Zatera Ul

My office looks out over the back yard, and guess what I just saw: a short, rather round and elf-like woman, with a big garbage bag over her shoulder, taking a peek in our trash bin. No luck — our trash day was yesterday, so it’s empty except maybe some used kitty litter (if MFH took it out last night). Then another woman, similarly elf-like and with her own garbage bag, caught up to her and they went on their way.

Our trash just has the stuff that can’t go into the garage sale box, the recycling bins, or the compost pile anyway. But I know lots of people throw perfectly good things away. Last weekend we saw that one of our neighbors had set out a plastic tree (not a Christmas tree) by their trash, and we were considering snagging it for our porch. The one advantage of our old apartment was the wide variety of furniture that would show up by the dumpsters. You could furnish your whole apartment for free, if you were patient and not too picky. The best thing we got was a bookshelf, which we sorely needed (and still have).