Nice weather = extra garbage runs

Posted on by garbagefinds

We’ve been blessed with mostly good weather this past week so I went on a bunch of extra trash runs. Garbage picking is a lot more fun when it’s not raining, and this post features some finds I made while putting in extra time.

It also helps that I’ve been on a bit of a hot streak lately. It seems that I’m finding something cool every time I go out! It’s hard to keep up with the extra accumulation, and my new garage is already loaded with (quality) junk. Still, I’m happy to be finding lots of neat stuff.

I think I’ll do a yard sale tomorrow in hopes of opening up some space for new garbage. It’ll be at my old storage (4096 Coloniale near Duluth), around 12-5pm if you want to come by. If there’s anything specific you want to see let me know in the comments or by facebook / email and I can tell you if the thing is still around or if I can bring it.

I was pretty busy on Tuesday. I went on a trash run the night before and then I did another one in the morning with a friend. We went to Villeray, which is the closest and most convenient Tuesday morning destination, though it’s pretty hit and miss in regards to actually finding anything. Thankfully, a place on Lajeunesse produced some quality stuff including this sweet vintage “Spartan” sled. I’m surprised no one grabbed this before I did! It’s a great decor item, but could be good to use as well.

We also found a box full of vintage metal bits, a lot of which date to the early 1900s. I’m not sure what most of them are supposed to do, I’m guessing they’re decorative pieces. There’s a bunch of nice vintage clothes hooks, as well as some fence post toppers / finials (like the ones at top right and top left – I have several more that aren’t pictured). The fleur-de-lys is well represented here. I expect this stuff can make me a bit of money, I just have to figure out how to describe it. If you can think of any relevant keywords let me know!

Sorry this picture turned out a bit weird, I’m still learning how to take good photos at my new garage space.

That pile provided some more hardware, including some vintage switches, old-school water faucets, and drawer pulls. I have to figure out if there’s a market for any of this stuff. The wooden thing looks to be a handmade noisemaker toy.

We also saved some furniture from that spot, but I’ll save that for a future post.

I learned while looking up garbage schedules in the morning that there was a Tuesday evening pickup in Rosemont. I decided to check that out as well, though I had some regrets as soon as I got there. I do love trash picking, but it loses its luster if you do it too often. At that point I’d already gone on two roughly 3-4 hour runs in the last 20 hours or so. Regardless, I kept going because I was already there, and I was interested in exploring this area I hadn’t traveled to in a while. Thankfully, some trash in front of a sold house made the trip worthwhile.

Inside the bags was a collection of beauty products, most notably some quality perfumes. Most were barely used and all the bottles were in very nice condition. The Paloma Picasso and Cartier have already been reserved, but if you have interest in any of the others let me know.

A different Rosemont run (Rosemont is quite large) produced an old Elgin self-winding watch. It had been stored inside an old pill bottle and seems to run very well, though the watch band is in pieces. Regardless, it’s a quality watch done in rolled gold and it should net me around 70-80$. We also found a neat enamel-top table that should fix up nicely – I’ll show you pics of that later.

Otherwise, I happened upon another great pile of trash thanks to the location of my new garage. I probably wouldn’t have been in the area if not for that. Anyways, the first time around it produced some neat old junk including some old and sometimes offensive Made in Japan figurines. One of the old colonial pieces is stamped “Made in Occupied Japan,” meaning that it was made sometime between 1947 and 1952. The others were probably made not long after.

I saved a lot more great stuff at this spot last garbage day. I haven’t even really had time to look through it all, but I’ll share it with you as soon as humanly possible.

Let’s finish up with some e-waste. I’ve been collecting it as usual, and last week I deposited a collection (mostly old cell phones, portable phones without their bases, and decrepit digital cameras) weighing 3.185kg. I’ve diverted 4.3kg of e-waste from the landfill since I started recording this data in the spring.

I bring it all (except the loose batteries, which go to container at the pharmacy) to a box run by Electrobac. It’s conveniently located at a grocery store just down the road. These boxes are thankfully becoming more common (at least in Montreal), and I encourage you to use them to recycle your small e-waste!

Relevant links

1. Facebook page
2. My eBay listings
3. Etsy store
4. Kijiji listings
5. Contribute to garbagefinds.com
6. Follow me on Instagram

Email: thingsifindinthegarbage@gmail.com. I often fall behind on emails, so I apologize in advance if it takes me a while to get back to you.

