Save the select items I brought home from the dorms last week, I haven't been to the grocery dump in several days and tonight seemed like a good night to go. We have had unusually cool weather the last couple days and I figured I'd take advantage of it by seeing what food had been spared from the summer heat. I ended up going to six dumpsters - two grocery stores and four pharmacies. Considering the number of bins I visited, I wasn't able to recover much. Still, I got what I went for and was satisfied with the night's findings. I got my friend to join me and capture some video of our run, so hopefully there will be some clips to share soon. Here is tonight's list:
8 bottles water
2 packages Ritz crackers
2 boxes trash bags
10 rolls cough drops
package of napkins
box cotton swabs
box freezer bags
20 Nutrigrain bars -
3 bags Kashi -
2 bags corn flakes - store must have a "take it out of the box before throwing away" policy, as I have noticed many pharmicies do
5 boxes Sun Maid raisins
1 can tuna
1 box elbow macaroni
1 box vanilla wafers
2 veggie and dip snack trays
4 tomatoes
8 apples
3 potatoes
2 boxes baby organic spinach ~my favorite!
3 boxes baby organic herb and romaine mix
4 zucchini
1 cucumber
1 green pepper
bunch fresh basil
1 can cream of celery soup
1 bottle chocolate syrup
jar dried bay leaves
whole deli turkey breast
rolling suitcase
Neutrogena face lotion
These are the stories,adventures, blurbs and recipes that explain how a simple experiment in living frugally turned in to living a new "freegan" lifestyle. I can never un-learn or forget the truths about our society that I've seen and am now dedicated to helping others who wish to learn them.
Hey Michael,
ReplyDeleteYour blog is super interesting. When you wrote about foraging at college dumps, it struck me that you're doing exactly my job right now..I just graduated college and I have a 2 week stint sorting trash at my college's recycling center. I totally hear what you're saying about people dumping out good stuff. You know the crazy part? Apparently this year, there's way less stuff than there normally is--at my school anyway. The people that work there regularly speculate that it's the economy. Nonetheless, I've pretty much stocked up a new apartment.
I'm totally excited about not spending any money when I move down to DC in a couple of weeks but I'm pretty scared of going foraging where I could get in trouble for it. What were those tips you were talking about that you learned from your security guard friend?
Best,
Molley