Friday we got two new windows. Milgard, double-paned, and the side window opens (Yay!). The glazers would ordinarily haul off the old windows and trash them, but I hate it when useful things are destroyed and dumped. Even if they’re inefficient, decades-old windows made of thin glass and what looks like home-made wooden frames. So I had the glazers put the them out by the street, between two telephone/power poles. I put a sign on one of the windows: FREE… 6’ x 52"… 5’ x 52". Several people stopped and looked at them Friday and Saturday. Last night The Wife and I went to the (yes, ‘the’) bar, listened to the live band, and each had one beer. We were probably gone less than an hour. When we got home, the windows were gone.
About a dozen years ago I replaced the French doors in back with modern, double-paned French doors with proper handles and deadbolt. The old doors were wood, with about a dozen or more single-panes in each. Man did it get cold in Winter! Still, they were nice vintage doors. Those were probably the first things I put out by the street, and they were taken within a couple of days.
I’ve put various things out to be salvaged, but I can’t remember everything. The Wife brought home a couple of patio chairs that someone had put out (Oh, that reminds me… I put out a pair of our patio chairs), and I picked up a candle lantern. ‘One man’s junk is another man’s treasure.’ I like that useful things that are no longer wanted/needed are wanted/needed by neighbours.
I had a push mower that had gotten caught on a slightly-higher-than-expected stump and bent something so that it vibrated badly. It provided me an excuse to get a new self-propelled mower, and I put the old one on our corner (yay for corner lots!) with a note saying “FREE” along with what was wrong with it. I’m sure it could have been easily parted out, and maybe the part to fix it was cheap. Anyway, it disappeared right quick.
I also had a gazillion starters of hostas that I put out in bags - they were snatched up in short order, too. I thought about putting our old charcoal grill out there, but it was pretty rusty, so it just went to metal recycling. But yay for free stuff!
We had an old rocking chair that was in very good shape, but not being used at all. We were in the process of getting it out to the sidewalk with a sign on it when a neighbor noticed and came over and claimed it. It didn’t even get a chance to sit there.
A couple/few weeks ago I put my screw-in fuzes and bullet fuzes (some NIB, and some taken from the fuze box we had removed) into a 1-gallon zip-top bag, and pinned them to the power pole. Someone eventually took them. (Lots of old houses here.)
Back in L.A., no doubt. (I once put a futon frame out in front of my apartment building, after calling the Salvation Army to collect it. Someone beat them to it.)
Hot water heater - gone in 45 minutes
Six foot tall by six foot wide entertainment center (particle board) - overnight
Two particle board bookshelves - couple hours
Decade-old TV (w/remote) - few hours
All were Craigslist ads
Massive tree branch - cut into two-foot lengths, stacked by driveway, one length went each night until all gone.
We had our water heater replaced about five years ago. The old one has been sitting in the basement ever since. You can put large items like that out on the curb with your weekly trash but you have to make arrangements with the city ahead of time. It’s just one of those things that we never think about doing, but a few weeks ago my wife called the city and arranged the pickup.
So the night before, I haul the thing to the curb and have it next to the trash bins. In the half hour or less between when I took it out and when my wife got home from work, it was gone.
Who the hell takes old water heaters? About the only thing I can figure is someone nabbed it and took it to scrap metal recycler for some easy cash?
(My wife’s comment was “If I’d have known we could get rid of it that easily, I would have put it out years ago!”)
Two years ago I bought new living furniture. I put 2 chairs, a love seat, and a bookcase by the curb and they were gone in an hour. I told the guy who took the sofa and bookcase to come back for the microwave cart and another bookcase, and he did. Neighbors got a new washer and dryer and within 15 minutes of putting the old ones out, they were gone. Lots of metal scrappers around here.
Lots of metal scrapers around here too. They’re like helpful parasites imho.
I sell kids stuff on the side and often get battery powered toys that are broken and I won’t sell them. I keep them in a old recycling bin and once it’s full I put it out on trash night. Someone always empties the bin before the garbage truck comes.
