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September 16, 2003
I <3 Other People's Garbage.
My latest acquisition.
My name is Spike, and I dumpster-dive. I hope that won't be a problem.
Let's tour my trophy room.
Damn flash...
The print was a gift from Skip Williamson, a pretty goddamn notable cartoonist. It was draw in conjunction with S. Clay Wilson, an equally notable cartoonist. This didn't come of of the garbage, but the frame did.
The frame was found in the rain, outside the apartment building, and sheltering world's most idiotic, insufferable OMG WOLVES RUNNING IN TEH SNOW print.
The answer is NO.
Pulled the wolf print off its backing, painted the backing red, reassembled the frame, hung it up. Infinitely less tacky now, and a hell of a deal, considering the price-gouging professional framing shops get away with these days. More:
That frame had a picture of a kitten wearing sunglasses in it. What the HELL, people.
Broken column? More like KITSCHY PLANTER. I'm so artistic. (The plant meant for it's currently sprouting from a seed on the windowsill.) It's featured here with an as yet unused frame, a delightfully tacky leopard print throw pillow (part of a set of two), and a Kenneth Cole brand soft leather briefcase. It's scuffed, so some spolied fuck trashed it. Not that I mind; $200.00 I don't have to spend.
Throwing away plants is mean.
And the other stuff I'm too lazy to photograph: Some little wooden what-not for storing about 50-75 CDs. Six new, color coordinated coffee mugs, still in their shopping bag and protective tissue paper wrapping. A media table, that now holds the monitor, VCR and Dreamcast. A wicker clothes hamper. Countless milk crates.
Unless all this stuff either smelled like pee or was haunted by knife ghosts, it really had no reason to be out on the curb... Not that I'm complaining. Living beyond my means with other people's trash makes me feel clever.
And now, in case you'd like to be as filthy as I am, some tips.
The booty for disgusting little trashpickers such as myself increases in volume and quality in August, when school's back in, and May/June, when school's out again. There's a lot of perfectly good crap that college kids throw out because they just can't fit it in the U-Haul. Haunt the curbs of student residences for the weeks just before and after school.
It's called "dumpster diving," but you'll find yourself actually digging through a dumpster maybe only half the time. Most of the best crap is set just outside the dumspter, or next to it, or in the general vicinity of it.
The best places to scavenge are commerical dumpsters, behind stores, malls, etc. Residential dumpsters tend to contain rotting food, and other such unpleasantries. They're best avoided. Construction sites are good too, but go when it's dark, and work's stopped for the day.
The Supreme Court ruled, quite some time ago, that trash is NOT private property. Still, some places have outlawed dumpster diving, or any cops that catch you will just TELL you it's outlawed. Even if it's not, just leave quietly. You can come back later. The chances of this happening is very unlikely, but some cops are just always upset because their penises are so small.
If a dumpster's locked, don't unlock it. If the owner or a store employee tells you to leave, leave, and stay away for a while. If you're told to leave and never come back, do just that. There are millions of good dive spots in any given city. This isn't worth getting into a fight over... and it's incredibly unlikely you'll ever even be confronted in the first place. I never have.
In the unlikely event that you are confronted, you've got two options: The truth ("I was looking for any good, servicable stuff someone might have thrown away.") or the extremely safe, universal dumpster diver's lie ("I'm moving soon, so I was looking for cardboard boxes."). It's up to you which one you go with. Be advised, the lie may be safer, but it'll require you to drop any good stuff you might have found.
If you've got a car, don't just park it in front of the dumpsters. People might think you're illegally dumping, which is ten times worse than plain old diving.
And ideally, you should be in and out of the area in under five minutes. Survey the area, open the lid, poke around, close the lid, off you go.
o/~ The more you know... o/~
Posted by Spike at September 16, 2003 06:42 AM
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