can't pass up usefull trash

I too pick up things that I think I can use sometime in the future. Plus, I can't stand to throw anything away. Saving all this "stuff" I'm sure has saved my wallet a ton of money over the years, and the time to drive into town to buy a few bolts or what ever else you need. You ought to see my garage/shop, stuff all over. I see pictures of the nice and neat shops on the web and ask myself, where is all the "stuff". However I've been more and more willing in the last year or so to toss out stuff I haven't used in the past few years. But I still have more stuff than I have room for. I hate this affliction I have. Anyone have any (painless) cures?

Lane

My problem is that once I got a lathe and a mill, every piece of metal I see now looks like "stock"

ALL

Walt , you know you have the habit when friends and family start " finding" "scraps of intrest" for you and delivering them to you........ in return they claim 24 / 7 welding and machining.

After reading about the "salvaged" fire extinguisher exploding in Roy's face, nearly killing his wife, and knocking his teeth out... I wouldn't stop to pick up a bar of gold bullion any more. I can afford a new fire extinguisher, ratchet strap, army boot, etc... but not a new set of teeth! David

Move. It worked for me.

Ron Thompson On the Beautiful Florida Space Coast, right beside the Kennedy Space Center, USA

The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools.

--Herbert Spencer, English Philosopher (1820-1903)

Tom is right. You should be asking if there is anyone here who doesn't stop.....

John Martin

You know it's bad when a complete stranger comes by trying to find a magneto. I actually had one which I was just going to give to him but he insisted on paying. After looking around my place a little he then pops off saying to come by his place and he'll give me a bunch of stuff. Some of the things he mentioned was a steamer, light plants, plows, etc. Then it got worse. I made a appointment with him for tomorrow. :-)

Wayne Cook Shamrock, TX

wayne, i've visited your shop via your website and you my friend have got some freakin cool shit in there! you're the exact kind of person i was thinking of when i posted this question.

walt

I do.

And I can trump your story.

My daughter is a police officer. The sector beat she works surrounds my house. She comes over for lunch a lot, and we watch the grandbaby one day a week, so she comes that day about four times.

The other day, she calls me on her cell, and gives me an address where they are tossing out a plastic bubble looking car that has swivelly wheels on it. She asks if I would run over and get it, BECAUSE IT WON'T FIT IN THE BACK OF HER SQUAD CAR! She would have picked it up herself, bit it wouldn't fit. I can see her right now, Glock and all, trying to stuff a yellow and blue bubble car into the back of a squad car. "Now, please cooperate, or I will have to use force .................."

I wonder where in the world she got the habit of picking up stuff from...............................

Well, I went and snatched it, got it home, and one of the wheels needs attention, and it needs a powerwashing. Kyle is 13 months now, and taking his first steps, so he will be ready for it any time.

You bet I pick up stuff curbside. When you used to could take stuff to the dump back in the fifties and sixties, we would sometimes come home with as much stuff as we took.

Steve

"Complete Stranger," I bet. Sounds like one of those underground magneto rings. Folks sitting around behind closed doors, fondling Fairbanks Morse hardware. I've seen what those kinds of depraved habits can do, given enough time. Next thing you know you'll be mainlining Scintillas.

Jim (with a personal thing for Bosch electrics...)

PS. Wayne you might want to check your driveway and fenceposts. He probably found the standard hobo's "Good Magnetos Here" symbol chalked there someplace.

================================================== please reply to: JRR(zero) at yktvmv (dot) vnet (dot) ibm (dot) com ==================================================

Some of the town "refuse collection stations" (That's PC newspeak for "dump")around here have "put 'n take" tables.

It's amazing the kind of good stuff lots of technologically deprived folks leave there (particularly in upper middle class towns.) Much of it needing nothing more than a new line cord or a rubber belt to be back in the pink again.

I think it's become ndemic to our affluent "throw away" plus "imported goods" society that the price to "buy" a simple repair exceeds the price of a whole new item.

My place is in serious danger of breaking through the earth's crust and sinking into the magma from the combined weight of all the stuff I couldn't resist grabbing.

Jeff (Probably the only guy in town whose home has five working electric brooms in it.)

i went to the "dump" the other week to get my $18.00 for old gutters and wanted to fill my truck with all the goodies there... there must be a clinical name for this affliction!

walt

Around here, in Eastern NC, we call it being a "Pack Rat"

RJ

I am posting this using a beautiful 21" (!) monitor that someone left at our "put 'n take", aka "swap shed".

Oh the pain!

michael

We have the "Material Recycling Facility", aka "The MRF". Like short for Murphy. My fingers would not make it typing the list of stuff I've gotten there. Having been fairly regular there, I've often been waved out with "catch ya next time". As if the pricing is not cheap already.

Hmm, haven't been over there in awhile...

michael

I think the major reason people chuck stuff is that we take for granted that everyone can fix stuff. My brother is helpless when it comes to any type of repair. If he were to take his 8 year old lawnmower somewhere (if he could find a place that repairs to begin with) by the time he paid for parts and labor, (and waited 2-3 weeks) he would have 75% of a new one paid for. So guys like us snag them by the curb, clean the carb, toss in a plug and change the oil. We sell it for $20-$30. and would already be using his $119.00 brand new murray lawnmower from walmart. I picked up a lawnmower yesterday that was blowing oil. Turns out it had too much oil in it so it was spewing oil out of the exhaust valve. I cleaned her up, changed the oil and the plug, now it runs like a top. That's a lawnmower, try to find anyone willing to try to fix half the stuff out there. It may be shot... or it may be a fuse or loose wire.

walt