Monday, April 25th, 2022 – Safeway
As mentioned in our last post, today we were on our way back home from a fantastic weekend family reunion in Lincoln City, Oregon. See last week’s blog for a few more details.
Tuesday, April 26th, 2022 – Park-and-Ride
We are back to our walks and the weather has changed for the better. It has warmed a bit, evidently causing folks to shed their clothing.
We found two caps, a pair of sweatpants and a sock. Probably not related. The black cap was unmarked and unremarkable. The brown cap is from a brewery in Anchorage, Alaska named 49th State Brewery. The Areo87 sweatpants were extra large and wouldn’t fit us, and it had an antitheft tag on it, so probably stolen.
We were able to remove the tag by cutting the pin holding the device to the backing ring. We assumed a strong magnet would release the backing ring, but evidently, we did not have a strong enough magnet. But brute force worked. All the clothing will go to Goodwill.
We did find another tool.
Okay, another socket that appears to be a 15mm in good condition. We are going to put all the sockets we have found into a separate jar so we can “sock it to folks.” Get it? Oh, never mind.
“Spoken for Destiny.”
Okay, what is spoken for destiny? Is Destiny a person or did someone say something very important that will affect our mortal future? People should not litter messages that can cause us such stress.
To make up for the possible effects on our destiny, this caused a spring in our step.
Then, this didn’t.
A couple years ago, someone was smashing Modelo beer bottles on Simonds Road and NE 145th St. Today, we found three smashed Modelo bottles along this route. We’ll see if this continues.
Wednesday, April 27th, 2022 – Safeway and 100th Ave NE
We reached midweek and have not found any money, but to make up for it, no roadkill. We can settle for that.
However, we found another tool.
Yes, another socket. We hear rumors that the TrashWalking judges are considering disallowing sockets as a tool. First, butterflies are not roadkill, now sockets are not tools? Give us a break.
Another lost gas cap.
Only one this week, so the drivers are no longer shocked at the five-dollar-per-gallon prices.
Someone came to the end of the sidewalk and decided to walk barefoot through the grass.
Either they are still wandering around the grass or they forgot their sandals. Either way, these are in the Goodwill pile.
A new, improved cigarette butt.
On the left, are traditional cigarette butts we find. They are mainly made of tobacco leaves and paper that decomposes fairly fast. However, the filters can take up to two years.
Now there is a new, improved cigarette butt made of high-endurance plastic and stainless steel. These Hi-Tech Cigarette Butts will affect the environment for many years to come. Watch for them, coming soon to a gutter near you!
Thursday, April 28th, 2022 – 160th to 124th Street
We needed to remove a roadkill squirrel today but made up for it by finding fifteen cents.
A rather corroded nickel and a bright shiny dime. The nickel was on 116th Ave NE and the dime was on Juanita-Woodinville Way. It is starting to look like a good week.
Along our route, we saw several opened mailboxes.
This normally means mail thieves came through harvesting mail and we found some dumped, but not much. We have found places where the thieves dump a large amount of unwanted mail, but we did not come across it.
116th Ave NE, the street that just keeps on giving. We keep thinking it will calm down like most of our other routes, but this one has not slowed down. The first thing we found was a bunch of business-related notes.
There were handwritten notes about the selling points of a vacuum cleaner, order forms and a bunch of filters. Unfortunately, we don’t know what the brand of the vacuum was so the filters are pretty much useless. We could try to hand-pleat them and use them for coffee filters, but we don’t have a drip coffee machine. Besides, they are vacuum filters. Wait, we can pleat them, donate them to a charity and write them off our taxes. Hand-pleated filters should be worth $75 apiece. Sure, that will work.
As seems to be the norm, we found a bunch of 14-Hands wine cans and bottles along with McDonalds bags.
There were three piles of wine cans and bottles, only one pile shown in the above photo. We also found four seltzer cans with a condom in the middle. The guy trying to seduce the girl with wine needs to take a lesson from the Seltzer Guy.
More random items from 116th Ave NE.
Another right-handed golf glove. As we learned last week, even though a golf glove looks to be left-handed to a normal person, to a golfer (abnormal person) it is a right-handed glove. We also found a sock. We don’t know which handed it is. Or footed, for that matter.
But the best thing today occurred NOT on 116th Ave NE but at our turn-around point at NE 160th St. and 124th Ave. NE. A lady flagged us down and thanked us for picking up trash.
She also gave us two gift cards.
A Starbucks card and a Panera card. This was a very welcome surprise and we really appreciate these gestures of thanks.
