Monday, 4th, 2021 – Safeway
This morning was warm and very wet, raining for our entire walk. There was a light amount of trash to pick up, much of it being washed down the storm drains into the Puget Sound.
This is getting weird, but in a good way. We don’t walk on Sunday, so this is our third walk of the new year and we found yet another dollar bill.
It was on the traffic island at the end of Juanita-Woodinville Way. After being skunked the last week of 2020, we’ve found a dollar bill all three days of 2021. We take this as a good omen. By our accounting, we found $95.95 in 2020, and that was helped by an amazing $40 find in July. We do not count gift cards that we receive as found money. At this rate for 2021, we are aiming for over $300. Oh, give us a break, we can dream, can’t we?
Someone left us a full, 32 oz. spray bottle of Tile Plus Foaming Bathroom Cleaner.
We’re not familiar with this brand, but it must be good. $14 on Amazon. We may give it a review.
Also, someone left us a couple of mangos by Safeway.
Even though we cleaned them with the Tile Plus, they still looked suspect. We’re not fans of mangy mangos.
The weather took a toll on some signs.
A lost-dog sign was in the gutter. Whoa! A $2000 dollar reward. Ok, if you find this dog, let us know and we will notify the owner for you, free of charge, of course.
And this sign fell off someone’s vehicle.
Or maybe they are selling the street. Is this like the selling of the Brooklyn Bridge? We’re in, we could make it a toll road!
Someone tossed a bag of trash.
Seven bottles of Sutter Creek wine and a bunch of cigarettes. Was this a last-ditch effort to give 2020 an appropriate sendoff?
A neighbor of ours has some family members in North Dakota who collect pop tabs for charities, so we collect them for him. We filled up our jar near the end of the year and emptied it.
We don’t count these tabs, we have a life, after all. However, we found someone on the Internet who determined that there are 1267 pop tabs per pound. Based on this, the jar had 1872 pop tabs. We’ve collected 6.8 pounds or 8645 pop tabs for North Dakota since the beginning of 2018. So we picked up over 8500 cans in about two years of our five years of Trash Walking. That is in our approximately five-mile radius of our walks on major roads. Think how many more are out there!
Tuesday, 5th, 2021 – Park-and-Ride
Today we needed to remove a roadkill rabbit from the road, but we did find more money.
Okay, a penny and a bit of a let-down from the dollar bills, but it is money. And, as someone once said, “A penny saved is worth, let’s face it, very little,” or something like that.
At the park-and-ride, someone rang in the new year.
This is a common occurrence here. So maybe they were ringing in the new week?
And someone else rang in the new year at the park-and-ride.
Another condom. Okay, and maybe ringing in the new week?
Wednesday, 6th, 2021 – Safeway
Today was a pleasant walk with mild temperatures and only a little mist. And the money situation is looking up.
A quarter, a dime and a nickel. Forty cents. Not quite a dollar, but it still increases our hourly wage.
We found a pair of socks near the apartments on 112th Ave NE.
They were in good condition but very wet. They’ll be washed and sent to Goodwill.
We came across a ball escaped from the KinderCare.
We were thinking of adding it to our ball collection, but we tossed it back. Leaving it made us a bit deflated, but it was too.
We picked up a bungee tie-down of some sort.
It was about three feet long and light. We may carry it with us from now on to bind random bulky trash we find. Not sure we would trust it to rappel down a ravine to pick up trash, though.
We scooped up a knit cap.
When we got it home, we saw it was Forty-Niner’s cap. That explains why someone tossed the cap. The Forty-Niners lost to the Seahawks last Sunday. We have some relatives who are Forty-Niner fans. We’ll offer it to them for our condolences. Heh-heh.
On the traffic island at the end of Juanita-Woodinville Way where we found the dollar bill on Monday, we saw some trash.
It was a bag and a wad of Christmas wrapping paper. There was a Wyndham Hotel key card, too. There was a lot of traffic, so we scooped it up into our recycle bag and continued to one of our drop-off dumpsters to sort things out.
In the trash there was an earring and another piece of jewelry.
So, was this some sort of holiday tryst of lovers exchanging gifts? But we also found this.
A new cell phone box. We have no idea what the dates mean. If they are birthdates, 1968 would be 51 years old and 1948 would be, yikes, our age. Did they get together to play Cribbage? I suppose we could call the number and ask. We need a burner phone.
Behind the party store, we found more beer cans from another party.
And there was a waterlogged magazine with it.
Foreign Affairs Magazine. Whoa, we may need to join this party hour. But first, they need to upgrade their beer selection. Coors Light and Modelo? How about some local craft beers, like Georgetown Bodhizafa?
Okay, another condom.
