pick any stray litter by my house. I couldn't help but watch fascinated through my kitchen window a neighbour who lives opposite and kicked a piece of litter away from the front of his house. It kept blowing back but rather than pick it up and bin it he spent ages trying to catch it under his foot and kick it further foot the street

Your in-laws are weird. I don't know how they would have coped if they lived in my house. My front garden always ends up with rubbish on windy days and after the last storm I picked up enough rubbish to fill two large black sacks, big cardboard boxes, loads of paper and polystyrene packaging, although I expect they would have just outsourced that as well.

Some people don't see rubbish /litter unless it is on their property. They see the end of their drive as the end of their responsibility completely.

I pick up litter on my own property but I wouldn’t pick it up on someone else’s and try and hand it to them! Leave them be. They’re allowed to make their own decisions.

I haven't got a front garden, just a couple of long planters alongside front door which opens straight onto street. If I left all the litter people drop there, we'd vanish under the weight. Your inlaws are VVVU. Awful people.

Anyone else old enough to remember Victor Meldrew listing all the stuff he had picked up out of his garden? And a Twix wrapper on the lawn. Sorry I digress of course you are not being unreasonable.

Yep. I do this too. If I see it, I pick it up. Good on you op.

Your inlaws are VVVU. Awful people

Oh for goodness sake! They are not awful people because they don’t do exactly what you do.

There they are, living their decent, law-abiding, perfectly normal lives, keeping their home immaculate, and their daughter in law turns up and tries to hand them some dirty crap she’s picked up of the ground and they don’t want to touch it, and now they’re “awful people”?

Leave the poor sods alone.

I wouldn't have wanted to handle someone else's rubbish. I have OCD so I would need to wear disposable gloves to do so. Maybe your PIL don't have OCD but maybe they're concerned about Covid at the moment or something?

YANBU i do the same

@HeddaGarbled

Your inlaws are VVVU. Awful people

Oh for goodness sake! They are not awful people because they don’t do exactly what you do.

There they are, living their decent, law-abiding, perfectly normal lives, keeping their home immaculate, and their daughter in law turns up and tries to hand them some dirty crap she’s picked up of the ground and they don’t want to touch it, and now they’re “awful people”?

Leave the poor sods alone.

Yes, that's what I was thinking. I would absolutely hate to open the door to someone handing me someone else's dirty rubbish!

@HeddaGarbled

Your inlaws are VVVU. Awful people

Oh for goodness sake! They are not awful people because they don’t do exactly what you do.

There they are, living their decent, law-abiding, perfectly normal lives, keeping their home immaculate, and their daughter in law turns up and tries to hand them some dirty crap she’s picked up of the ground and they don’t want to touch it, and now they’re “awful people”?

Leave the poor sods alone.

They don't recycle. At all. I consider that awful.

They also don't recycle a single thing, which blows my mind. They do an extra 2 tip runs per week to get rid of their bin bags as they won't all fit in the wheelie bin.

And all sanitary towels and nappies get bagged and put in the dog poo bin down the road so they don't have to have them in their bin.

And would rather rubbish not be placed in their (unused) recycling bin and instead have it blowing about in the street. Sounds awful to me.

YANBU at all! I do this. I have some neighbour's down the road who put their paper recycling box out the night before, and some of it often blows about the pavement. If it's outside my house I collect it and put it in my recycling.

YANBU - but your in-laws are.

There they are, living their decent, law-abiding, perfectly normal lives, keeping their home immaculate, and their daughter in law turns up and tries to hand them some dirty crap she’s picked up of the ground and they don’t want to touch it, and now they’re “awful people”?

They are "awful people". OP offered to put the rubbish in the bin and they told her to put it back where she found it. They sound like idiots, and I would have been leaving the rubbish on their doorstep if they had said that to me.

My people!
Hoochydog and I pick up rubbish on our daily walks.
Someone said, 'If you walk past it, you accept it'
OP, you are not being unreasonable, but I would have just put it in their outside bin.

Yep, I litter pick where I live.

I think handing them the rubbish was really odd. Made more odd when you explain that you know exactly what they're like with recycling so it's obviously very unlikely that they'll be up for clearing rubbish from around their house/street

However I do what you do and clear up my street as I see the rubbish