Teams
Forum List
Toggle sidebar

Friday OT #2 - Dumpster Diving

Angie

Angie

Tugboats and arson.
Staff member
SuperFanatic
SuperFanatic T2
Mar 27, 2006
28,168
12,837
113
IA
I got a $100 gift certificate to Target for a photography session I did for some friends. My boss and I were discussing yesterday how we both hate going into grocery stores and no stores. I mentioned that I have to hit up Target this weekend, and she reminded me it is move-in weekend for apartments. All those parents optimistically buying cleaning supplies…

What is your take on dumpster diving? Have you ever grabbed anything from the side of the road? What was it, and was it worth the experience?

I used to have a coworker in her upper 50s who made it a sport on move-out day to go through all the dumpsters in Campustown and grab stuff (really nasty pots and pans, etc). She would take the day off of her well-paying job to do it. The practice always struck me as a great way to contract hepatitis at her age!
 
I don’t dumpster dive. Have to draw a line somewhere.

In my younger days, I “curb shopped”.

In college there was always a couch available that was better than the one you had at the time. Call it an upgrade.

In the Dirty, curb day would bring out a host of folks “shopping”. It was quite a spectacle, even parade like.
 
  • Like
  • Haha
Reactions: Angie and CYdTracked
I remember move out days at college so many lofts just got tossed to the curb. My dad and I would grab any good lumber we could get our hands on and put in the truck as we always had a use for it on the farm. I get some of the people throwing stuff out at move out just didn't have a way to store it or transport it home but was so much good lumber just sitting on the curb that felt like a waste if people didn't grab it before it went to the dump. I guess lofts are provided in all the dorms now I see so this probably isn't a thing anymore.
 
  • Like
Reactions: carvers4math and Angie
One of my sons still has a chair in his living room that someone didn’t want to move at his Ames apartment complex seven years ago.

When we lived in West Des Moines, this was an event. Good way to get rid of stuff you hate too. We had a beautiful back yard with a range of strange statuary including two little kids who looked like children of the corn. Husband moved the girl statue to the curb and before he could return with the boy, she was gone. Then boy statue was gone before he could lug out what we referred to as the Shinto shrine. We grabbed a neighbor’s spindly chair with a warped back, took the back off, and I still use it as a plant stand on the three season porch.
 
  • Like
Reactions: NWICY and Angie
I've never picked anything up off the side of the road, but I have put a few things there with "free" signs.

Former in-laws were the champs at it. FIL would take a couple of the kids out at night, and shove one INTO the Salvation Army box to get good stuff out. One of them reads this board...
 
  • Like
Reactions: Angie
carvers4math said:
One of my sons still has a chair in his living room that someone didn’t want to move at his Ames apartment complex seven years ago.

When we lived in West Des Moines, this was an event. Good way to get rid of stuff you hate too. We had a beautiful back yard with a range of strange statuary including two little kids who looked like children of the corn. Husband moved the girl statue to the curb and before he could return with the boy, she was gone. Then boy statue was gone before he could lug out what we referred to as the Shinto shrine. We grabbed a neighbor’s spindly chair with a warped back, took the back off, and I still use it as a plant stand on the three season porch.
Click to expand...

It feels like there are some things that are way safer to grab than others. Silverware, pots and pans - that sort of freaks me out with corroded metal and spit germs everywhere, and who knows if they cleaned it. A statue would be hilarious!
 
Unless you're totally broke, I can't see any reason to dumpster dive. 1. avoidance of collecting things you don't need/won't use. 2. sanitation.
 
For garbage day I was dragging our old bed to the curb. A car drove by and asked if there was a box spring also. I said yes and a frame when I’m done. The driver offered to help carry them out. I told him I’m good (thought to myself, anyone who is willing to take a used bed I don’t want in my house). It was gone minutes after it was put out.
 
Angie said:
I got a $100 gift certificate to Target for a photography session I did for some friends. My boss and I were discussing yesterday how we both hate going into grocery stores and no stores. I mentioned that I have to hit up Target this weekend, and she reminded me it is move-in weekend for apartments. All those parents optimistically buying cleaning supplies…

What is your take on dumpster diving? Have you ever grabbed anything from the side of the road? What was it, and was it worth the experience?

I used to have a coworker in her upper 50s who made it a sport on move-out day to go through all the dumpsters in Campustown and grab stuff (really nasty pots and pans, etc). She would take the day off of her well-paying job to do it. The practice always struck me as a great way to contract hepatitis at her age!
Click to expand...
Daughter cant move in until the 15th.
 
  • Informative
Reactions: Angie
Early 2000s, Cedar Rapids introduced a very short lived garbage day. One day you could set out anything. As you would expect, it was a disaster, but the surreal part was the number of people curb shopping. Loads of people cruising up and down neighborhood streets going through everyone's garbage.
 
