IMACOMPUTA

Free stuff!

Man do I love free stuff. Food, furniture, electronics, etc. I don't even care if I need it. Cheap stuff is good too. Sometimes, I decide I need to replace things I wouldn't normally buy, but would wait to get for very cheap. The prime example of this is clothing, but in this case I really needed a new couch. Look at my old piece of junk:

I got it for free a couple years before. Couldn't even sit on it anymore. So I browsed the newsgroups and looked at some couches until I found I was happy with. The only problem is, this couch was huge. The guy was willing to part with it for $125. I drove over and strapped in on my little car's roof, as I have done with so many other oversized objects.

I learned that the guy selling the couch was leaving the country a few days later, and he mentioned I was welcome to any of the stuff he couldn't sell. I knew he wouldn't be able to sell much, so I planned to come with a truck the day before he was leaving. The only problem was, I didn't have a truck.

So I grabbed Stephen and we planned to rent the Home Depot truck, which was available for 75 minutes for $20. Here was our route:

We had to buy something at home depot to use the truck. I wanted it to be convincing, so we got a piece of 4x8 drywall. Armed with the $8 sheet, I filled out the paperwork for the rental, which was surprisingly little paperwork and took way too much time.

0:00 We get out to the truck. It's basically a flatbed pickup covered with snow and ice. No one is around to clean it though. And we don't have time to spare. We threw the drywall on top of the snow covered bed, and jumped in. Of course, the window was also covered in ice. And no ice scraper.

3:00 On our way. I hadn't really planned the route in advance, so decided to head toward the Bloomfield Bridge, and then on over Bigelow to the Liberty Bridge. Of course I had to put up with ridiculous lights with green arrows still active at night when noone was even on the road, losing me precious seconds.

9:00 The engine on the truck feels pretty weak, maybe it is going to burn out? Upon reviewing these videos, it is clear to me that I still have not hit puberty. Someday...

12:53 I realize the Fuel light is on. We have to go about 10-15 miles or so total, I'm not sure if it will make it. And I've had a lot of experience with running out of gas, trust me. Stephen knew this, too.

14:41 Liberty Tunnel

17:07 Racing through the South Hills, and feeling the engine start to sputter, I concoct a plan: If we run out of gas, we can at least get the money back for the truck. My AAA should work to fill up this home depot truck with some gas.

19:57 Finally get to a gas station at the base of the hill. I decide to put in about .5 gallons, enough to possibly get us home. Cost:$1

23:17 Away from the gas station and up the hill to this guy's apartment.

28:56 Arrived. I came in with the intention of taking everything not bolted down. After all, this guy was leaving the next morning forever. I felt bad so gave him what me and Stephen had in our wallets, $20 and $6 respectively. After that, we proceeded to take everything we could fit. The next 40 minutes are filled with frantic furniture moving, followed by the tying down of the furniture in the truck. The interesting thing is, all the rope that was designed to hold down the stuff in the truck was gone. That's why this took 40 instead of 20 minutes. Luckily I was only seriously injured once during the creative packing.

1:12:52 Pull away

1:19:08 Liberty tunnel going back. We are already over the 75 minutes, and still have to unpack.

1:28:37 My apartment. Luckily we unpacked a lot faster than we packed.

1:45:00 Left my apartment.

What followed was a race back to Home Depot, which was already closing when I arrived. I forced my way in an explained. By explained I meant I told them I had actually run out of gas, which did not happen. They offered to reimburse everything, including the drywall, which I had unfortunately left in the truck. I allowed them to take off the late fee ($10 or so) but I felt so guilty, so not for the drywall or initial rental fee. Oh yeah, and I didn't ask for the $1 for gas back either.

$125 for the couch initially, $30 for the drywall and truck, $1 for gas, and $26 for taking all that guy's possessions. Total Cost: $182

Total Haul:

  • Very nice couch
  • 3 Coffee tables
  • Queen sized mattress and boxspring with frame
  • Recliner
  • Couple laptop bags
  • 3 CD wallets
  • TV stand
  • Card table w/4 chairs
  • Standing dinner tray
  • Table with embedded lamp
  • Duffel bag
  • Iron
  • And maybe some things I forgot