Let’s all hope the latex recycling market doesn’t pick up.
Absolutely. I’ve got a nice utility table, a picnic table, and a huge box of lps out of the trash; when we were cleaning out our house last year and made a pile of trash and old doors and stuff, I noticed that some of our stuff on the trash pile disappeared, and I was glad to see it go - less stuff for me to haul to the dump. We recycle stuff within our family all the time - between five households, the chairs and tables and beds and tvs make the rounds.
Part of the “new frugality” that makes me chuckle is having grown up in a household with a Mennonite mom - none of this is new. The Mennonites and people like them have been reducing, re-using, and recycling for a long time now.
ETA: Forgot to address the OP - I’m very much in the “get over yourself” camp, too. If you didn’t know they were garbage-picking, it can’t have been affecting your life much.
Got the chair I’m sitting on off the curb. Had it twelve years now. Guess I’m a gross creep for not letting it go to waste in a dump. I know the world is filling up with garbage and all, but I wouldn’t want anyone to think I’m not classy enough to be wasteful. And why do I have the nagging suspicion the OP is also one of those folks who are mad at the poor for spending all their money on stuff they can’t afford?
Victim. Bless your heart.
It’s refreshing that people aren’t so invested in putting on airs and that they are comfortable saying that they get stuff from the trash.
I have a well-paying job now, but my living room furniture came from Salvation Army - precisely the quality of stuff one could find on the streets of Boston when dumpster diving. And I see no reason to upgrade it. It’s durable, cheap, and if something gets spilled on it, no big deal.
The OP never clarified if the neighbors were cutting up his/her trashbags and digging through snot rags, soup bones, etc. That’s kind of gross, and they should not leave your cans in disarray. However, if they’re finding stuff they can use, they’re being socially responsible by keeping your junk out of a landfill. More power to them, I say, and as others have said, why not make it easier by leaving your good junk out and accessible?
I have no objection to people taking usable items I’ve thrown away–in fact, like others I’ll put them out next to the trash (and if they’re really good I’ll put a “free” sign on them). We’ve got a little Asian lady (I’ve seen her–she wears one of those Chinese coolie hats that I didn’t think anybody wears in real life, and I don’t think she speaks a word of English) in our neighborhood who will come by every week the night before trash morning and pretty much take all of our recycling. There really isn’t any way to stop her short of calling the cops on her, so we don’t bother. If she can get some extra money from our old aluminum cans…whatever. I don’t need them anymore.
Where I’d draw the line, though, is people rifling through our actual trash can, opening the bags and such. If that happened, I’d get annoyed because I can guarantee we don’t throw away anything that anyone would want. Old food wrappers and cat doots…uh…no. But so far that hasn’t happened, so it’s all good.
I lived in a place where the trash bins were behind the house. Sometimes a neighbor would be found in the back opening cans and rooting through bags. He’d also take any items left next to the cans in the open ended shed type thing… I’m pretty sure he took only somewhat useful stuff (not a crazy guy picking up old tin cans and piles of old magazines to hoard).
The neighbor who lived downstairs where he walked past the door of to get there called the cops and he was arrested for tresspass.
He came back and did it again sometime later and got arrested again.
Must be nice. The people next to me (a woman with 4 kids in a 2 bedroom) have thrown stuff IN my trash. I finally got rid of the can, and drop my trash off in a nearby place.
Who gives a shit.
Hell I have throw out stuff and had people stopping before I could haul it all out to the curb and told them there was more in back where that came from. They were so thrilled they hauled it from the back for me and right to their truck. Saved me the labor if doing it.
I was “victomized” last month . It was a broken monitor. It was there at 7pm at night but some thief must have grabbed before day break the next day.
I am perplexed as to why they were placing their garbage in your bin? Were you charged for garbage pick up or something?
But what irks me is was it necessary to point out a mother of four in a two bedroom? Maybe that is all she could afford? Ever think there might have been two kids to a room and she slept on the couch?
Three times I’ve put things out on to the kerb for “hard rubbish day” as it is known here. Not once has any of my stuff been still there when the pickup comes around - always there are others who have found it first and taken it for themselves.
It’s what we all expect to happen, and I’m happy to see it.
I once put a broken monitor in the trash room, and saw it disappear and reappear three times before the garbage company got it.
