Tools

Here’s another thing I like about riding my bike everywhere: free stuff for my shop!

Yesterday, I picked up a perfectly good pair of Vice-Grips that were just lying in the street, nowhere near the pickup truck they probably fell out of. Not only are they a useful addition to the stock of tools in my workbench, they also go really well with the screwdriver I scored last week as I pedaled home from school.

This isn’t all that an uncommon phenomenon, either. I’ll bet that I find some sort of useful (or broken) something or other at least every other week. It ranges from a simple box wrench one day to, on another occasion, a cordless electric drill, complete in a box with the charger and everything. (Admittedly, it turned out to be busted—I think from being run over by a passing car—but still, a pretty good find; someone at Goodwill, where I eventually took it, surely made out well with it.)

Of course, I haven’t bought a bungee cord in years; I rarely go more than a week or two without finding one abandoned by the side of the road. Now, you might think that those that have sprung themselves from whatever they were holding onto might not be so desirable, but none of those I’ve garnered have given me any trouble; they certainly work just fine on my bike trailer.

I suppose I might do a better job of trying to return the loot that I come across to its rightful owners and, in my defense, I have, from time to time, placed whatever item has presented itself to me on the hood the nearest automobile, although admittedly, when it comes to box-cutters (of which I’ve found three or four) that strikes me as courting danger, at least indirectly.

It’s safer for me to take these things home, just like the dime of devil's lettuce I found near the park last week.