Maybe they are ringing in the new day? What’s next, hours?
Someone tossed their Holiday Forever Stamps.
Could it be that Forever is here?
Thursday, 7th, 2021 – 160th to 124th Street
The weather today was cooler and started out foggy, but we had no rain which was good. We also found no money which was bad. We’ve had a good week, so we’re not complaining… much. Come on, guys – loosen up.
Other than cigarette buts, beer cans and the like, the first thing we came across was a nice tennis ball in a ditch along 112th Ave NE.
There was no obvious home, so we will give it one in our ball collection. Once it dries out.
Then we found a tool.
It wasn’t readily identifiable to us, but when we got home, we found it was an Alltrade telescoping magnet. We couldn’t find it on their website, and we think we know why. As we telescoped the extensions out, they fell apart. And the shims that fell out were made of copper so we couldn’t use the magnet to pick them up. What’s with that? We should have left it in the gutter. That’s the last time we pick up an Alltrade tool. Okay, we will, we can’t help ourselves.
Select Stud.
Chuck’s sure Janet isn’t interested, but she said she has some friends who might be. She took the paper.
Yet another mask in a plastic baggie.
What gives? We keep finding these, sealed and apparently unused. No, we toss them in the garbage.
We found a strip of paper.
We had no use for it, but it was free. You can’t pass up something for free.
Yet another do-rag.
Like the others we’ve found, we’ll wash it and send it to Goodwill.
Then on 145th Street NE, we found this empty box.
The warnings or instructions are in Chinese. We tossed it in someone’s recycle bin. What? No, there’s no way we would put it in our recycle bin.
Friday, 8th, 2021 – 100th Ave NE
This morning was mild with no rain and made for a nice walk, but a bit boring. After a nice start, we are now in day two of no money finds.
But, at the Tolt Pipeline at the top of Norway Hill, another condom.
So, this week we’ve found more used condoms than money. Not a good trend.
Near the start of our walk, we found a baseball across the ditch.
We find a lot of baseballs across from the school, but this one was near the opposite end of the street with no obvious home. We put it in our ball collection. Our ball collection is overflowing and needs some organization. Unfortunately we have not been on the ball in this respect.
On 100th Ave NE, some construction was started and a portable latrine was added.
Today a chair appeared, apparently to use while waiting a turn for the toilet.
Someone thoughtfully left us a knee pad for working on that hard-to-get litter.
Thanks, but it’s a bit bulky for us to carry. We would appreciate the $8 it cost.
Finally, someone left us an unopened pouch of Seattle’s Best Pier 70 Blend coffee.
Thank you, but we prefer Kirkland-brand coffee beans and our trusty, several-year-old De’Longhi Magnifica Espresso Machine.
The perfect end to six miles of picking up trash. No Starbuck’s cups, straws, lids or other refuse to pick up.
Saturday, 9th, 2021 – Riverside Drive & Brickyard Road
This morning was foggy, a cold 33°F (0.6°C) and fell below freezing during our walk. Toward the end, we started hitting some icy spots. We removed a large rat and a small bird from the road but found money, a penny.
It was very beat up and barely recognizable, but it’s a penny. Really.
On the way down the hill to Riverside Drive, we found two McDonalds McCafe cups with marijuana tubes in them.
“Smokey Point Infused Joints.” Ah, now it’s clear why McCafe is so popular. It’s not the coffee, it’s the stirrers.
We found some reindeer spectacles.
“See Reindeer in every Holiday Light.” We don’t know about you, but when we look at lights, we want to see lights, not reindeer. Oh, of course, reindeer probably do.
We found some clothes today.
Two knit caps and a pair of mittens. The mittens had a clever way to keep together so you don’t lose one. They were frozen together. Of course, then you lose both.
Then, at a bus stop, we found a pair of shoes.
Scratch that. We found two shoes.
Gnome for the Holidays.
Scattered along Brickyard Road were six Washington State scratch-and-lose lottery cards. Perhaps we are being too critical. Maybe they purchased
twelve cards and the other six were winners. If you believe that, you probably still believe in Santa too.
A Hot Shield Ball.
We had not heard of this ball but, thanks to Google, we find that it is designed to be fast, but have little or no bounce. Indeed, when we dropped it from about six feet, it bounced four to six inches. What’s the fun in that? Ok, after some more research, thanks Google, it is for sports like street hockey. And no, sorry Google, we did not research street hockey.
We found an obviously stolen and dumped Amazon box.
Five pounds of peanut butter worth $26. Let’s see, at the rate we consume peanut butter, this will last us over ten years. We will donate it to the food bank. Besides, it sticks to the roof of your mouth. Ask any dog.
Trash Walking 