Pet Peeve of the Week: Phone Book Deliveries

As you could probably guess from the lack of entries on this site over the last month or so, I've been pretty busy. The good news is that I now have a long list of things I want to write about, so I hope to return to a semi-regular posting schedule soon. And what better way is there for me to get back into the old swing of things than to complain about something?

About a half hour ago, I was heading home from the vet with my sick (again) dog, and what did I see but a huge truck parked outside a nearby apartment complex, and two guys taking out stacks and stacks of new telephone books to drop off at each entryway.

Now, I don't know how it is where you live, but here in Chicago it seems like we get two HUGE phone books -- the yellow pages and the white pages -- about every other month. Thankfully, people on my block now have a recycling program, so I'm hoping that everyone's making use of it when they chuck out their old phone books. But that doesn't change the fact that a ton of paper's being wasted and countless trees are being mowed down to print these directories in the first place. I seriously don't remember the last time I cracked open a phone book... I just Google-search any place I want to eat or visit or whatnot, and up pops its address, phone number and (most likely) web site URL.

Do you still use and phone book, and if so, why, for the love of God, WHY?!?

Everyone's talking about the death of newspapers and the decline of printed media, yet there's no end in sight for these freakin' twenty-pound monsters. Why are they still being printed in such quantity and with such frequency?

Unlike junk mail or telemarketing calls, I don't know of any way to "unsubscribe" from getting the phone book. So I guess for now I'll continue to build a bit of arm muscle every time I take one from my doorstep to the recycling bin in the back.