Life is a busy place, with salmon to catch, women to be courted, kids to be raised, lawns to be cut, a job to raise money to do all of the above -- you get the idea. The list seems to get longer each year and it is often hard to fit a little fun into the schedule like a spin on Beluga Lake in the winter or a relaxing day on the water in the summer.

And now a new event to fill one of those rare Saturday mornings, Electronic Recycling -- why bother, just take stuff to the landfill and go for a hike. I mean over the last year you've only accumulated a couple of busted cell phones, and that old VHS player that doesn't work any more, and the TVs that were replaced by the plasma screens and new-fangled digital signals, and the old Windows 98 Gateway and its big monitor. Oops, almost forgot the defunct microwave, the printer in the basement that stopped working two years ago and those long fluorescent bulbs that they won't take at the landfill.

The easy route is to take them all to the landfill, it's not illegal yet and you might be able to sneak the tubes by the guy who watches if you take them on a real cold day when he is inside. Besides, you already pay for the landfill in your taxes and you're not sure about actually paying someone to take your old stuff. And that would be it -- it all becomes someone else's problem

But then you did read that article about all of the poisonous stuff in electronics: like lead, the TVs and computer in your pile have somewhere between 12 and 24 pounds of the stuff. And you've read that it takes very little lead to cause brain damage in kids, and your neighbor and his four kids live fairly close to the landfill and they have a well -- maybe some of that lead could end up in their water?

And mercury -- when the fluorescent tubes break after they drop off the conveyor belt that mercury-laden vapor might blow into their yard, and it's even worse than lead.

The article also mentioned chlorinated solvents, brominated flame retardants, PVC and all kind of unintelligible junk -- it called them "neurotoxins," which sounds pretty scary. Messing up your neighbor's kids' brains doesn't sound like a neighborly thing to do.

On the other hand, if you load all of your old electronics in the back of the 4x4 and take them to Spenard's, pay them a few bucks to dismantle it all safely and send the parts to where they can be safely reused you can help keep your neighbor's kids safe. It sounds like a good alternative, and you'll still have the rest of the afternoon to watch the kids get a little early-season Little League practice and then drive out on the Spit and get a brew at the Salty Dawg.

Better mark that on the calendar -- April 25 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Robert Burns is an electrical engineer by education and sailor by avocation. He also is one of the promoters of Homer's electronics recycling day.