April 2012 – Things I find in the garbage

Some stuff from yesterday and from before

April 27, 2012 garbagefinds4 Comments

The board on top reads “Puces de lit [bed bugs].” Thanks for the warning.

I found this box of books somewhere near St Denis. I took only the one on the top about the hospital, and the rest I put in a more visible location right along St-Denis. Most were French, but I probably would have done the same if they were English.

I looked into the bins near a swanky apartment complex near Laurier and La Jeune. I found all these records and put them on Laurier for others to look through.

From the bins I pulled all this stuff too. An awful picture I know, but the blanket is quite vintage, some boots (I also left on Laurier – someone took them by the time I left), a dirty old tray (that cleaned up quite nice) and a polaroid camera.

I found all this stuff with the handcuffs and camera and such. A lot of these pins are really cool, and their coolness isn’t at all captured by my camera. This is the best I can do with my current technology.

A lot of them are for skiing, one is for the 1968 Olympics, and I don’t know what a lot of the other ones are references. The marijuana leaves seem like the odd ones out, but I found them in the same pile.

I found this Olympic flag with all that stuff too. I’m wondering if it’s from 1968 in Grenoble, since he had a pin from there too. I also found flags of Switzerland, Italy, and Germany.

I found all these old heavy glass mugs, and really nice heavy glass pitcher. Now I have two really cool heavy glass pitchers from the garbage, though this one’s way older than the Budweiser one I found a while back. The pottery pieces are marked “Orchids of Hawaii” and “Taiwan,” which seem a bit contradictory.

I rummaged this little musical box out of the bin. It looks pretty old. It’s marked “Switzerland, Lador, Ste-Croix.”

A bunch of little things from the bins. My camera fails hard on these kinds of shots.

Some more little things. The statue of liberty thing is a lighter, but I’m not sure it works. I might open it up at some point and poke around.

Some of my favorites from the bin. The ring on the bottom with the two holding hands is sterling silver, as is the other ring. The tie-clip (or roach clip) is super classy. My friend told me the deal on top may be bronze. The “Cuzco Peru” llama bottle opener is just cool. It’s probably made of brass.

The holding hands ring opens up into this. I don’t get it.

A cute little owl. I’m keeping this one. It’s only about an inch tall.

There’s a word for this thing, but I forget what it is. My friend thinks it’s legit. The other side states the Kilo-newtons it can support, and it looks like it can support around 1500lbs one way and 6000 the other.

Back on the streets, a couple of friends and I found this stuff. Some cool old maps and some other things.

Some of the things from yesterday

April 25, 2012 garbagefinds1 Comment

Here’s some of the stuff I found last night. There’s still some stuff to go through, but this is all I can handle tonight.

I found these little pictures with the ladies shoes from yesterday. They look like they were made from some kind of kit.

I usually avoid taking fabric from the garbage, but this blanket was too gorgeous to leave behind. I threw it in the wash, and now it’s on my bed. I’m a sucker for things with a lot of colors. This, and all the following were things I found in that last pile of stuff from my last post.

Some pretty nice vintage mugs. The mark on the bottom reads: “Ashdale Pottery Products, Made in England.” A few small chips around the top, but definitely still good.

A good frisbee. Copyright date is 1975. It’s made by Wham-o, who I’m pretty sure invented the frisbee.

This alarm clock / calculator / tape recorder was in it’s original package, and appears to have barely, if ever, been used. Everything in perfect shape. I need to test the calculator / alarm clock, as it runs off a different battery, but the tape recorder works for sure (and the batteries were included, and left on the side).

Seems like a pretty odd combination of things, but I find it pretty charming. I’ll probably keep it.

An old Solingen knife. The knife casing reads “Sois Pret” (be prepared), so it might be an old boy scout knife. Does anyone recognize that symbol?

Handcuffs! And these aren’t fake. The key is included too. Pretty interesting thing to find.

A couple of old cameras. One’s an old foldout, and the other is an old Soviet Kalimar. There’s a couple of lens’ too, both fitting the Kalimar. They seem to be in pretty good shape. I may be interested in keeping the Kalimar. Looking through the lens makes me think it would take some nice vintage shots, and the different lens’ make it pretty versatile. I don’t know how to use these old film cameras at all, but it’s worth looking into for sure.

Finding this also makes me really want to upgrade to a manual digital SLR. I was playing around with the settings a bit, and it was cool how much control you had over what you saw.

That’s all for now! I expect to have some more for you tomorrow afternoon, most of which is from the same pile. It’s also garbage day, so I should get have some fresh stuff too.

Some pretty interesting stuff

April 24, 2012April 24, 2012 garbagefinds1 Comment

I wasn’t feeling so hot today, but I still managed a good walk. I didn’t regret it, although I’m pretty tired now.

I started off finding a box full of old papers. Most papers seemed to be cutouts from old magazines, mostly of recipes. There were some old photos in that envelope, so I took it to look at later. I’ll let you know if I find anything particularly interesting in there.

There’s an unused ledger from my birthyear (1987), and racist looking old recipe book from VH.

I got these old school women’s shoes from the same spot. They looked vintage, clean, and pretty ballin’, so I took them, even though I’m far from a shoe expert.

I found a pair of shoes online that look like the one’s on the left (the Ferncraft), and they sold for 96$ from what I can see, so maybe I can get some money for them. I like the “Made in Hollywood” stamp. http://www.etsy.com/listing/95906293/20-off-sale-1940s-pumps-vintage-gold

The others are of “Oomphies” brand. I did a Google search of them, but didn’t find any that looked like them. It might help if I knew what these kind of shoes were called.

I was in the area, so I checked out the garbage at the second-hand store on Gilford. I didn’t find too much, but I took these.

I was searching through a nice pile (as seen below), and some women walked by and noticed this really old stove. It was a pretty nice piece and weighed about 10000 pounds, like all those old stoves do. I offered my help to get it in their SUV, and we got it in. They seemed like pretty nice people, and were thankful for my help. I’m glad someone got to use it.

I like this picture. They didn’t know I took it, obviously. I enjoy taking authentic “life as it is” photographs. The kicked is the “life is good” over the spare tire on the back of the SUV.

I looked through this pile for a while. What was in it? Check back tomorrow 😉