Old House Handyman: A scrapyard story after a near disaster

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3 days ago

The washing machine failed in a way that filled the house with acrid smoke.
A project to remodel a half bath — including moving the laundry 'room' from that space to a second-floor room above it — was delayed by unexpected additions to the project and a plumber who didn't show up.
And a massive tree branch hit by a brief and powerful gust of wind crashed across the driveway five minutes after our daughter drove across that very spot to park in her garage.
In short, the branch, 2 feet in diameter and at least 20 feet long, could have flattened her car and killed her if her timing had been off by minutes.
We all share a collective sigh of relief and send up prayers of thanksgiving for her safety.
It was quite a month at the home of Daughter No. 2, but there was a bright spot in all of this: I took her along with me for her first visit to a scrapyard.
Some might call it a junkyard. Others would call it an auto-wrecking company. And we look at it as a recycling center that pays us to not toss old appliances, pieces of metal pipe, a castoff cast-iron tub or strings of old wiring into a landfill.
In short, it's an adventure. On my first trip to the scrapyard a few weeks ago, I pulled up to the gate to see a concrete-block building with more bars across the windows than a state penitentiary and more grime caked to the walls than mud stuck to a farmer's boots.
There were no signs offering directions on how to proceed, but beyond the gate was a platform that I assumed was a scale to weigh my truck going in and weigh it going out, so that the operators would know how much metal I deposited.
But there were no signs. So I hopped out of the truck and pushed open the rusted metal door to the office. Inside, I found a pretty, young woman sitting behind a desk. She was thumbing through a stack of auto titles, which I presumed were the recently departed cars that were on their way to be melted for reuse in some other car or a new washing machine.
She did not look up.
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'Hello,' I said. 'I'm new here. I have a couple of old microwave ovens. Where should I take them?'
'Drive onto the scale,' she said without looking up. 'Wait for the green light. Drive straight ahead and turn left, and dump them there.'
I did as instructed, driving between piles of battered appliances, pieces of wrecked cars, mountains of twisted wiring and piles of indistinguishable, rusting, recyclable refuse. A young man appeared from nowhere and asked, 'That all you got?'
Yes, I said.
'Don't drop them. I'll take care of them,' he said.
He grabbed them from my truck and tossed them like footballs onto one of the piles.
I thanked him and drove back between the growing piles and past men operating cranes and loaders, drove onto the scale and waited for the green light. But now what?
I stopped at the office again, opened the door and was greeted by… silence from the stoic, artistically tattooed young woman.
'Me again!' I said cheerfully.
She did not respond, but eventually peered over the top of her glasses as if to say she was at least not happy to see me and, at most, growing annoyed by the newbie in her presence.
'Can you tell me what to do next?' I asked.
She exhaled an exasperated sigh.
'Park out front. Come back here with your ID.'
I did as instructed, returning to the office and the same frostiness. She took my driver's license and swiped it through a card reader.
'Look up at the camera,' she said, pointing generally up in the direction of the wall behind her. I had no idea where the camera was, so I'm sure that's a portrait fit for framing.
'Take the receipt over to the ATM, scan the bar code and get your cash,' she said.
At the same time, a man with the beard and vibe of a member of the ZZ Top rock band had his feet on a desk behind me, and he launched into a profane lecturing of the young man who had thrown my microwaves like footballs.
The bearded one unleashed the most creative use of eff-bombs I have ever heard — so much so that I was momentarily distracted.
'Excuse me?' I said to the young woman. 'Could you tell me again what I need to do?'
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Another exasperated sigh.
'Take the receipt over to the ATM and get your cash,' she said without raising her voice or her eyes.
Again, I did as instructed, struggled a bit to get the ATM to read the bar code on my receipt, and waited for my cash.
'Grab it fast before it pulls the cash back in,' said the helpful microwave thrower.
I jumped as the cash appeared and pulled out a whole $6!
So when our daughter was feeling a little blue about an AWOL plumber, nearly getting flattened by a tree branch and seeing her washing machine go up in smoke, I told her that I knew of something that would cheer her up.
'You need some entertainment. Let's take your washing machine to the scrapyard!'
Alan D. Miller is a former Dispatch editor who teaches journalism at Denison University and writes about old house repair and historic preservation based on personal experiences and questions from readers.
[e-mail]
@youroldhouse
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Old House Handyman: A scrapyard story
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