I was looking for something yesterday, when I found a set of Hohner Piedmont Blues Harmonicas in a zip-top bag. From the reviews I’ve read, they’re utter crap – but I wanted the case, which isn’t bad. I haven’t tried to play them. I just put them in a bag.
There’s a three-day weekend coming up, and I suspect people will be taking their kids to the beach. Crap harmonicas are just the thing for kids – especially small ones who just want to make noise. I think I’ll tack them to the telephone pole for the taking.
I once wheeled an old washing machine to the curb and it was getting loaded up before I even had the dryer on the cart.
I’ve unloaded all sorts of stuff that way from a box of old VHS tapes to a sofa and chair combo to a giant wood antique desk that was a real white elephant. I’ve always had good luck with it too – no people leaving a mess or destroying things. The people who took the sofa knocked to make sure it was okay that they came with a truck for it and might have to make two trips. I figure it’s all helping someone somehow. Even if the guy with fifty old VHS movies is going to sell them for 25¢ each at a flea market, that’s money for him and less crap in the landfill.
Only thing that doesn’t move around here are old televisions. Someone always puts one out, it sits and sits… then it gets rained on… then it sits until you’re assuming the owners expect it to be reclaimed by nature and finally disappears but I’m guessing they paid someone at that point or threw it in a ditch someplace.
I have tried to list an old futon frame on Craigslist, no takers, even under the “free” section. September 9th I am having a yard sale and I am hoping someone steals it.
I also had an old microwave that I left on the curb for some kind of recycling day where one could do those things. Someone “stole” it, but it scares me because it let off sparks when I tried to use it. I even taped a sign saying “not safe to use” on it.
A few months ago I bought a bundle of Styrofoam cups to keep in the kitchen at work.
My plan was to take ONE cup each week and reuse it through out the week. If it were just me using the cups, this bundle probably would have lasted me a year. I figure my other coworkers might take one here and there, but for the most part, I figured they would leave them alone because most of my coworkers are in the habit of bringing their own cups to work.
Well, I’ll be damned if those cups weren’t all gone inside of two weeks. I paid $1.77 for the entire bundle! Lol. I am thoroughly convinced people will take ANYTHING that isn’t nailed down to the ground.
Today I stuck my Hohner Piedmont Blues harmonicas on the telephone pole. They’re new and unused (‘So don’t “try them out” and then put them back! If you play it, take it!’), and each one is bagged with a tag indicating the key.
When I bought them, I only wanted the case. It was cheaper to buy the ‘toy’ harmonica set and get rid of the harps, than to purchase a case on its own.
When I graduated from college, I put our sleeper sofa, for which we had paid $35 at the Salvation Army, out in the yard with a sign on it that said “FREE TO GOOD HOME”. The next morning, the couch was gone, and written on the bottom of the sign said, “Thanks for the couch. We will take very good care of it. Let us know if you want any little couches when it has them.”
SWMBO decreed that I shall empty the travel trailer that is attached to the house, so that it may be demolished. I’ve started in earnest.
Someone put a chair on the corner of the next intersection up, so that people may put Free Stuff on it. So things show up on either side of the chair as well. Saturday afternoon I put out three boxes of books. By evening, I consolidated the remainders into a single box. This morning there was half a box of books. (I brought my 23-volume Time-Live Epic Of Flight and my 20-voluyme The Ocean World Of Jacques Cousteau sets into work today so that she can give them to her grandson.) Someone got a travel iron, someone got a Krupps espresso/cappuccino machine. Also claimed were a brand-new-in-the-box Bachmann N-gauge train set, a cheap radio-controlled Jeep, a tube of Pick-Up-Sticks, a Rubik’s Cube, a pair of little-used CAT work boots, miniature Christmas lights, a cheap Timex watch, and I don’t remember what else. As of this morning, no one had taken the hair dryer, the small coffee maker, or the Radio Shack battery charger.
I chatted with a neighbor as I started on my walk yesterday. She said, ‘Keep putting stuff out!’ Especially books. I have a lot of books.