  • Agree
Reactions: CascadeClone
Angie said:
It feels like there are some things that are way safer to grab than others. Silverware, pots and pans - that sort of freaks me out with corroded metal and spit germs everywhere, and who knows if they cleaned it. A statue would be hilarious!
Click to expand...
I kind of agree with you on silverware and pots and pans. I wouldn’t grab them, but then I think how really different is that then eating in a restaurant?
 
  • Agree
Reactions: Angie
I've taken numerous discarded computers and the like home. I take them apart and sell the components on eBay. Some stuff is perfectly usable in todays world. Other stuff is purchased by collectors (I sold an 8-inch floppy disk drive to a museum in California). There are electronic musicians who look for vintage, 1990's-ish sound cards. And there seems to be a subculture that enjoys running 25-year old hardware just for fun. So lots of stuff sells.

Any circuit board type part that doesn't sell on eBay can be sold to companies that recover the gold and other precious metals.

Stuff like the case can just go to the metal scrap yard where they pay around 8-cents a pound (depending on current scrap markets). Not a lot but in my mind it's better than landfilling it. I usually take a trunkload at a time, so it will basically buy me lunch somewhere better than fast food, but faster than good food.

I won't be quitting my full-time job, but it brings in a couple hundred dollars a month and I feel good about diverting it from the landfill.
 
  • Like
Reactions: wxman1, Bocy, NWICY and 3 others
BCClone said:
I have to block my thoughts when using restaurant silverware, otherwise I struggle to eat.
Click to expand...
Me too. One of many reasons I think that other than when necessary when traveling, husband and I are just going to continue doing take out only. No one stopping at our table to chat. No Hawks. No constantly refilled garbage food we don’t need like chips. No worrying about whether the dog is destroying the house. And not using a fork that two million other people had in their mouths and who knows how it’s washed.
 
BCClone said:
I have to block my thoughts when using restaurant silverware, otherwise I struggle to eat.
Click to expand...
I always feel like they think I'm a child when I request a straw, but I just don't want to put my mouth on a restaurant glass.

I think a lot of people furnish their stock of silverware from restaurants though. A group of friends and I go to dinner at a place once every couple weeks. One week, one guy got a box to take his leftover food home in. Another guy was basically sneaking silverware from the table into the first guys to-go box. Later that evening we all got a text about how much he hates us and he's never stolen anything before and now he a thief because he discovered the silverware in the box. So, a couple weeks later, we're joking about it again at the restaurant and getting a rise out of him again. I jokingly ask the waitress if they came up short on silverware a couple weeks ago. She said they do every night. They spend about $1,000 on silverware every 6 months. So we got to looking and bulk pieces of restaurant silverware is about $0.06 a piece. So they are buying around 16,000 pieces every six months. Assuming they are open every night for six months (182 days), they are replacing 87 pieces each day. Even if they are buying fancier stuff at double the cost and only losing 40 pieces a day, in my mind, that's a crazy number. I should ask at other restaurants, maybe it's typical?
 
  • Like
Reactions: BCClone and carvers4math
JayV said:
I always feel like they think I'm a child when I request a straw, but I just don't want to put my mouth on a restaurant glass.

I think a lot of people furnish their stock of silverware from restaurants though. A group of friends and I go to dinner at a place once every couple weeks. One week, one guy got a box to take his leftover food home in. Another guy was basically sneaking silverware from the table into the first guys to-go box. Later that evening we all got a text about how much he hates us and he's never stolen anything before and now he a thief because he discovered the silverware in the box. So, a couple weeks later, we're joking about it again at the restaurant and getting a rise out of him again. I jokingly ask the waitress if they came up short on silverware a couple weeks ago. She said they do every night. They spend about $1,000 on silverware every 6 months. So we got to looking and bulk pieces of restaurant silverware is about $0.06 a piece. So they are buying around 16,000 pieces every six months. Assuming they are open every night for six months (182 days), they are replacing 87 pieces each day. Even if they are buying fancier stuff at double the cost and only losing 40 pieces a day, in my mind, that's a crazy number. I should ask at other restaurants, maybe it's typical?
Click to expand...
Yep, I get a straw whenever possible. I got mono a little over a year ago. The only spot we could pin it to was a restaurant that I didn’t use a straw at. Otherwise We had not eaten out around the time I would have needed to catch it except there. I also wash my hand more than most people. So, I definitely always ask now.
 
A few days ago I was driving north on NE 14th on my way to Ankeny. Saw a guy getting into the dumpster at The Outer Limits.
I wonder what kind of magic treasures he found in there?
 
  • Haha
Reactions: cycloner29
You must log in or register to reply here.

Help Support Us

Become a patron
Top Bottom