Thinking of starting another trashy blog...

I have mentioned in online vanilla communities as well as here that I am fascinated by what people throw away. It appeals to my voyeur side, my thrifty side, my adaptive talents in re-purposing other's discards.

I have often thought it would be fun to keep track of the approximate retail value of what it is I find, maybe take a few pictures. I enjoy doing it even when I have no need financially to do so. In fact I am more likely to do so if it isn't a needful thing, I have nothing against those that do subsistence diving and have done so myself. Wen I am out lurking in the night and on the rare occasion I see another diver, I often try to discern whether they are a for profit salvage expert or someone just down on their luck. If the former I will swoop in ahead of them and feel no pangs of conscience in leaving the cupboard bare. If I see signs that someone else is frequenting the same dumpster I visit, I will set aside things that I don't need in a place they will see on their visit.

Lately it has been a subsistence thing for me. Business is non-existent. I was renegotiating the repayment of my mortgage with a couple of different reps at my mortgage holder's servicing agent. They found my estimate for groceries and sundries for 7 persons to be unrealistically low. It was in fact higher than I actually spend.

I am a supremely competent scrounge. I can find just about anything if I have the motivation to find it. Most people I relate this too, are a bit incredulous and envision the process to be much less pleasant than it actually is. There are dumpsters to avoid and dumpsters that are not often fruitful bit there are those that pay off like a gamblers dream of a broken slot machine.

Sometimes it is very predictable which will pay and which will not. I used to avoid the dollar store dumpster for example. If I don't want most of the stuff inside, why would I want the knick-knacks after they are chipped and broken and thrown out? I changed my mind one night years ago when I pulled 35 brand new Duncan brand yo-yo's still in the packaging.

Last night I was visiting the dumpster I consider my green grocer behind Safeway. I don't know if all Safeway's are this way, or if the affluence of the area is a factor, but they are very choosy about their produce. If an apple is too large or two small or misshapen much less bird-pecked it is culled. Anything even close to over-ripe is tossed. I find better produce in their dumpster than I can get INSIDE the produce departments of many other stores. The 18 wheeler was idling there so I cruised on by and hit the dollar store dumpster. I call it "neighbor trash" when people ignore the "no tresspassing" and "no dumping" signs and risk a $500 fine to illegally dispose of things behind stores. Somebody had 1/2 filled the otherwise nearly empty dumpster. I almost found out the hard way that some of it was a large plastic planter filled with glass shards. The kids regular ignore my threats of bodily harm and make off with my dive light. I was diving by the very bright display back light of my Motorolla blue-tooth enabled camera phone. The blue tooth I use less often then the glow of the screen.

After I negotiated my way into the dumpster safely I was able to see by the glow the labels on the cans. It turns out someone had thrown away 59 size #10 cans of long term food storage. I got flour, sugar, dried apples, rice, powdered milk and 2 gallons of canola oil. Once the semi-truck left and I got a 1/2 bushel of limes and a box of mixed apples, pomegranates and bananas.

Tonight I baked 4 loaves of very good white bread using nothing purchased but the yeast. I even sliced the bread with a bread knife that I got from one of my end-of-the-month apartment dumpster forays. Sliced bread really is the best thing.

I took a picture of the bounty for last night and had in mind I would cut and paste this entry for the post on the new diving log blog if I ever get around to starting it.