I Love Trash!

[holmesuser01]

A few months ago, I was trolling trash when I found a Kirby Generation III vacuum cleaner with all the attachments sitting on the curb infront of a home. I slammed on the brakes and went back and got it. The previous owner stood at the door and just watched me pick it up, and didnt even wave back when I smiled and waved at them.

The kicker was when I got it home. I opened the car trunk and got the smell of dogs**t instantly. Guess what they used it for? Anyway, I washed the bag and scrubbed the parts out and it is now quite presentable as a very nice example of a $1500 vacuum, and I use it daily. Only have had to replace the fan impeller. It runs and smells like new. Good thing I can stand the stench! I would have dropped it off somewhere else if I couldn't!

I got a cute little RCA B/W 17" tube set a couple of years ago. It works just fine after I dried it out.

[rca2000]

In the 30 or soyears I have been routing(including long before I could drive, where I routed on foot, by bicycle, or had someone drive me) I have been threatened with arrest, chased, and even been threatened with a GUN, by one WOMAN!!, for "curb shopping".

As for the pigs(yes I DID say that, as that is how I have been treated by most of them!!) I have been searched personally, had my car searched more than once, and wanrned that I could be charged with THEFT by one pig in Mt. Healthy, who could finid nothing better to do than call FIVE of his buddies in to harass and question me, a "hardened criminal, "(that is how they made it seem anyway), and finally, allowed me back to my car, and they all LAUGHED about things, and gave me a $74 dollar ticket for NO front plate, as that is ALL they could charge me with!!

Has ANY of that stopped me from my "shopping" trips?? Heck NO!! I do not route much in Mt. Healthy, though. Most of the time in other communities when the police see me, they just go about their business and leave me alone. But not those pigs in Mt. Healthy, Middletown or Morrow!! (in 1987, I had one play that same game with me, and finally admit that i was "not doing anything illegal", before he let me go.) Nonetheless, I continue to take my chances, as there is WAY too much good stuff out there, too often, to pass up!!

[Chad Hauris]

I remember when collecting TV's from the trash during large item pickup in Ohio...you could get a lot the night before but often people didn't put stuff out till the morning so it was a mad dash in the morning to load the TV's, record players etc before the trash man came. I can remember being about 16 yrs old and lifting huge RCA consoles into Dad's toyota corolla station wagon by myself.
Now I am the official TV collector for the yearly Texas Recycles Day in Midland, TX. Always get a good amount of TV's and even still some tube type sets.
There is no "curbside" pickup of any trash in this area. In the city you put it in a dumpster in the alley...in the country you have to haul to the dump yourself or have your own dumpster with a private trash hauler.
Speaking of Kirby vacuums I have gotten plenty from thrift stores for $3-5 each, still working fine.

[NowhereMan 1966]

Originally Posted by rca2000

In the 30 or soyears I have been routing(including long before I could drive, where I routed on foot, by bicycle, or had someone drive me) I have been threatened with arrest, chased, and even been threatened with a GUN, by one WOMAN!!, for "curb shopping".

As for the pigs(yes I DID say that, as that is how I have been treated by most of them!!) I have been searched personally, had my car searched more than once, and wanrned that I could be charged with THEFT by one pig in Mt. Healthy, who could finid nothing better to do than call FIVE of his buddies in to harass and question me, a "hardened criminal, "(that is how they made it seem anyway), and finally, allowed me back to my car, and they all LAUGHED about things, and gave me a $74 dollar ticket for NO front plate, as that is ALL they could charge me with!!

Has ANY of that stopped me from my "shopping" trips?? Heck NO!! I do not route much in Mt. Healthy, though. Most of the time in other communities when the police see me, they just go about their business and leave me alone. But not those pigs in Mt. Healthy, Middletown or Morrow!! (in 1987, I had one play that same game with me, and finally admit that i was "not doing anything illegal", before he let me go.) Nonetheless, I continue to take my chances, as there is WAY too much good stuff out there, too often, to pass up!!

Yeah, sounds like you had a lot of run-ins there with overzealous cops. I don't do much curb hunting myself but I do keep my eyes peeled for electronic things and computers. I got hold of a motherboard with Pentium III capability and I plan on making a "Franken-Computer" out of it. What limits me is space and I don't want to get mom mad at me for hauling home more junk so to me, it will have to be a "must have or die."

From what I've learned at Business Law in college, once it is on the curb, it is fair game.

I know here in Penna, we only need a license plate on the back, but yeah, there are cops out there, especially local ones, who try to look for anything to pin on anyone, doubly so if they are in a rotten mood.

[captainmoody]

I have heard horror stories before about people yelling, cops and all that as well. The last thing I want to do is fight with someone over garbage! I have never had a problem, but almost always go to the door and ask first.
What I did years ago was ask if it was out in the trash and that I could use it for parts as I was a repairman. Always had good responses, many times the owner would help me load it even! Quite often I would get other non-working sets they had or they would need repairs on other tv's in the house. Made a lot of friends that way as well!
I think that if you approach people in a friendly way about the items on the curb they are more than happy to give them to you. Plus, if you let them know you can help them with any electronic repairs in the future (vcr cleaning, repair discount) it gives them something back. Never have I paid money for any curb finds. I have dealt with a wide range of people in the business world for 30 years now and have gotten to know how to deal with all types of people pretty well. Of course, I no longer do any regular picking so maybe people have gotten grumpier lately? If I happen to be driving somewhere like I was several weeks ago and find something than so be it. But gas is too expensive and my car unreliable to drive my old routes anymore...

[Whirled One]

It's amazing how many people around here go "cruising for trash" on these special bulk waste / clean-up days. It almost seems like a neighborhood gathering 'event' in some areas. You see the same people driving up and down the streets looking for stuff out on the curb the night before the pick-up day. Sometimes people can get a bit carried away, though, as shown in the attached photo of a vehicle I saw last year on one of these trash days.

I've never seen anyone get upset when picking up trash items from the curb. As a matter of fact, many people seem to try to encourage people to take large items (by putting signs on things like "Works!" or "Free!"). That might be because even on bulk-trash days around here, I think some cities still charge for removal of certain types of large appliances (refrigerators, for example), even though it's otherwise pretty much a free-for-all in terms of what you can set out on the curb on those days.

By the way, I've noticed a surprising number of not-all-that-old PCs on the curb so far this year, including several PIII-class machines in the 500-800 MHz range. I've usually left them alone (unless there was something else interesting with them), but tonight I found in front of one house an Athlon 1.0 GHz (Sony VAIO) *and* a very new-looking Celeron 2.7 GHz (Compaq) machine, and couldn't resist. Haven't tested the Sony yet, but the Compaq works fine. I've only powered it up briefly, but it appears to have a bunch of spyware installed on it bogging down the system, perhaps that's why it was tossed away. I guess even a personal computer has become "disposable" enough that people will just throw away a perfectly good PC just because of something like that...