Friday, April 29th, 2022 – 100th Ave NE
This morning was a fine walking day, warmer and partly sunny. Our walks are now starting in the twilight which means we don’t need to use our flashlights very long. Entering the good part of the year.
We removed a mole and a whole rabbit from the streets. But, as before, we also found money.
A penny and two quarters. Fifty-one cents, a very good week indeed.
In addition to the whole rabbit, we also found a lucky rabbit’s foot.
Yes, supposedly lucky for us, but obviously not the rabbit. Strange that we did not find the rest of the rabbit. Or a key chain.
There is an infamous gully on our walk over Norway Hill. We used to say if we saw five beer cans down the gully, there were at least ten and we (Chuck) should climb down and collect them. We have changed up our routes so we seldom come over the hill at the same time. Today we did and WE cleaned up the gully.
Seventeen cans and five bottles. Chuck’s bag runneth over.
Okay, it is Friday and time to see what is in Chuck’s vest pocket.
Starting at the upper-left, Thomas’ employee card. A game die with what appears to be an Ebola virus on it, a couple of hair bands and a visible circle, made of stainless steel, not like the transparent circles last week.
Continuing down, a UNO card and a ONE card. They appear similar, but the UNO card belongs to a travel card game, whereas ONE card appears to be a gambling card good for several electronic games. These electronic cards for gambling are just wrong. If we are going to lose money, we want to hear the ka-ching of coins disappearing down the slots, not the electronic voices cheerfully saying, “you lose.”
Continuing down, a half a credit card, not good for electronic machines and a Stay America key lock card that may be good for the vibrating bed. Not that we know.
To the right, a Washington State Lottery scratch-lose card. “CASH TO GO” that “GOT UP AND WENT.” Finally, a Bartell Drugs receipt found on, you guessed it, 116th Ave NE where we picked up all the trash. It includes two bottles of 14-Hands wine. Cheers!
Saturday, April 30th, 2022 – Riverside Drive
Today was the warmest it has been in a long time at 48°F (9°C) but it rained just about the entire time. We found even more clothes.
An athletic beanie. A sports bra and tank top and the tank top still had the antitheft tag attached. Another pair if sweatpants, the second this week. A pair of trousers across from the apartments on Woodinville Drive. The pants looked soiled, but we were wearing gloves. As we picked them up, sixty-seven cents fell out of the pocket.
Then later as we were crossing the freeway overpass, we found another penny making today’s take sixty-eight cents.
Going down the hill toward Riverside Drive, we spotted a bag that looked like it could be the McLitterers.
But it was too heavy to be them. It was relatively heavy with what turned out to be a bunch of french-fries. The crows won’t even eat cold McDonalds fries.
At a bus stop, someone forgot their breakfast.
An unopened package of Costco cinnamon-raisin bagels. No, we didn’t partake, we had not worked up an appetite yet.
Another pin-tail comb.
Yes, we know, good for combing through our trash. We have used that line a few times before.
Another vaping device.
A Voopoo Drag model that retails for sixty bucks. When we got home, we plugged it into a USB power supply, but it appears to be dead. The manufacturer says it has an 18650 battery in it, the same as we use in our flashlights. We will open the thing to at least recycle the battery.
We found a couple of tools today.
A screwdriver bit in good condition and a pruning saw with a scabbard.
Close-by, we found a lost water cooler lid. Next Halloween, Chuck is going as a Viking!
At another bus stop on Brickyard Road, we found a book.
We can’t wait for it to dry out so we can find out how it ends.
On the freeway offramp, we found more Busch 25-ounce beer cans, all with the pop-tabs removed.
We find these cans every week at the same location on the offramp. It is the same person because these are the only Busch cans we consistently find, and the pop-tabs are always missing. So. someone drives on the freeway drinking twenty-five ounces of beer and dumps them just before he exits. Not a safe practice.
We found a plastic egg with an earthworm heading for it.
Somehow, it reminds us as a “birds-and-bees” illustration.
We found this free sign.
So, we took it.
We arrived home with eight bags of trash and recycling.
We also dumped at least six bags along our walk, so this was a banner day.
Granted, we missed our Saturday walk last week, but that is no reason to make fun of us.
That wraps up our shortened walking week. Our take was,
- Two $25 gift cards.
- $1.24 in found change.
- Zero Mike’s Lemonade Cans on Norway Hill. It may be the litterer took the week off or, more likely, the grass is getting too tall for us to see the cans.
- A bunch of clothes including three hats and two sweatpants.
- A wet Arthur’s Tooth book.
- Two antitheft tags that didn’t work.
- An unlucky rabbit’s foot.
Trash Walking 