I found one of those expensive cyclone fans about 20 min ago. A neighbor moved back to France and left his apt with everything in it. Lots of other good stuff I had no use for.
Hope you still feel that way when the guy who died in it shows up and wants it back. 
Yeah, I’ve found a few good things in dumpsters.
… died getting a truly wonderful massage. 
Did it come with the happy ending attachment too?
My personal best find was a hunk of kitchen cabinets with the countertop still attached. It was exactly the right length to fit in my husband’s new workshop. He was finishing the drywalling on the day I stumbled across the cabinets. Shoved 'em into the rear of his hatchback, and he’s working on that countertop as I type.
Years ago (maybe 15?) I saw this antique short dresser, almost Shaker style, out at the curb. In Pittsburgh, this is no biggie – lots of old homes and old people means even antique furniture is almost a thow-away unless its really something special. Thing was I already was using two identical styled pieces and this would give me the full set. I knocked and they were indeed out for trash so I loaded them in the car and went home.
The drawer bottoms were shot so first thing I did was get everything lined up in my little work shop for repair. In taking everything apart I saw something glint in the back wall of the body proper. Here, hidden in the rails, were several Finnish gold pieces. At the time (cheap gold) value still added up to like $300.
I had this bad tinge of honesty and took them back to where I had gotten the dresser. I knocked and the same guy answered and I explained what I had found and offered them back to him.
“Those aren’t mine”
Well, honest – they were partly hidden and without really taking things apart you couldn’t -----
“I said those aren’t mine dammit and get away from me or I’m calling the fucking cops!!!”
OK. I tried.
Still had them when gold hit the one big jump and got almost $3000 for the bunch.
I’ve found other things in furniture and stuff but that one is always going to stick in my brain.
(PS – at the coin shop I work at we have a guy who brings in a shoe-box or two of old currency every couple years. We identify it all and then buy it from him. He recycles mattresses.)
The kind where the depth is about the length of the top bone in your thumb? I’m used to seeing those for herbals. My mother has a couple of gorgeous sets, heirlooms from different sources.
Not from a dumpster, but I once got a bed for free from a coworker. In turn, the best hand me down I’ve given was a microwave oven, a bunch of mismatched kitchen items, several pots and pans, and an ancient sofa bed (this last one had been a hand me down from my mother), to someone who had just left her parents’ home for the second time (she’d gotten a job back in our home town after college, her parents refused to accept that “mid-20s” counts as “grown up”); she was absolutely extatic, kept bouncing up and down.
The office chair I’m using right now came from outside the property manager’s office. That’s where this part of the condo complex dumps its oversized trash.
Dag! I just bought my husband an iJoy massage chair for his birthday. He used one at a ski chalet we rented and loved it.
My father found a brand new Samsung Galaxy, still in the box, in the dumpster of a local Radio Shack. My sister still uses it.
Did you find his golf clubs and clothes in the dumpster too? Wouldn’t be the first guy to have his belonging taken to the curb by a pissed off spouse. I’d be checking that dumpster out some more.
What comes to mind was an air-conditioner. As a child growing up my parents alternated the window a/c between my sister’s room and mine throughout the summer. I found this one and lugged it home, plugged it in and it worked - a/c for both of us. It lasted 5 yrs.
Psst. That’s how employees steal things; they take them out with the trash.
A perfectly good toothbrush, it still had most of the bristles too!