February 17th, 2020 – Safeway Route.
The temperature today was 36°F but felt colder probably due to the moisture in the air. We started out ahead of schedule but ended up later than usual because we got sidetracked a couple of times. It was President’s Day, so schools and government workers and a few others had the day off so traffic was very light. We waved to Salinas Construction and got a nice verbal thank you from a man turning onto Juanita-Woodinville Way.
And, we found MONEY!
Five dollars and two cents. 
Each in a different location. Okay, you guys made up for missing Money Monday last week, just don’t let it happen again.
Then we found more “lettuce!” 
But not the same kind.
Fallout from Valentine’s Day. 
“Thank you for your Valentine’s Day gift. I’ll find a special place for it and cherish it forever.”
Is a T-Rex a suitable Valentine’s gift? We did find a unicorn, which may be more fitting. 
Perhaps it was in the same package as the T-Rex and escaped. An amorous T-Rex? Maybe. “Rawr! Amorous T-Rex dinos had their own form of foreplay”
“In courtship, tyrannosaurids might have rubbed their sensitive faces together as a vital part of pre-copulatory play,”
We’re not sure having a T-Rex with those sharp teeth so close to one’s nose would get the libido going. Or other parts of one’s body for that matter, but we won’t delve further into that. No wonder the unicorn escaped.
Okay, enough about Valentine’s Day. How about a birthday? 
It must have also been a rough party, this balloon is barely holding it’s own hanging in at neutral buoyancy. By tomorrow, it’ll probably be grounded. Is it named the Hindenballoon?
But, never fear. 
“Happy 21st birthday Murray. I will take a memento of this day and put it where I can gaze upon it daily.” Nope. We took it.
We found another tool for our Lost Tool Collection. 
Another socket. It was in great condition, only run over a few times.
In the same vein, a Spring Gate O Ring, Round Carabiner Snap Clip. 
Yep, that’s its real name. It was in really good shape. It didn’t look run over at all. Not sure what we’ll do with it, though.
We found another unidentifiable lost hubcap. 
Definitely not headed for Goodwill. Recycled.
We thought we’d found another dog poop bag. 
But there was actually something dead inside. Poop bags we kind of understand. Totally irresponsible pet owners. People bagging dead animals and leaving them by the side of the road is just weird. What do they do when Grandma passes?
We washed our vests and jackets this weekend. They needed it. But they are getting a bit frayed and we found this label. 
We did wave to the Salinas Construction driver this morning who originally gave us our vests. Maybe we need to flag him down for a new set?
We find a lot of these dental aids. 
Might as well clean your teeth while you commute. Most we find have been run over and damaged. This one was in mint condition. We can use it! We’ll flip coins. Loser uses it.
February 18th, 2020 – Park-and-Ride Route.
It was a nippy 32°F today but calm. It was a little uncomfortable but not unbearable. We got a short honk from a white car and two verbal thank-yous. Overall, the trash was light and mundane.
While running errands yesterday, we noticed some cans in the parking area at the bottom of the Tolt Pipeline. This morning they were gone. A short distance away, we found part of another safety vest tag. 
It’s from a 3M Safety Vest. Someone seems to be encroaching on our territory. It better not be that damned older couple.
Again, we ended up at the park-and-ride before the bus came to clear out the riders so we wandered the lot for a few minutes. 
We saw a glove we’d left a few weeks ago and placed it by a light pole. This time we took it.
We tried to pick up this trash. 
We struggled with it for a minute, but it was frozen solid to the parking lot. We’re sure we’ll get a rematch.
It’s a girl! 
They don’t seem too thrilled about it.
When it gets this cold, we carry Little Hotties hand warmers. We found the discarded container of another brand. 
Hot Pockets. Later, when we checked it out, we found that we’d picked up someone’s lunch trash.
Hot Pockets!
Wonder if he got sued for this?
February 19th, 2020 – Safeway Route.
It was a little colder this morning and was a bit uncomfortable until we got warmed up. We removed a small bird from the road that had been hit by a vehicle on Juanita-Woodinville Way. We also got a very nice Thank-you from a lady waiting at the Safeway bus stop.
Today we found a matching glove for one we found on Monday. 
We seldom find the biological twin. It was a tearful reunion. Oh well, off to Goodwill.
Cigarette Wednesday! 
Really? They have cigarettes for each day of the week like towels? Appropriately, today is Wednesday.
Speaking of cigarettes, thank you good citizen for using your car ashtray. 
Then emptying it on the roadway. And yes, they were frozen to the ground.
Someone set up the knocked-over sign. 
Careful. You don’t want to further upset ill-tempered traffic. [groan]
It says “Display on Dash,” 
not “Show on Road.” It wasn’t even in a parking spot. What an idiot.
A pricey smashed water bottle. 
An 18-ounce Hydro Flask. A cool [pun intended] thirty dollars on Amazon. That’s a lot of money for a water bottle. We find a lot of water bottles in better condition that we will let go for much less than this. Actually, we’ll sell you this one. Let us know if you’re interested. But hurry, Tuesday is garbage day.
A full packet. “Hand Crafted Harvested” 
We thought we’d found some marijuana. But it looks like something to do with plants and vases. The instructions are pictographs. Here is our translation.
- Pour contents in vase.
- Add water and stir.
- Murder a flower with scissors.
- Wait, it’s a mass murder.
On further inspection, it is manufactured in Bogota Columbia. It may be drugs.
February 20th, 2020 – Park-and-Ride Route.
