What Preps are you doing this week? Part 5.

[Arzosah]

I'm a fan of dehydrating too, even though I don't do very much of it, and nor do I dehydrate meals. But I have 4kg of veg sitting in 3 sandwich boxes - the space saving alone makes it worthwhile to me. And I really like it that it needs no electricity once its done.

[Yorkshire Andy]

Finally got a co2 extinguisher for the shed due to the tumble drier living in there ...

It's not one of the recalled ones but better be safe than sorry...

https://www.itv.com/news/2018-01-16/up- ... port-says/

Co2 will penetrate the duct work to the element (often where fires start due to lint build up) easily compared to powder / foam / water (once it's turned off) and it won't freeze like water or foam

[Arzosah]

Bit of an odd one, this - it's a question, in fact. There was a lot of stuff going on in my road today (police, police and armed police) so I went for a walk in an unusual direction for me, ended up walking by all the builders merchants - there's about 4 of them in a row. There's a tile merchant there too. All of them were closed for Christmas, but there was a skip outside the tile merchant, so I went for a look - they regularly offer stuff free, and I've had coffe-table-sized tiles before (they had some in the skip today too, but they were so tightly jammed in, I couldn't get them, even though I like skipdiving).

Anyway. Another item half buried in the skip was a set of crutches. Actual crutches, the one with arm supports, handles for you to hold onto, and adjustable length legs. Covered in mud, and maybe other stuff too, I'm not sure but I just couldn't leave them in a dratted skip, so I took them. I'll certainly clean them, maybe find a medical charity to donate to, maybe just keep them. Am I mad? I might be off my game today ...

[diamond lil]

What an exciting place you live in Arzosah

[Arzosah]

I moved here because I thought it was quiet!

[jennyjj01]

I like skipdiving... but I just couldn't leave them in a dratted skip, so I took them. I'll certainly clean them, maybe find a medical charity to donate to, maybe just keep them. Am I mad? I might be off my game today ...

You don't live near Wimbledon Common by any chance?

Technically, isn't such skip diving illegal?

Anyways... to answer: It's the rest of the world gone mad. Skip users are mad and if they throw serviceable stuff in skips, they are wasteful. You are not mad. Maybe just unusual
I'd always feel wary skip diving, in case I'd find anything I really didn't want to see, such as a body rolled up in that nice piece of carpet. That would be a dilemma, if the carpet was nice.

[Arwen Thebard]

"such as a body rolled up in that nice piece of carpet. That would be a dilemma, if the carpet was nice. "

[Arzosah]

Thievery never occurred to me! I was wondering more about the dottiness of apocalyptic thinking I'd fit right in, in that imaginary Wimbledon

So then I went looking at google, of course.

From this one, it seems to be fine, the key quote being, "if an object has been truly abandoned, it is impossible to steal it". https://comescavenge.wordpress.com/2012 ... w-part-ii/

And the beeb has an article from back in 2011 about some poor woman taking bags of food dumped by a Tesco after a power cut, where the key quote says exactly the opposite, "just because someone throws something away, does not mean they don't own it." https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-13037808

Dear me! I do skip dive, and I've always asked permission - homeowners look at me like I'm mad, but I'd never take anything from an individual's skip without asking. The tile place, though, they've had blackboards out front saying "please take", so even now I'm not too worried. Funnily enough, I *did* have the police round here last night, doing house to house questioning

[ForgeCorvus]

I think the main point of skip-diving is to re-use or recycle something that would otherwise go to landfill.
Taking stuff out of recycling bins or dedicated scrap bins is obviously a no-no. However its weather the contents of waste bins/skips etc is regarded by the entity (person, business or global multi-corp) as still theirs or not thats the difficult bit.
Often just asking somebody or (as with the Tile company) them having a sign is good enough.

Supermarkets hate people going into food-waste bins because they want to sell you the stuff (sometimes at an insane mark-down.... ), even though the wastage is practically criminal...... The commonest reasons they give are "Health & Safety" or "The mess encouraging vermin"

Personally, if I have to pay to have a skip emptied and somebody comes along and takes some of the Carp away I'm happy. Its when they chuck stuff everywhere while searching (or even worse, dump their own rubbish. It happens) that get up my nose.

Common Courtesy Counts.

[grenfell]

Done a fair bit of skip diving in my time , I even got the nickname skippy at one point at the firm I used to work for. Stemmed from my father who was a council worker , originally on a bin lorry and latterly as a furnace controller at an incineration plant. The plant had publically assessable skips for people to use and I would often go up there with my father when he was working on a Sunday . I don't think father ever came home without something and it really was an eye opener as to what people would throw away , we've had antiques , thawing food , full unopened bottles of spirits , and goodness knows how many mowers , vacuums and bikes. I was there one day when a guy came in to the plant in a tatty looking hillman car. He asked if he could scrounge some of the waste oil . Dad said fine and the guy helped himself to a gallon and poured it straight into the engine. Seemed the thing used nearly as much oil as petrol and was on its last legs anyway.
At one point the council wanted to stop people from taking stuff out of the skips and did approach the police whose response was less than favourable. As they said people are " stealing " rubbish so what exactly would they be charged with? That was back in the 70's and early 80's but now there are notices at our local tip saying people will be prosecuted for " rubbish" ( my words) and cctv is there to watch us all. It seems to have gone full circle as well considering they actually charge us for dumping certain things.