Beer Can Archeology

August 26th, 2019 – Safeway Route.

Today was cool and clear and with the normal amount of trash.  We got a honk from a bus driver.  We finally trained another one.  Early in our walking, we had a regular bus driver honker but he must have switched routes.  Mr. Handyman is another no-show.  He may have retired.

We removed two roadkill squirrels and a medium-sized rat from the road.  We also found more money.  A dull thin penny and a shiny dime.  We could do the dime and penny magic trick but we don’t know what it was.  We could buy it on Amazon but it’s $10.  So they get ten dollars and we get eleven cents?  That is a trick. 

Wow! We could have had a V8! We could have, there was still some in the can.  Tempting, but we didn’t.

We do like V8.  

Yes, we know, we’re old.

We went down an embankment to retrieve a Bud Light can and stepped on a ball.  It had been buried too long so ended up in the garbage.  There was no question, it wasn’t even in the ballpark.

We found Ryan’s debit card.  We used to call these cards in, but you need to go through an eight-level telephone menu to get to an agent.  Now we just shred them.  No, we don’t try to use them first.

What the… An overstuffed garbage can, and most of this was recyclable.  Really!??

Someone sat on the curb and ate some Hi-Chew candy.  We don’t know how we figured it out.  ESP, we guess.

The guy putting in the culvert on 145th started on a tree.  He seems to be going after the tree now.  He seems to be connected to Fort Lewis because he appears to have acquired a gate from there.  From the looks of the tree, he seems to be attempting to chop it down with a bayonet.  Chuck took basic training at Ft. Lewis many years ago.  The only thing he did with a bayonet was stab used tires.  They died a gruesome death.  Maybe we’ll try a tree.

We picked up a pair of socks in a parking lot.  There was some white powder around them.  Overuse of talcum powder?  A cocaine deal gone bad?  We’ll never know.

Someone purchased an item for $40.  These were from Marika where you can purchase three sports bras for $33.  There was no identifier to know what they purchased, but it could have been three-and-a-half sports bras.

We found a nice tot’s moccasin.  Unfortunately not a pair, but we’ll hang onto it for a few days just in case.  Yes, there is an actor named Justin Case.  Not him.

We found an obese unicorn.  It had a hole in it’s stomach oozing some kind of gel.  The jury is still out, but it may end up in the garbage.  Who buys this stuff?

Another fortune! Again, not a real fortune, but it definitely speaks the truth.

We got a very nice lost tool.  A crescent wrench that does not appear to be run over at all.  It bypassed purgatory in the found-tool collection and is in the real-tool collection.

Another $10-dollar lottery ticket.  There are still two $200K tickets left, so keep buying those tickets.

Finest Cannabis Tincture. From the website, “Enter paradise with this relaxing and euphoric Indica water tincture. These tinctures are water-based and water-soluble, so they dissolve instantly into any beverage or can be consumed sublingually. You can make your own Cannabis Cocktail, add it to Tea, Coffee, or Water.”  Great.  A modern day hip flask.

The McLitterers did not disappoint. An easy pick by the side of the road including the two tea cups.  The only anomaly was five rather than four butters.

Double, double toil and trouble, fire burn and cauldron bubble.  Well, this came to mind.   

But why would someone toss these things.  They are headed for GoodWill.

So, at the Safeway driveway bushes, we found some trash left by the beggars who dumped what they didn’t want.    

Within four feet, McDonald’s trash, unopened candy, and an uneaten Dairy Queen hamburger, that looked pretty good, by the way.  Yep, keep giving the panhandlers food, we’ll keep picking it up.  By the way, they prefer cash.

 

August 27th, 2019 – Park-and-Ride Route.

Another nice day to walk. There are so few.  We came across no roadkill but did get a few honks including one from the lady who gave us the Amazon gift certificate last week.  We did find some money, though.  Twenty five cents.  Eleven cents yesterday makes $0.36 for the week.  Not a bad start, but this is how last week started.

A Seattle Sidewinders window decal.  It took us a while to figure this out, but it appears to be a young women’s fast-pitch softball league.  They could do a bit better pitching their website.

More drug evidence.  Only the cap.  No syringe to be found.

A nice frisbee hanging from a fence post.  We almost took it, but thought, maybe the person wanted to store it here for future activities.  We’ll see.

This guy’s still hacking away at the tree with his bayonet.  This is really kind of weird.  This is on the City of Bothell’s right-of-way.  Maybe when they find out, he’ll try to blame it on beavers.

We thought we’d found an iPhone, but it was only a cover.  It didn’t fit our iPhones, thank goodness.  This probably belonged the the CEO of IBM.

