Jacquie Phelan's Weblog

Every day is Earth Day around here.

Having lost a wallet and learned that the finder has a girlfriend who decided to keep it (and all the i.d. to aid in starting up whatever accounts people that borrow identities do)….I find myself graspy, greedy.

An orderly pile of black Hefty bags hooked my right eye as I scooted past a dug-in driveway on that hill section of Surf Rancid Rake Blvd.
It’s Monday, the morning garbage is picked up. Now ’twas afternoon, and the cans were empty, but the pavement around them is heaped with “treasure” begging to be inspected.
I think: “Just a quick look-over“.
One peek into a well-tied sack, and I become a swift, efficient gathering machine.
Half an hour later, with traffic droning by at about ten to twelve cars a minute, I have sorted things I can use from the things Everyone Else could use. Yeah, yeah, I ‘ll go back and tidy up tomorrow.

I didn’t take: Britta water filter (still in box–CC is bummed I didn’t grab it even though our water treament plant is 10x more sophisticated than the MMWD + Britta times Avogadro’s number), huge Gordon Bierschstein liter-and-a half glass, pillows, fine lamps. Men’s underwear. Sunglasses. Woven blankets. ANOTHER duvet (not sewn into baffles, more of a feathery lumpen bag).
Festoon the tall garbage cans with these as a sort of Sign to other Scroungers, who, despite the paucity of bicycle traffic on SF Drake, will espy something and move in for the take.

Some goodies were too big to haul, so I hid ’em.

I returned for the new blender, stainless “steal” dish rack with red accents, four bottles of booze (“green Hungarian”, Sambuca Romana and Remy Martin brandy). Three quarts of canola oil, barely used, brown sugar, mayo, butter, chicken stock, provolone, way too many(farmed) salmon steaks, ground beef, pork loin, more beef…isopropyl alcohol —-Charlie uses it in the shop—–brand new toilet brush, brand new broom, new rugs, stainless Revereward saucepan, kitchen towels, sponge, “fantastic” kitchen-cleaner (“Now with Bisphenol A!”).
Judging from the piles of new books on religion (“How to make your religion contagious”) and the many bags full of medical industrial samples (damn! No EPO) and drug company notepads, he’s a born-again carnivore drug company rep who fries his dinner, washes it down with brandy, and uses brand new ivory white bath towels to mop up after himself. He’s also in a bit of a rush.

In fact, he is so late for his rendezvous with The Rapture that he had to toss the contents of his apartment.
He was clearly not a pennypincher: at the bottom of one bag, a tupperware tub full of pennies/ nickels/ dimes, rather sticky with spilled dish soap.

Money laundering?

Our town has a machine that eats coins and spits out a chit for 90% of the value…I’ll get some decent Dr. Bob’s or Green & Black ice cream. Charlie has guessed it’s twelve bux worth, I have guessed two dollars and forty two cents.

The rest of the day for me was contentedly sorting and putting it all away.

Supper out in the yard: a pile of salmon with tortillas, iceberg lettuce chopped w/mustard greens, wasabi +mayo and fresh lemon…now I’m waiting.

Waiting to see.

Enraptured.

~ by jacquiephelan on April 22, 2008.

Posted in Uncategorized
Tags: food, found, gleaner, waste