Grumble Goat · Mat Labotka & Veronique Hurley

Curbside Garbage

March 16, 2026·19 min·1 clip

Marianne says strangers keep turning her curbside garbage can into a dump for coffee, takeout, and dog poop.

1. Grumble Goat's "Curbside Garbage" opens on Marianne Goodell in Brooklyn complaining about the city-issued curbside garbage can outside her townhouse. 2. Marianne says Mayor Adams's ordinance forced residents to use a big black bag inside a curbside can instead of putting a loose bag on the street. 3. Matt Labodka introduces Grumble Goat as a show about "all the small things" that drive him insane. 4. Marianne explains that the garbage men lift out only the bag, leaving the can open on pickup day. 5. She says strangers drop half-filled coffee cups, takeout containers, and other loose trash into the open can. 6. She says she now has to tip over the deep can, empty the contents onto the sidewalk, and pick up other people's garbage by hand. 7. Marianne points to a dog-poop bag that was not closed and left poop floating in water at the bottom of the can. 8. She repeats that the can is "pristine" only until passersby treat it like a public bin. 9. Veronique Hurley joins the "What's got your goat?" segment after a bagel run and reacts to Marianne's guest spot. 10. Marianne says she won the guest spot at Amanda's fundraiser. 11. Matt says Grumble Goat Studios has already recorded all of season one of Prego My Lesbo and is now editing the rough cut. 12. Veronique says she likes "the return of audio theater" and compares it to old radio plays. 13. Marianne says she is an actor and the managing director of Hedwell Theater Company in Queens. 14. She says Hedwell Theater Company is producing Brandon Jacob Jenkins's The Comeuppance in Long Island City from April 17th to April 25th. 15. Marianne describes the play as a reunion story about high school friends in their late 30s and early 40s. 16. She says the characters were members of a multi-ethnic reject group called Merge. 17. The conversation turns to The Parlor Place, a devised project she made with director Dina Vavsi and Kyle Metzger. 18. Marianne argues that 1880s parlor plays let women participate in society and politics under the guise of a play. 19. Matt and Veronique connect the trash complaint to rat pressure, mandatory composting in Brooklyn, plastic waste, and materials that no longer break down cleanly. 20. The episode closes with a commercial-free pitch and a Patreon ask for Grumble Goat listeners.

As heard by us

A city-issued can turns other people's coffee into a small civic grievance.

A city-issued garbage can becomes a strangely public object once it is left at the curb, drawing half-finished coffee cups and open takeout containers into a townhouse bin that was meant to stay clean.

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Why you'd press play

For the person whose pristine curbside can keeps collecting someone else's coffee.

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