We spotted a beer can a long way down an embankment.  Chuck ventured down to get it and found many more treasures.  We ended up with a large bagful of trash.  Some of the cans were very old, note the can on the left opened with an old church key can opener.  There were several of these old cans with a mixture of new cans and bottles.

A couple of the cans were recognizable as Kingsbury Beer from Sheboygan Wisconsin.  The one we found on the left was the best of the cans we found.  The church key opening is evident.  The website on the right shows a can in much better condition for $30.  Maybe we need to do more digging.  They estimate the can’s age at about 1960, which seems about right.  It looks pretty good for being buried for nearly 60 years. 

 

August 28th, 2019 – Safeway Route.

This morning was cool and clear, perfect for a walk.  We removed a roadkill rabbit and didn’t find any money and didn’t get any honks, but we did get two very nice thanks.

The first was a guy at a bus stop who gave us a cup someone had left. He thanked us and said he and his wife were inspired by us to pick up trash.  A very nice compliment.

The second was from a lady at an intersection.  She lowered her window and waved us over. She also thanked us and said she has seen us walking for years.  These two made our morning.

Yesterday while running an errand, we saw a McMess down the hill, our Saturday route, so decided to walk down and pick it up before it got scattered more than it was.  There were two of these McMesses.  Of course that wasn’t all.  Among other things, we found an empty vodka bottle. Mango Pineapple?  When does a concoction lose vodka status?

We also picked up a dog recovery collar.  $17 on Amazon.  The dog probably wouldn’t have tossed it out the window if it had paid for it.

On to today.  We haven’t found any balls in a while, but today we found three.  The red and blue one was in bad shape, but the other two are now in our ball collection.

Along Juanita Woodinville Way, someone was doing some trimming and left their pruning shears in the bushes.  We set them up against the fence so they could be seen.  If we had taken them, someone might make some cutting remarks about us out of “shear” meanness.

We had a bright idea. Well, okay, not that bright.

But here’s an idea how these guys can increase their market share.    Start a new line for Dishonest Kids.

Steve left us his phone number.  We probably won’t call him.  We have a bunch of Steve’s in our life already.

Someone lost the shirt off their back.  Perhaps he bought too many of those $10 lottery cards.  We’ll wash it and send it to Goodwill.

This guy’s still at it.  Maybe he has a pet beaver?  We also noticed that he has chairs on his roof.  Strange things are afoot near the 7-Eleven.

 

This looks like pasta spoon. But it’s only about 5.5 inches long and we’re not sure if it’s bent or made that way.  We’ll put it in our found flatware collection.

We picked this up.  It was a large block of hard rubber about 3.5 x 3.5 x 6 inches.  The two bolts that secured it had sheared off.  That took a lot of pressure.  We see big dump trucks in the morning.  It may have fallen off one of them.  We started carrying it for the rest of our walk.

Then we found these.  They were sitting on the sidewalk and looked to be two terracotta flower pot trays.  They were filled with cornmeal, onions and peppers.  The one on the right had a slab of meat in it.  It smelled pretty good, but looked like a Home Economics Class experiment gone bad.  (Yes, we know we’re dating ourselves.)   No idea, though.  Life is full of mysteries if you know where to look, and we seem to look in all the right places.

We put the onions, peppers and meat in our garbage bags.  The cornmeal got dumped out of sight under a bush.  The two flower pot trays were heavy, so we placed them and the big rubber block behind a tree and picked them up later with the car.

 

August 29th, 2019 – Park-and-Ride Route.

This morning was a bit warmer than yesterday but a slight breeze kept things comfortable.  School is starting again, so there was a slight uptick in traffic, but will probably not reach the full impact until next week.  We did see empty school buses practicing their routes.

We got a honk from the brown van and a wave from Salinas Construction.  We also removed a medium-sized raccoon from the road, a relatively rare occurrence.  But the sad news today was Chuck lost his flashlight.  At this time of year, we use our flashlights for the first half of the walk then turn them off and put them away when it becomes lighter.  We will look for it tomorrow, we are not hopeful.

One of the first things we came across was more drug evidence.  Charred tin foil used to smoke meth.

We found a nice hat.  It is from George’s Restaurant in Kirkland.  We were not aware of it, but it looks pretty good.  We should try it, but parking in Kirkland is very problematic.  Maybe if we wear the hat, we’ll get a discount, but probably not.  It still looks good, though.

