[DAVETHOMAS90]

Matt, what a beauty!

You clearly have a wealth of experience - and memories - really wonderful to hear. Thank you.

I grew up in Ilfracombe, on the North coast.
I had a real obsession with pointing, chest beckets, lanyards and bell ropes as a kid. Still have my copy of Ashley's Book of Knots.

Then I started climbing!

Just talking the other day about getting a boat.

Thank you very much indeed for sharing that. How about a separate thread?

+1 of course!

[Oldmanmatt]

I was born in Paignton, but my dad was a copper and he was transferred to Bodmin traffic, when I was five (1976). So I actually grew up in St Tudy, just outside Wadebridge. I was a Sea Scout and Sea Cadet, when they were both run by Fishermen. My unit was in Padstow, and many of my mates were sons of Trawlermen.
I learned to repair nets, whip and splice and hand and steer. Did all the RYA dingy stuff and power boat to instructor.
Joined the London Sailing project and rose to Watch officer and Coastal skipper, before running away to sea at 18 (did a runner in the Xmas holidays and joined on 9th Jan 89). I couldn’t face another day at school and St Austel sixth form college was a selective and strict.
Ironically, because of those pesky aptitude tests the Navy make you do, they sent meback to school for four years and made it a criminal offence (punishable by fine or stoppage of leave) to fail an exam.... 😱

[DAVETHOMAS90]

In the Jagged Globe skip now lol!

Unbelievable 

Matt, I'm at the Foundry will read your post in a little bit 

[DAVETHOMAS90]

Several boxes of unused and used jackets and fleeces, and the plastic boots, have now been left with the homeless charity collection at the Foundry 

Er, less one.. 

[DAVETHOMAS90]

TS. Capstone were my crew on Ropery Road in Ilfracombe.

All the usual Naval Acquaint stuff, steaming round the channel etc. Damage control at Raleigh was an experience!

Won a scholarship for a trip away on TS Royalist, which was a highlight, until I realised how long it usually takes me to get over sea sickness!

I'd grown up on a solid diet of Arthur Ransome. Sadly, my grandfather died in a boating accident in Bristol docks - gybe-boom-head-water-drown.

When I caught the climbing bug, my parents tried to get me to enter the Marines. Again, great fun, but ultimately it backfired, and photos of Jerry Moffatt hanging off bits of wood in the Poly gym enticed me away to ditch school and home life, and accept sponsorship from Maggy.

Your post has generated a lot of wonder

[SA Chris]

Several boxes of unused and used jackets and fleeces, and the plastic boots, have now been left with the homeless charity collection at the Foundry 

Surely the boots would be snapped up my a cold footed Sherpa somewhere...

Horrified that this stuff has been dumped in a skip.

[tregiffian]

OMM,      I`m sorry that St Austell VI Form didn`t prove right for you. At least we sort of helped start you on your truly impressive life trajectory. Most of our exes speak well of us; Silas, sometime Deputy Governor General of South Africa, Rachel, a feminist author and activist and Patrick who still sometimes busks in the town centre.

[SamT]

split topic?

Anyhow - Good effort Dave for sorting out the stuff in the skip.   

Perhaps JG knew the stuff would get lifted from the skip (it being in the foundary car park).  There is sometimes internal politics involved in giving stuff away from businesses and it makes things easier to say - "well we just dumped it"
(I'm thinking along the lines of gear testers who get into trouble for flogging all the gear that they get given to test)

Though the proximity of the Foundry homeless collection point leaves little excuse.

[Oldmanmatt]

OMM,      I`m sorry that St Austell VI Form didn`t prove right for you. At least we sort of helped start you on your truly impressive life trajectory. Most of our exes speak well of us; Silas, sometime Deputy Governor General of South Africa, Rachel, a feminist author and activist and Patrick who still sometimes busks in the town centre.

I had a Girlfriend, nextdoor in the Tech, doing Photography, Ceramics and Art. I was spending too much time in their “Dark room” developing things and not enough time doing prep.I was on Maths, Physics, Design and doing a fourth A in Geology, next door with Mr Trott. Was torn between joining the Navy as an Engineering officer (I was, in fact, sponsored by them at that point), but I also had offers at Loughborough for Geology and Camborne for Mining Engineering.

So I had a “moment” instead.
Married the girl a year later too.

Chalk and cheese.

[DAVETHOMAS90]

I hadn't realised - until I spoke with Foundry staff - that the charity collection went directly to projects to help the homeless, which is fantastic.