34 thoughts on “Nice weather = extra garbage runs”

  1. The Made in Occupied Japan piece is possibly quite valuable to a collector, have seen a gorgeous teaset from that era brought back by an Australian serviceman

    1. I think it’s probably worth around 5-10$. The most valuable Occupied Japan stuff tends to be old toys and large dish sets.

  2. Those figurines are splendid.I cannot believe somebody would throw them in the garbage.Shame on them and kudos to you for rescuing them.

  3. I think the vintage metal bits are hardware for holding curtain rods.

      1. Embellishments! That’s a good word for them, I’ll try to remember that. I expect they might be worth money to an interior designer

        1. The metal thing in the top left is called a finial. In this case, it was probably used at the end of a metal rod that held the drapes, one on each end. I don’t know about the colored metal bits. Having two of everything might lead you to figuring out what they were used for. Look for holes where they might be screwed into walls or other pieces. Depending on the holes, some might be used as “tie-backs” — a metal bit screwed into the wall to hold the drapes open {while looking closed at the top}. You’ll figure it out.

  4. Some of the metal pieces in the second photo are likely wall-mounted curtain tie-backs.

  5. I love reading your blog and thank you very much for properly disposing of the e-waste and batteries. I can’t believe people throw all of this stuff away into landfills. Thanks for all you do. Great read and your photos and descriptions are awesome.

  6. Always great to read your post. We have our place up and running now! It’s filled with our junk from the garbage and boy, are we making money! After many years of hunting for garbage, we have a 1500 SQ ft. barn filled with our finds and it been wonderful! We also took in a huge 1500 70s rock collection in,can consignment and made a mint off of that! Money is just rolling in right now and it’s all been made possible from GARBAGE!

  7. The pieces look like curtain rod holders and decorative ends for the rods.

  8. I love the “embellishments” and the perfumes, great scores. I’m sure you’ve thought of this/have tested, but the light switches in the upper right corner of your photo look to be 40s bakelite–I think they will have some (modest) value as a lot if that’s the case. Wish we had those e-waste boxes in Ottawa, but we have frequent weekend take-it-back dates for e-waste from a local (possibly for-profit) outfit. Keep posting!

    1. I’ll check that out at some point, currently these are just sitting around in my garage. I’ll deal with them eventually. As for the e-waste, as long as it doesn’t end up in the dump I’m happy.

  9. Martin, some scrap yards will buy your e-waste… perhaps not for a great deal of money but still, it might be worth your while since you have storage space.

    1. True. It’s too much of hassle I think though, I just check and a local yard pays 30 cents a pound for cell phones. So, thus far I’d have made about 3-4$ for the scrap. I’d have to accumulate a big haul to make it worthwhile, and gas would cut into the profits a bit. That being said, I’d like to visit the scrap yard at some point anyways just to see what it’s like.

  10. i think the “metal bits” are for draperies. the brackets would hold the rod and the other bits would be the ends of it

  11. I’m always amazed by the wide variety of finds you make!
    Love the more frequent posts … now I’m not going into so deep a withdrawal between fixes. 😀

  13. The wood noisemaker is a probably a groger. Used for making noise during reading of the scrolls of Esther during Purim. Beautifully decorated old ones are wroth money in Judaica categories on Ebay.

    1. Like most Yiddish words this word can be spelt many ways. I have always spelt it gregger although I have also seen grogger, and gragger. Just thought I would point this out in case you are trying to google it. I immediately though it was a gregger too.

    2. It does look a bit like that, though the area I found it in isn’t at all known for being Jewish (like some other neighbourhoods are). Still, you never know how things move around and where they end up.

  14. There is a market for vintage drawer pulls. Early American, Victorian and mid century are selling now. Mixed lots also sell Also, Brass scrap is worth 2.00/lb.

    1. True that, I’m making a note now to save drawer pulls if they’re nice and the piece is otherwise ruined.

  15. I agree with the curtain rod theory.In Montreal we have a lot of tramway apts.A corridor with rooms off of it.The double rooms needing dividing up and also to cut down on drafts hence decorative dividers.

    1. That one was gone before I even saw it. I have three large, stackable Rubbermaid containers there now which works okay. I also have the garage, and my need for storage is generally lower than it was before.

      1. Glad you found it! If there’s anything else you like let me know before I ship it out on Monday, shipping would be free on any small / light objects which would cut down on overall costs a bit.

Comments are closed.