Last week, we found an eagle emblem. Even though it looks green, it is actually black and chrome plated and the green is from reflected foliage.  One of our several Steve friends suggested it was a Harley-Davidson emblem.  This caused us to renew our search for the source.  Now we think it is a Philadelphia Eagles emblem that it fell of a trailer hitch cover.

These are sold by Home Depot.

We found another socket for our lost tool collection.  It was only a 3/16th inch.  No wonder they lost it.

We found a Carabiner.  It was labeled “Not for Climbing.”  Well, duh, it was only about an an inch-and-a-half long.  It had been run over and was useless anyway.  Into the recycle.

Some safety glasses. Hopefully the guy wearing them fared better than these.  Janet said they were missing a “Side Thingy.”   The technical term is “Earpiece.”  Amateur.  

Lost keys.  There were no identifiable markings.  One looked like a house key and the other a desk key.  They are now in our key jar.  No, it’s not locked.

This was cool.  As we were walking a bird flew over us and alit on the overhead wires.  We think it is a Juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk, but we are not bird experts.  Well, we know it isn’t a crow.  We kept moving.  We didn’t want to be mistaken for roadkill.

We have been watching a particularly steep embankment counting the beer cans.  It reached the trigger-limit of five, so we ventured down to collect the cans.  Yep, that’s about right.  Go down for five cans and come up with eight.  The odd man out was a Fremont Brewing Summer Ale.  We have no idea why it was slumming with the Bud Lights.

We found a comic book.  Well, just the cover.  The comic book was from 1971 and is selling for $78 online.  Perhaps we should search for the missing pages.

The guy is still whittling at the tree.  We have no idea what the plan is for the tree to fall.  There doesn’t seem to be a “safe” direction.  All of this work was being done on the City of Bothell right-of-way and we were wondering if the City knew about it.  After our walk today, we happened to see some official-looking (orange-vested) people examining the property.  It will be interesting to see what evolves.  No, we did not contact the City.

 

August 30th, 2019 – Safeway Route.

Today was warmer and a bit humid, but a slight breeze helped make our walk a bit more comfortable.  We didn’t find any money, but later in the day, Janet found a ten-dollar bill in a parking lot.  Since we were not on a walk, it went in her private reserve instead of our walking jar.  No, Chuck tried to reason with her, but there you are.  We got a few waves from the car and bus drivers and removed a roadkill house mouse from the road.

As you recall, yesterday Chuck lost his favored flashlight.  We drove along our route and even got out at the location where we went down the embankment to retrieve beer cans.  Chuck slipped on his way down and may have lost it then.  However, we were not able to see it.

This morning, Chuck, using an inferior flashlight looked for it without success.  As we reached the beer-can site, Chucked prepared to crawl down the bank.  At his feet was the flashlight.  Yesterday, we must have almost stepped on it while peering down the embankment for it.  Chuck remembered pulling a new bag out of his pocket before going down into the gully.  That is probably when the flashlight got dropped.

We spent a lot of time looking for the right walking flashlights and did not relish researching another candidate.  All’s right with the world again.  At least with Trash Walking.

However, when we peered down the embankment, someone had tossed yet another can.  It can wait for another day.

Someone got a parking ticket.  There was an article in the Seattle Times about a guy who had $17,000 in unpaid parking tickets.  We’ll just pass this on to him to add to his collection.

Another Nerf Bullet.  We’re getting a bit uncomfortable walking unarmed out here.  We are considering getting a concealed Nerf permit.

We found a waterlogged bagel for us.  It was waterlogged and picked up in pieces.  We didn’t partake of it even though it didn’t have any ants on it.  They could have added some flavor.

After the mowing along Juanita Woodinville Way, we found some toys.  A frisbee that lost badly to the mower in a disc golf match.  It got retired into our recycle bin with dignity.

Also, we found a couple more balls.  

The “Eyeball” on the left appeared to have had bad laser surgery, so ended up in the recycle.  The “baseball” on the right was really a tennis ball and ended up in our ball collection.  On probation, however.

A real fork in a disposable Cup O Noodles cup.   The fork ended up in our flatware collection.  The cup went, well, you know.

Another pair of lost sunglasses.  The claim by Seattleites is that Seattle has the highest purchasers of sunglasses in the U.S. presumably because we go through a long grey winter when sunglasses are lost through non use.  However, this analysis shows this is not true.  This is probably someone who left the glasses atop his car.

We found someone’s vehicle registration, indicating that their car had been ransacked. The address was within four homes of our normal route so we returned it to them.  The family was in the front yard.  Their car had been burgled and they were very happy to get the registration back.  One of the kids ran up and hugged us.  Walking is rewarding.