It warmed up this morning to 34°F, but with a slight breeze. We kept our hoods up most of the walk. We didn’t get any honks or verbal thanks, but we did wave to Salinas Construction and got smiles and waves from other passersby.
We found more money. 
Not like Money Monday, but a penny. This probably doesn’t seem like much to you, but it makes “cents” to us.
On a similar note, we found another coin. 
Another Washington State Lottery Scratch and Lose coin. This is like tossing out your pack of cigarettes to quit smoking. It seldom works.
At the park-and-ride party spot, we found some cans and other trash. 
Then one of us, I won’t mention her name, started looking through the bushes and found five bottles that have probably been there for weeks. We dropped the lot in the trash can at the bus stop.
As you are probably aware, we find a lot of gas caps near service stations. 
Today was a radiator cap. It must have been an old car. In the “old days” when you got gas at service stations, the attendant always checked your oil and radiator fluid. If your tires were low, no built-in pressure sensors, you had air hoses near the gas pump to fill the tires. Then service stations converted to full service islands ($$) and self service islands. Now they are all self service.
And you need to pay for air. Try telling that to a driver in 1960.
We don’t know what this is. 
It was firm rubber and looked like a small iron, about 5 x 3 x 3 inches in size. Our guess is that its some kind of specialty shock absorber.
Yet another discarded condom. 
It’s actually a good thing that litterers do not procreate.
February 21st, 2020 – Safeway Route.
It was a bit cooler this morning, but not uncomfortable. We got waves from several folks but found no money and no roadkill.
At the KinderCare, yet another number two. 
They must really hate that number. We’ve found several number twos. We tossed it back over the fence anyway. At least it’s not a number six. Ugh. Is it a six or a nine?
We saw a half-buried beer can up on the bank and climbed up to retrieve it. 
When we got there, we discovered a buried golf ball. We were pretty happy about that until we got it home. It had a big gouge out of it. In golf, that’s called a huge slice. It’s in the trash, not our ball collection. We have our standards.
Another dime bag. 
We find a lot of these. How do they pick their designs? Is there an annual dime bag design award? They have the Oscars, the Emmys, and the Espys. How about the Druggies?
A few weeks back we found someone had dumped a bunch of PVC confetti and we’ve been picking it up since then. Today, we walked to the end of Juanita-Woodinville Way and on our way back, our flashlight picked up something about 75 feet away on the other side of the road. Had we missed something?
We crossed over and found, 
another 1 x 2 inch piece of very reflective confetti. We should have ignored it.
We found another discarded phone. 
It had been in the bushes for a while. When we got it home, we removed the protective case and found it as an iPhone 7. When we find lost/discarded phones, they are normally dead or on life support. This iPhone was in fine condition and took a charge.
The phone has been there less than three weeks because it was backed up three weeks ago. It was still on the T-Mobile network, but did not have any information that allowed us to get it back to the owner. We took it to T-Mobile to let them handle it.
February 22nd, 2020 – Riverside Drive.
It was warmer this morning at a comfortable 41°F. We got several waves including one from the bus driver on Brickyard Road and a honk/wave from a car on Juanita-Woodinville Way. We also removed a small roadkill bird from the roadway.
We got “nickel-and-dimed” this morning. 
Wait, it’s a Mexican peso. And a peso is worth about a nickel. But “peso and dimed” just doesn’t sound right.
It was another average week for gloves and poop bags. 
Eleven gloves and seven bags. And nothing matched. Well, perhaps a couple of the poop bags.
Last week we found children’s clothing on Saturday. This week, it was socks. 
Sock it to us.
We found another painted rock. 
Last time we found one, they wanted us to log a picture of it onto a private Facebook site and find another place to place it. This time, we left it alone.
On Brickyard Road, we found a water bottle filled with cigarette butts. 
We used to find a lot of these, mainly Gatorade bottles, but whoever was doing it quit or started dumping them somewhere else. This one was half-buried and covered with moss, so it’s been there a while.
Another tennis ball in good condition. 
Added to our ball collection, tennis section.
The chair from last week is still in front of the apartments. 
“What’s this? Another place to toss trash. All right!” Or maybe they were playing a new game called Trash Toss? I guess it’s up to us to contact the city once again.
Whoa! More money. 
The quarter was half buried and the penny was on a piece of metal and looked like it had been used as an electrical conductor. 
Before circuit breakers, houses had fuse boxes and when a fuse blew, if you didn’t have a spare, you could put a penny behind the fuse to bypass the blown fuse. More education from TrashWalking.blog. We took the penny anyway.
We found another socket for our tool collection. 
It’s a Williams 11/32nd inch deep socket. Available on Amazon. $10.00 + $11.17 shipping. Really? Many years ago, we bought a complete socket set for that. Granted, it was not a good set, but $21.17 for a socket not destined for use by NASA on mars?
A tossed key. 
For the guy to toss it out the window, it must be a minor key and not a major one. Since it’s on the ground, is it considered off key?
We dug a deflated Paw Patrol balloon out of the berry bushes. 
The guy on the left flipping us the bird is named Rubble. Now you can call him Recycle.
We found two unused pencils. 
One is used for drawing straight lines and one for curved.
Near the freeway, we found another foreign coin. 
Wait, it was a Sacagawea Dollar! How often do you get that for change?
That’s $1.36 today and $6.39 for the week. Oh, and a peso. Unless we find a $20 bill or get a gift card, this may be a week record. w00t!
Trash Walking 