Scrap Day!

Today is scrap day.  Nick's Garage/workshop is in desperate need of some cleaning out and organization strategy.  Unfortunately, between lumber and unusable appliances you can hardly enter the place.  The lumber is being kept, though it does need some serious sorting.  That leaves getting rid of the busted appliances (3 stoves and a hot water heater) as the first step to what I hope will be a full garage overhaul.

One stove does work so we're gonna try and sell it on craigslist, where it will fetch more than the $10/#100 our scrap yard is currently paying for tin.  The rest of the appliances, along with every piece of metal junk my husband has been hoarding for the last 4 years are going to the scrap yard today.  My dad graciously volunteered to give us a hand.  My mom threatened our lives and my husband's reproductive organs if my dad (famous for declaring a busted shop-vac to be "A perfectly good bucket on wheels") came home with anything we had declared scrap.



My dad got here around 6:30.  I fed him and we started loading.  Apparently we had a little more to learn about sorting and cleaning scrap than we had thought, so it took a little while, but white Sanford & Son are now on their way to the scrap yard.

So now i'm sitting here, waiting for the grand total and thinking about scrapping.  It's kind of a double-edged sword.  Melting things down to be used again seems like the ultimate green on its surface, and i really do hope we're at least breaking even if not doing something good, but it's not exactly a clean process.  The question is: is it cleaner than mining for the stuff?  I really do think it is, which is not to say I'm really happy about it.  Call me an idealist, but i've just never been ok with the whole lesser of two evils thing.  *sigh* We can't change the world overnight.  

Anyways, thats all for now.  I promise to update when i learn what we made (i doubt it'll be very much, the brass and copper wasn't cleaned enough to take in today) AND I promise to preserve some snow peas and our FIRST (of what i'm sure will be many) zucchini this weekend and share.  Ya'll are my accountability buddies on this one.  

UPDATE: we made $67.90 (which means we hauled over 600 lbs of scrap).  $20 went to my dad for gas, we would have split it down the middle but he wouldnt let us.  So we now have almost $50 to put towards the vacation fund.  Its by no means a ton, but every little bit helps.  That there could be an afternoon of parasailing!