dumpster diving

School dumpsters are great! My mom works in our town's high school cafateria. At the end of last school year, they were going to throw out a Little Debbie display with four shelves and wheels. One of the ladies she works with had said she wanted it, but never ended up taking it. So, now it sits in my workshop holding a rather large number of books considering it is something meant to hold snack cakes and such. Wonderful. There is also a lot of food thrown away--stuff that is not exposed, but either still in its packaging, ziplocked, etc.--that she brings home. We get lots of frozen breadsticks that are broken in two and so "unusable" for school lunches. Of course, the school system frowns on this, which is ridiculous. They are making lots of cuts at the school (right now the cafateria is terribly understaffed) and implementing cost-saving techniques, but don't touch the edibles in, or on their way, to the dumpster. Heaven forbid someone get a free meal (or useful bookshelf lol). I understand in order to write things off they have to throw away, but how hard is it to look the other way? Currently, the school is PAYING "consultants" to come in and tell them where they can SAVE MONEY. These consulting geniuses have them removing bulbs from every other fixture, removing other energy sucking devices which could simply be unplugged when not in use, cutting needed jobs, etc. They got rid of a crazy number of microwaves--I am sure some were not needed; however, it was such a number that I had to wonder if they we also taking them from the Home Ec department. Home Ec without necessary aplliances? Tsk Tsk. Now I am all for saving energy and money (c'mon, I eat dumpster food), but they are starting to take things too far. A school should be well lit and have the necessary learning materials. The Superintendent just recently purchased--local taxpayers purchased--an insanley expensive new wooden desk, as well as some sundries, for his office. I am sure they were all much needed. How can a man of authority work at a cheap desk surrounded by outdated office supplies and equipement? It's fine for the kids, but the Superintedent? No way. Got a bit of topic and I apologize, but, in my ramble, there is a part of the root as to why we (US for me, but really most, if not all, of the world) are poor and looking for ways to survive such as hitting the dumpsters. "Yet the dogs eat of the crumbs that fall from their masters' table(Matthew 15:27)." An out of context quote but it is too good/appropriate not to use here.

A friend of ours works at a university textiles department and the amounot of useable fabric they throw away is disgusting. She often grabs things out of the bin that we can use. They do send it for recycling but often they'll throw away something like cotton sheeting from a display and then order a bunch more next term for another display.