I can appreciate there may be (difficult to justify?) commercial or legal reasons for throwing away perfectly useable clothing or food, and that JG may not like the fact that the kit was removed from their skip. It was very well hidden. I'd actually seen a boot lace which I thought would be useful to replace the one that had just snapped - then I realised that the boxes were full of jackets, fleeces etc.

Here's a link to a podcast from Jamie Veitch's Sheffield Live show where he interviews a local manufacturer with a policy of donating jackets to homeless charity projects, on a sell one, donate one basis: 

https://www.jamieveitch.co.uk/2018/11/allen-holland-one-sold-one-given-jackets-plus-crowdfunding-and-manufacturing-tips/

[DAVETHOMAS90]

Yay! Santa's been 



I guess it's broken already! The full set is there, so should be an easy fix. 

I remember getting one of these in the late 70s after Hunt's championship winning year.

[simes]

I used to have a bandolier that I had shortened and hand stitched it back together. I lent it a mate to Lead something and when I followed and arrived at the belay I found he used it as an extender from the belay

My first SRT caving harness was homemade. Took me about half an hour on one of my dad's industrial machines. I used it regularly for a couple of years before I decided to buy a replacement.

[SamT]

top Tip tip.

Broke our microwave glass plate thing. Was at the tip and noticed they had a whole bunch of mircrowaves stacked up (about 40!!) so went up there and sure enough, a quick rummage and voila, the glass plates were all the same anyway, so nabbed a replacement.  In fact, got two so we can put one in the dishwasher and pop the clean one straight into microwave

[DAVETHOMAS90]

That's the spirit!

I bet a good number of the machines were working too. Kettles in skips generally seem to work.

Simes, you only have one life! Don't go throwing it away 

[Oldmanmatt]

I used to have a bandolier that I had shortened and hand stitched it back together. I lent it a mate to Lead something and when I followed and arrived at the belay I found he used it as an extender from the belay

My first SRT caving harness was homemade. Took me about half an hour on one of my dad's industrial machines. I used it regularly for a couple of years before I decided to buy a replacement.

Working as an instructor in mid-late 80’s, kids harnsses were non-existant. If the Small Whillans didn’t sinch up enough, we’d knock up a harness out of knotted slings.
Actually, most of them were better than the Whillans, at least they were if you had testicles.

[T_B]

 

Just seen this. Ref the JG skip, I agree that stuff should have been re-cycled or donated. The boots are v old but I don't know why they didn't get recycled as I'm pretty sure a previous lot did. I have put quite a bit of stuff we have been given in the Foundry Warm Stuff box.

We get clothing for porters/Sherpas made in Nepal. They get new stuff, it's the right size and we spend money in Nepal rather than giving it to a courier.

[DAVETHOMAS90]

Hi T_B.

I take it from your post that things are all good re transferring the kit to the collection at the Foundry.

Posted it up here assuming you might see it, and was OK taking any complaint that it had been moved.

It's great that there's a more vocal effort to bring the issue of homelessness into more general awareness. There are so many people sleeping rough at the moment. Always have been of course.

[DAVETHOMAS90]

Couple of good ones.

Went for a "skip run" last night, well 2.30 a.m. and found this 



I'd kept a very small piece of necklace that I found in the street a year and a half ago. Nearly chucked it in the bin too, but it wasn't magnetic so I thought I'd take a closer look.
Very small possible hallmark, so in the end took it to the local gold merchants, expecting them to put it in the bin for me.

"£150" came the reply from the girl on the counter! 

I was off to the bank to withdraw some money for a car too, so great timing.

[Muenchener]

Some places in Germany used to have an organised giveaway system: one day a month people would put usable stuff that they no longer needed or wanted out on the street; people could go around and pick up whatever they fancied, then in the evening council trucks came round and took the leftovers to the tip. A friend of mine furnished her student flat that way, years ago.

Doesn't exist with anything like the same scale or organisation any more, sadly. I've never seen such a thing in my twenty years as a Münchner. But the odd box of stuff marked as a giveaway on somebody's doorstep is still a fairly common sight.

[tommytwotone]

On the topic of furnishing flats.

Think the best I managed was from my Dad, who was a maintenance / snagger type person for one of the big housebuilders during the mid 2000s boom.

