Dumpster diving for dinner

Most consumers demand perfection. Knowing this, retailers end up throwing a lot of their stock in the garbage. That they can do this is a testament to the obvious -- that in America, there's a lot of stuff going around.

But even though there's so much in circulation already, the economy demands constant production and purchasing. More coals, more coals, fireman! She needs to be fed!

"All this excess is terrible," says Genevieve Luikart, a recent New College grad. "But without it, we wouldn't be able to live like this for free."

Luikart and her boyfriend, Joe Flanagan, are part of the growing set known as dumpster divers. They collect most of their groceries in their Sunday-night surveys of Sweetbay dumpsters, plus the downtown bakeries Pastry Art and C'est La Vie.

On a late-night expedition last week, the three of us went a-scrounging, not only for foodstuffs but for hard goods as well.

Borders bookstore

Our first stop is the Borders on U.S. 41. We work our way into a weird sort of channel, between the rear walls of two shopping centers.

"It's funny, because nobody sees these back alleys until they know what they're looking for," Luikart says.

We locate the dumpster, and the young couple breaks out their headlamp and flashlight. We hop into a slippery pit of magazines and start rooting around. As a reader, diving and cavorting in this pile of words, I feel like Scrooge McDuck in his beloved coin vault.

When the magazines at a bookstore like Borders become outdated, management tears off the covers and sends them back to the publisher to get reimbursed. Besides reams and reams of Sudoku puzzles, we find copies of Toyfare, Guitar Magazine, and Loaded (the original lads' mag).

Our best find at the Borders' dumpster? A David Bowie tribute CD featuring such bands as King Crimson and Mott the Hoople.

Village Bikes

It's a short drive over to the bike shop, where we go hunting for parts. Flanagan says we have to be careful not to open the bags in this dumpster because there's a dentist's office in the same complex. Once he found an assortment of dental casts, which he made into an art project.

There are plenty of tire tubes lying around, but none of them are usable. Flanagan, who works at Ryder Bikes in Bradenton, says bike merchants often shred the tubes before throwing them away, just to foil people like us.

I do find a perfectly good hub, four new brake pads and a set of gears for my bravely aging bike. Flanagan warns me against hoarding, though.

"You accumulate a lot of things that you think you might have use for, and at the time you might have a good plan for ... but when it comes down to it, you just have no use for it," he says.

"It's easy to become a pack rat when you dumpster dive," adds Luikart.

Their comments remind me of a piece of business jargon that's been used in discussion of dumpster diving. Most shoppers practice "just in time" economics. They buy things based on their needs at the moment. You need lettuce, so you look for the lettuce and buy it.

Freegans, those who've dropped out of consumerism, collect on a "just in case" basis. They find things they don't necessarily need, then wait a while. My brakes are going to go, and I'll have a backup pair waiting.

Sweetbay grocery, Bahia Vista location

"Roses -- for you," Flanagan says, handing a bunch to his girlfriend. He's found bouquets of healthy reds and yellows sitting on top of the dumpster.

Flanagan and Luikart have started a garden -- mostly herbs but a rosebush, too -- from potted plants they found in dumpsters.

"As soon as they start to wilt, (the grocers) just toss 'em," says Luikart. "They don't have time to take care of them."

Not much else here, though. Next is another Sweetbay, since Publix and Whole Foods -- plus big box stores like Wal-Mart and Target -- usually use a trash compactor.

But first, we stop downtown behind Pastry Art bakery, where the couple usually finds tasty carbs in the trash bin. But tonight all the bagels are wet, ragged, uninviting. We move on.

Sweetbay, Lockwood Ridge location

Bowls of fresh cold fruit! Chilled lettuce! What else?

"Ohh no -- Smart Dogs!" Flanagan cries enthusiastically.

"Wait," says Luikart. "Look."

She directs him to a grey pestilence that fills the corner of the package. Damn.

We continue rooting around, find a berry medley and a bagged Caesar salad. The packages are sealed and still cold, so the contents aren't contaminated. But we still have to worry about our hands.

"Watch what you touch," Flanagan says. "We got live meat."

I look around and there it is: a long red booger of beef hanging out of a banana box. Apart from the occasional cache of (untainted) hot dogs, which are loaded with preservatives, Luikart and Flanagan shy away from discarded meat.

But, I talked to an individual last week who gets pounds and pounds of choice steak from dumpsters. T-bones, sirloins, filet mignon. He only dives at the closing hour, and he only takes what's ice cold. He feeds it to his family and his unwitting elderly neighbors.

Legal issues

Technically, dumpster diving is a trespassing violation, since most businesses have some kind of a sign posted in the back of their lot.

However, says Capt. Steve Burns with the Sarasota County Sheriff's Office, "I'm not saying we go around and arrest people with a trespassing charge for going and taking stuff out of a dumpster."

Taking from a recycling bin, on the other hand, could constitute a theft charge. Once something is put in that container, it becomes the property either of local government or the private company contracted for recycling.

So dumpster diving isn't really outside the law. This may disappoint those more political scavengers who, when they go shopping at "D-Mart," see themselves as a sort of passive resisters.

Flanagan and Luikart, though they say they aren't drastically anti-establishment, probably fall in this category.

"It feels good to say, 'Fuck you,'" says Flanagan, seconded by his girlfriend:

"We're going to eat this for free."