spoils_from_the_flood epitome of incomprehensibility Yesterday my sniffly self was walking the dog with Mom around the quiet back streets. I noticed pile after pile at the ends of driveways - planks of wood, broken chairs and cabinets, a couple of mattresses. So I asked, "Why's everyone throwing these things away NOW?" Our city's traditional moving day falls on July 1, Canada's birthday (which doesn't mean everyone who moves does so then, just that it's a common day to move). And then I realized and answered myself: Wet_Debby had flooded many people's basements. Ours included, but just with an inch of water, and luckily Dad and I - mostly Dad - had tidied it up earlier in the summer, sending bags of old clothes to Renaissance and etc. (This prompted me to go down there just now and check on Mom's craft supplies. I composted a still-damp, yellowed paper plate - pretty sure they can go in the compost?) Anyway. My parents weren't badly off, maybe (ironically?) due to their relative poverty, the "unfinished" basement having fewer things that water can spoil. But a lot of other people had stuff to throw away. At one house there was a sign, "Do Not Take - For Insurance Eval" or something to that effect. At another there was a laptop bag that looked fully functional, just damp-smelling and dusty. I picked it up. Heavy! Inside was a laptop with a charger. "I'm guessing this is broken," I said about the laptop. "If not, really old, anyway" - there was a floppy disk in another pocket. "But the bag looks fine if I wash it." A boy around ten wandered around the yard, the way kids do. It took a couple of tries to get his attention, and maybe he needed to see my mother and the dog to decide I was a safe enough stranger to talk to. I asked him if his parents were giving these things away, and by then he didn't just nod but added magnanimously, "Oh, you can take anything. All of this, you can take it. It might be a bit dirty, though. You might need to wash it first." ...So I brought it home, but my lethargy exceeded my curiosity and so far I haven't done anything with it. The laptop is presumably kaput, so it can go to electronics recycling. 240813 ... e_o_i There's a nice-looking travel bag on another street, too. I wonder if we could use that. But the joy in discovering these things brings a bit of a guilty feeling. One of my parents' expressions is "don't have fun at others' expense." This isn't exactly that, but it feels close. Another irrational feeling I had yesterday was irritation: I saw wrapped-up rugs and carpets on the curb too and got annoyed at the presumably rich people who would just toss them, thinking: Surely you can air them out. Surely whatever water and mud accumulated in that short time only caused surface damage like wavy splotches. But I'm no rug expert, and don't I wish for new and unstained things, too? Don't I want my recycled and reused things to be pristine-looking, even if I know that's not realistic?? And and and, wouldn't I be happy to see the left-behind rugs if I *needed* rugs??? 240813 ... e_o_i A lot of things weren't salvageable, though, such as broken electronics. Someone had a whole freezer destroyed. Other buildings had piles of torn-up wood flooring awaiting removal. Even on my walk with Shiloh today I saw leftover garbage. 240906 what's it to you? who go blather from