They'd sold all the properties on the estate, including the show home, and he turned up to find them chucking still sealed, brand new furniture that had been used to "dress" the show home in a skip. Fortunately his van was empty so he bagged me a brand new double bed and a mattress!

[DAVETHOMAS90]

That's a good one.

On the subject of leaving stuff out for people to take, I think that's something which is becoming increasingly common, which is good to see.

The most obvious "Owt for Nowt" which I hardly ever see these days is hitch-hiking. I find that incredibly sad. Somehow, these days I think that having very little/no money is viewed far more negatively than it used to be. Ironically, back when Maggie was in office, there was a sort of kinship in getting by on next to nothing, and with it, a true sense of appreciation of what little you did have, rather than what you didn't.

In my view, post Blair, things seemed significantly more meritocratic, with his emphasis on "social mobility", delivered with a thick layer of protestantism. Somehow, it seemed as though those who fell through the net, became invisible. I believe that in bi-partisan politics, what's needed is a stronger dialectic, and with Corbyn in opposition, I think there is an increased awareness of those who have nothing.

I often hitch out into the Peak. My last "proper" hitch was an attempt to get to Font for a tenner, on a flight from Prestwick airport. At 7am, an hour before my flight, I was dropped off a tractor in the pouring rain, with five miles to go. I didn't make it, so hitched into Glasgow, where very handily, Bubba was working at the time, and gave me a ride back to Sheffield.

[tommytwotone]

Ironically, back when Maggie was in office, there was a sort of kinship in getting by on next to nothing, and with it, a true sense of appreciation of what little you did have, rather than what you didn't.

In my view, post Blair, things seemed significantly more meritocratic, with his emphasis on "social mobility", delivered with a thick layer of protestantism. Somehow, it seemed as though those who fell through the net, became invisible. I believe that in bi-partisan politics, what's needed is a stronger dialectic, and with Corbyn in opposition, I think there is an increased awareness of those who have nothing.

Give it a couple of months - those days could well be returning, though more out of necessity than choice!

I often hitch out into the Peak. My last "proper" hitch was an attempt to get to Font for a tenner, on a flight from Prestwick airport. At 7am, an hour before my flight, I was dropped off a tractor in the pouring rain, with five miles to go. I didn't make it, so hitched into Glasgow, where very handily, Bubba was working at the time, and gave me a ride back to Sheffield.

I used to hitch a bit back in the early 2000s when a lot of the Derby crew did, especially as not many of us had cars. I managed an accidental hitch from Wirksworth at 10pm at night back to my front door when a boyfriend of a colleague happened to drive past,.

One time when meeting Derby mates at Plantation when I'd been in Sheffield overnight I stuck my thumb out at Hunter's Bar, no sign but just held up the old Rockfax bouldering guide - was lucky enough to be picked up by climbers going there too.

[SA Chris]

When I was young (20) I hitched to turkey and back over 3 months, only resorted to a bus a few times in Yugoslavia (as it was then) and trains and buses in parts of Turkey. Hard to think of doing it in a post 911 world, was a bonkers adventure. Can't imagine doing it now, or even considering encouraging anyone (including my own kids) to do it.

[DAVETHOMAS90]

Some of my recent weird and wonderful skip finds.

Brand new futon mattress, original oil painting (signed, no frame), brass wall plaque for home ("Bless this House", will Ebay), metronome in perfect condition (which I need), really sweet miniature set of dominoes in silver plate box, various discarded old meds (er.. Trama-somethingorother, cocodam.. sleeping tablets, always handy  ), vintage cut-throat razor in great condition (with original box; will Ebay)..

Oh, and what looks like a really handy guide to "Rope Access Techniques". All sounds very esoteric; a black art perhaps? Says “Prepared by Adam Long", whoever he is?  .. pair of All Stars in my size from the same skip (Thank you!).

In a bizarre twist, I was dropping off items at the local tip/recycle point when a friend turned up to dispose of a tub of DDT which she'd found in one of the same skips. Very random!

Of course, all of the above plus hundreds of metres of old wire, brass, lead etc to scrap.

Edit. Sold the guitar above for £20.

[tommytwotone]

Blimey Dave, good haul - do you keep your explorations local? Is this the fruits of skip diving in an affluent area?

What's the protocol on taking stuff? Do you just grab and run? Or do you knock on door and ask? I'm assuming if the skip is on someone's drive it's a different matter?

Having followed your finds I always have a look round my way, but it probably says something about my village that I've never seen anything worth having!