We found an emergency sign.  If it was a real emergency, shouldn’t you dial 911?  Okay, maybe you don’t have a cell phone.  This is an emergency.  First, remove and save the tape.  Where to save the tape?  Next, attach the sign to  the inside of rear window facing traffic.  Okay, did the car spin around?  Facing traffic which way?  This will need some further investigation.  Damn.  Forget where we saved the adhesive strips.  Wait, what was the emergency?

The pruning shears we found yesterday were still leaning by the fence. We placed them atop the fence to make them more visible.  We’ll see if they find a home.

Also, in the freshly-mowed bushes, we dug up several signs.  These are mostly old campaign signs that the opposing voters toss into the bushes.  We didn’t want to spend the time to harvest the signs today, but we’re sure they will be there on Monday, Labor Day when traffic will be almost nonexistent.

And the guy on 145th Street is still whittling away.  Just a little bit more.  The Washington State Lottery should take odds on which direction it falls.  The PowerBall will be what it destroys on it’s way down.

 

August 31st, 2019 – Riverside Drive.

We had a relatively quick (three-and-a-half hours) walk.  We didn’t come across any big messes and kept moving.  Traffic was very light, probably due to the three-day Labor Day weekend.  We found a penny.  Okay, it’s really beat up and corroded, but it counts.  We checked with the judges.

We remove two roadkill squirrels and two snakes.  One snake was in almost perfect condition.  Well, except for its head.

At the Sammamish River Park, we found another wine bottle.  We’re back to finding one per week.

Near by, was a lot of trash.  The iPhone doesn’t always focus properly in the dark. Our first thought was drugs, but it was automotive parts.   Spark plugs, hose clamps, etc.  Great place to tune up your car.  And litter, of course.

Also the guy apparently left his tee-shirt. Guess he didn’t want to get it dirty working on his car.  Or maybe he needed something else to litter.

Awe, isn’t this sweet.  “Hi Cathie – I am sending you my best thoughts for speedy + healthy recovery.  Hope this book amuses you.”  We hope she liked the book better than this card she tossed out.

Someone left Janet a tag.  But it was attached to the road.  As a matter of fact, she does own the road.

This startled us.  Then, looking closer, they were decals.  Dang! Fooled again.  When the guy was a teenager, he probably drove around with a friend in the trunk with his arm hanging out.  We did.

We found some chapstick.  Never mind.  It was Lip Therapy.

Under the freeway on Riverside Drive we found Amanda’s wallet.  Three licenses, several credit cards, receipts, etc. We figure someone acquired the wallet, took whatever they thought was valuable and tossed it.  It could have been tossed off the guard rail on Riverside Drive, but our guess is it was tossed off the freeway.  After our walk, we contacted the Bothell Police and they sent an officer to collect it.  There was twenty-six cents in it.  No, we didn’t keep it.  Janet wanted to put it in her private reserve, but this time, Chuck prevailed.

We found a crocheted hot pad.  This was probably left the the street crew putting down the new pavement.  That stuff gets pretty hot.  The worker’s are probably sorry they lost it.  His grandmother probably crocheted it.

As we have started doing, this is the weeks wrap-up in gloves.  The two single gloves were from the Proctologist’s bus stop.

And, the infamous poop bags.  All found near apartments.  Again, people, it’s about being a responsible citizen.

So, we were walking along and wondered what is the most populous country in Africa.  No, really.  Then we found this.  Chuck got it right.  Ok, not really.

We found Cedar Park School’s football strategy.  It’s all smoke and mirrors.  But it’s for sale for the right price.

We found some jewelry at the bottom of the Tolt Pipeline.  Okay, it’s probably not the Hope Diamond.  But we can hope, can’t we?

Toward the end of our walk, we found more stolen mail.  All junk mail, so we didn’t bother tracking anyone down.

We found a Kazoo.  

We had a great musical walk on the last part of our walk.  But Chuck didn’t appreciate Janet’s continuous thumping on the back of his head.  That’s what drums are for.  After all, those are hollow things with air inside.

Far ahead on the road, we saw a raccoon lumber across the street.  As we passed near the location we spotted it behind a tree.  It warily watched us as we warily watched it.  It didn’t look very friendly.  Are Raccoons carnivores?

We’ve talked about the crow rookery located at the University of Washington, Bothell campus.  There are up to 16,000 crows nested there.  This morning, they were acting very strange.  They were flying over in droves, not unusual, but they were flying low and alighting in close-by trees and cawing.  We think they were complaining that they had to work on the Labor Day weekend.  But as we point out, we do not speak Crow.