One blog post, pretty good working order, tell me when you can collect.

Call it what you will: Freecycle, Freegle, etc. A wonderful invention, and one we use a lot. Not sure what it is? A Yahoo group where you post things you no longer want or need, and give them away for free to people in your local community. We’ve given away a hell of a lot of stuff, and have received quite a bit, too.

I belong to a few local groups, but the one actually based in our city is such a clusterfuck. You see, you can post offers, but you can also post for things you want. On our group, this is where shit gets surreal.

It’s not uncommon for people to offer hedge clippings. Yes, you heard me right. ‘Lovely apple tree clippings to be repotted,’ ‘spider plant babies,’ etc. Another goody is ‘various for car boot sale.’

Or my personal favourite of recent weeks:

‘Offer: various stuff we’re taking to the dump this weekend if no one wants.

1. A piece of wood

2. Extension cord that has been chewed through. You could put tape on it and it would probably work.

3. TV aerial – old fashioned

4. Half a bag of coffee beans

5. Old office chair, missing one leg’

etc etc. You might as well say, ‘Hey, folks, I’ve got a piece of shit teddy bear – only missing the head, otherwise in great condition!’

The odd thing is, people’s wanted lists? Top of the line pushchairs, iPods, iPhones, netbooks, yadda yadda yadda yadda.

Now, I know you might be thinking, ‘How shocking. How simply dreadful. These people are abusing a community resource by posting their dream shopping list.’

Me? I’m thinking, ‘What sort of stupid motherfucker thinks they are going to get a working laptop from a group of people who regularly offer broken vaccum cleaners, balls of twine, and “assorted children’s toys, mostly broken – but may just need batteries. With a good clean they will be safe and good.” ????’

You might as well do a mojo-filled dance on your front lawn asking for that computer, cause honey, we po’. Yes, po’. Baby items seem to be the one exception – we got Snort’s crib from there, and it is actually a top of the line gorgeous piece of art.

That being said, we just gave away a piece of shit cot mobile that no longer lights up and is absolutely covered with a year’s worth of dirt and dust because we never used the fucker.

See? Po’. Go get your expensive goods the next city over, honey, ’cause we ain’t pretentious here. Hell, I just got myself a Lord of the Rings collection (a shitload of thin books easier to read than one giant book), and counted myself lucky that only two of the books had ripped in half spines and there was no visible mould.

PO’.

Tags: community spirit, freegle