Expressway: Do you know these litterbugs?

Note to litterbugs: It's time to clean up your act.

The odd, but often proffered excuse that someone else will do it, doesn't work anymore.

Because guess what: In this age of draconian government budget cuts, and less cleanup, you are it.

When you leave trash on the street or highways, chances are it will remain there for weeks, if not months, or until it is blown somewhere else by the next nor'easter.

I watch as Long Island's once pristine highways and major streets fill with litter. Not only do wildflowers bloom in the spring, but so does the litter tossed by careless and thoughtless motorists and pedestrians. Winter used to provide a respite from the detritus on the grass, but last February when rounding an exit off the Southern State I spotted an abandoned fast-food bag, apparently with empty containers inside, sitting upright on a snowpack.

More than ever we need to do our part to keep this beautiful Island clean. Some people might say my pleas won't make any difference. But I think it's worth the effort because the litterbugs are out of control. And they are morphing into too many subspecies. Here are a few:

Supermarket bugs: The species of shoppers that discards coffee cups on shelves in supermarkets. I spotted a cup when I looking for brown sugar recently in my local market.

Fast-food bugs: Particularly active. See mention above.

Butt bugs: Smokers who fling cigarette butts out the window on the highway or blithely stamp them out on sidewalks and walk away. Many of them decry how little understanding people have of their addiction. But their flinging butts willy-nilly might help to explain some of the anger about their habit.

Moving-picture bugs: These are litterers who never leave a movie theater as they found it. Some walk away from half-filled tubs of popcorn and leftover sodas. Sure, ushers clean, but sometimes not as quickly as they should. Thus, a new audience is left to sit among the filth.

Gummy bugs: They're real pests whose improper disposal of wads of chewing gum on sidewalks or supermarket floors leaves sticky, disgusting messes underfoot for everyone else.

And the morphing doesn't stop there because perpetrators never run out of things to discard or inappropriate ways to do it. Here are two other subspecies:

Cart bugs: These park their unloaded shopping carts behind others' cars. "How am I supposed to get out?" I asked someone after I nabbed her in the act. She just shrugged her shoulders as if to say, "I don't know, and I don't care."

Clotheshorse bugs: They trash dressing rooms with myriad outfits they don and doff and leave behind. They believe it's the dressing-room attendant's job to tidy up. But how many retailers have enough help to make sure their dressing rooms are presentable to each customer? Few, if any.

These are not the biggest problems the Island faces. But litter is a quality-of-life issue that matters day after day. So, I am appealing to my fellow Long Islanders who litter: Stop the madness. The litter safety net is frayed.