I noticed in Orlando on Thursday nights in my neighborhood that there are several guys with pick ups roaming around that stop in front of houses that are throwing large items away. quite a few of them are loaded up. Friday is pick up day for large items, sofas, fridges, etc. Probably going on all over the place and people just assume the trash collectors took it.
It wouldn’t seem to be a big problem if someone grabs old furniture or broken appliances you’ve left out at the curb - but what if there’s injury potential or fire hazard you’re unaware of, and the treasure-seeking neighbor winds up hurt or having his house burn down? Is there a potential legal claim against you?
Having people actually open up trash bags and rootle through them is a no-no in my book, even if you remember to shred all your credit card info. I don’t want the neighbors knowing what meds I take, reading letters to find out whether my sister’s kids have flipped out again, finding instructions for satanic rituals etc.
One means of discouragement might be spraying something really stinky inside your garbage bags (Liquid Fence, a deer repellent, has a bad taste and sticks to your hands pretty well. Or you could recycle dog poop or such. The real “trash is treasure” types probably won’t be discouraged by mere stench, though.).
Last year I moved from a fairly cramped subdivision with 200 houses to a neighborhood on a side street with about 10 houses. When I put out an old bookshelf or the like it’s actually still there in the morning when the trash men are coming.
I tend to feel kind of bad about it, actually. At least at the old place I knew people were taking the worthwhile stuff and trying to get some use out of it.
Oh, and I must be a disgusting trashpicker. People a couple houses down at the old neighborhood were moving and they left behind a bookshelf and a perfectly good glider rocking chair. I shamelessly picked them up and toted them back to the house. The glider (with re-covered cushions) has been in my daughter’s room for over two years now.
-Joe
So it’s better to throw out usable things and have people buy new things rather than recycle?
I’ve rescued things from the garage, including a box of stuffed animals I gave to the Salvation Army at holiday time. Just cause you don’t want it doesn’t mean someone else can’t use it.
Wow. It’s just amazing how apparently wrong I am about all this.
I guess I was just raised an “elitist” and “stuck up” because if I need a new chair or coffee table, I just go to Wal-Mart and buy one. It would never cross my mind to go rooting through someone else’s trash. Never. Once.
Then I guess that makes me all the things y’all are calling me. As someone famous said, “your opinions aren’t wrong or right. Their yours”. I still stand by the creep factor of 4.
So to my trash-rooting neighbors, I apologize. Feel free to root through my trash anytime you damn well feel like it. I’ll be hiding in my elitist house with my stuck up cats and my brand new stuff that I’ve purchased with my hard-earned money, still feeling creeped out, but also feeling wrong about being creeped out.
Oh, and all those missing Netflix returns I’ve been having? Apparently I am in the wrong for instantly assuming it was you. I blame my parents for raising me to be a stuck up elitist.
<double-locks doors when I leave the house now />
It seems to me that the reason this is troublesome to the OP may be that it feels like being spied upon. One’s trash conceivably reveals intimate details about one’s daily life.
“What do you mean they have no bread? Why don’t they just buy some cake at Wal-Mart?”
You live in a very strange personal world, dmatsch. I hope you can come out and play with the rest of us here in reality someday.
It seems to you, huh? Well the OP has posted repeatedly and so far her only complaint is that it’s somehow morally superior to be wasteful.
I just can’t wrap my head around anyone throwing away things that are potentially useful.
And dmatsch, you’ve illogically turned the whole argument on it’s head. Nobody is suggesting that you “go rooting through someone else’s trash.” No. Not once.
It is suggested that if people are throwing away items in the trash that still have potential use or value, it is not the end of the world if someone else takes them and uses them. They are, by definition, not “trash”.
ETA: A friend once showed us some sterling silver flatware that looked very nice. They had recovered it from the trash can of a neighbor in Toronto. They took it to the householder and said " you threw this out by mistake". The reply: “no, I threw it out. I got tired of polishing it.”
I’m at work. Went to the men’s room a little while ago. Right in front of the entrance is where they put the large rolling garbage collection bins. Someone’s office must have been cleaned out, because there was a bunch of office-y looking stuff (uninteresting). What WAS interesting, was the furry stuff. Picked it up - it’s a brown faux-fur pants and shirt. Probably some manager’s Halloween costume from several years back. A bear costume, maybe. Thing is, whoever threw them out recognized that they must have some inherent worth, because they hung them neatly on the rim of the rolly, so they wouldn’t get soiled.
Mine now!
PS NO I’m not a “furry.”