The dump nazi, we thought, trembling as she chastised us for tossing the plastic Bubble Wrap into the wrong bin, which she angrily retrieved with a grappling hook and returned to the back of our pickup truck.

“Bulk,” she said, “take it to bulk,” along with those plastic flowerpots, a couple of mop handles, a battered plastic chair and a plastic bag of kitty litter, used.

Our trip to the Ultimate Transfer Station, located in southern Maine where people apparently do what they’re told and snap to doing it, offered many challenges, not the least of which was restraining the urge to knock the attendant’s teeth out with a mop handle. Or envelop her in Bubble Wrap and then pop each bubble, one by one.

The many bins were clearly marked, and the people in southern Maine – the dump lemmings, we’ll call them -marched in line to each bin, stuffing flattened cardboard boxes through the 4-inch slot, then moving en masse to the containers marked “paper” or “household garbage” or “plastic.”

That was the problem: the plastic containers the dump nazi guarded so they wouldn’t fill up, we assume, and have to be carted off by the bulldozers and trucks zigzagging around the transfer station, making mounds disappear while dodging the lemmings who waited in line for the chance to show off the dump stickers on their vehicles.

The plastic containers, into which other folks threw soap jugs or milk bottles or a variety of gaudy-colored items, were off-limits to us, for some unknown reason, no matter how hard we tried to follow directions, walk the straight and narrow and join the lemmings. We even dropped two pair of boots into the bin marked “Salvation Army,” before moving down the line to the plastic bin, where we deposited three empty six-packs of plastic that earlier held pansies.

We did nothing wrong yet stood accused of violating the Ultimate Transfer Station dictates, for which we were punished by having cigarette smoke blown in our face while being chewed out till our shoulders slumped in shame.

Waiting in line for permission to enter the “bulk” section of the Ultimate Transfer Station, we pondered the environmental and economic benefits we were witnessing as machinery and people moved like robots across the barren acreage. Our truck would be weighed, our items would be declared as though we were crossing the border at Calais, and we’d move down the assembly line, past the discarded brush and dried Christmas trees, past the piles of wood, around the rows of sheet metal, past the glass and brass, past the stack of toilets, around the appliances, and finally to a safe spot to unload the damnable Bubble Wrap that had so successfully protected old china dishes.

“Don’t take that milk can,” another dump attendant yelled. “You have to weigh out and then come back in to get it,” said the grumpy old man puffing on his cigar.

We abandoned the milk can notion altogether, anxious to get out of the maze and be free from intimidation.

And we couldn’t wait to get back Down East, where we pay plenty for solid waste disposal and recycling – and an additional $1.50 for each yellow garbage bag.

We’re just tickled to death to pay for curbside pickup, despite not having curbs.