I already had a fulltime job that, by definition, has me driving around all day in areas where the residents have more dollars than sense.
I was pondering getting a part-time gig to help fund some things we wanted to have/do/etc.
One day I saw a simple, orange extension cord sitting atop someone's trash bin. I likely wouldn't have given it a second thought, but just that morning I'd read an article about how copper was almost $4/pound and folks were predicting it to go to $10 () . So I stopped & grabbed it. I took it home & spent almost an hour stripping it with a utility knife & pulling the copper out by hand & really wasn't too thrilled with the effort & time involved... but I really liked the heft of that ball of copper at the end. I also knew I could find easier ways to get at that copper if this new idea that was forming in my head worked out. I started looking around at the trashpiles in the areas I drove through & realized there were other metals that were worth money. That aluminum shower door... that diecast lamp... those rusted steel flowerbed borders. I started picking all those things up, and realized I could make just about as much as I would've working part-time for someone else, but I could do it out of my garage where I don't have to answer to anyone... well, anyone except my wife!
Then, one day I was puttering around the net & I figured there might be a place I could go & learn a little more about other folks that picked up metals... get some of their ideas & put them to use. Lo & behold, I fould this website called scrapmetalforum.com & would you believe... there's a PhD in scrapping residing in the threads on that site. But yall already knew that.
Best part was, I learned on that site about this stuff called ewaste... peoples' old computers are actually worth a WHOLE LOT of money.
I'll still pick up extension cords, though!
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