A memo retreived from the garbage contains valuable information
Here are the things you should consider includ-ing in your GIRK - Garbaged Information Retrieval Kit:
Rubber gloves. Either surgical gloves, or the kind you use while washing dishes. Though most garbage you'll be rummaging through is "clean" (white paper bins for recycling) it's a good idea to wear some sort of thin gloves anyway. You'll also want to wear gloves when you're at home sorting through the bags you lifted.
Ladder. I'm not talking about real ladders here, al-though you may want to use one. Some dump-sters are very high, or are vertically-oriented, and so climbing out of them may be difficult. Find yourself an old chair or hassock some-body's throwing away, and take it in the trunk of your car. Then you can either put it into
the bin from outside if it looks like you'll have trouble climbing out, or you can use it to climb into the bin in the first place. Either way, if you have to leave in a hurry for some reason you can safely leave it behind - after all, it was garbage to begin with, right?
Flashlight. Take a piece of rope or a strip of denim or something and fashion a strap. Make the strap just big enough so you can easily slip the flashlight on and off your hand. Especially if you'll be rummaging at night, you will need a powerful flashlight to guide you through the garbage. Make sure the batteries are okay -best
thing is to use rechargeables.
Garbage bags. Not the clear kind. You must use black, brown, or similarly colored bags for this. After all, you don't want people to see what you've got in them. If you're just pulling manuals, memos, etc., out of the trash and are not bringing home whole, intact bags, you should bring along at least one of your own darkcolored garbage bags, to put everything in. You might want to take two bags, placing one inside the other, to insure against breakage.
Appropriate clothing. Don't go rummaging through garbage bins in your Sunday finery! Wear shoes you'll be able to climb and jump with. Wear clothes that won't snag, old clothes, clothes that you don't care if they get destroyed. You might want to wear a custodial type outfit, if you have it. If you know the company maintenance staff tends to wear baseball caps, or a certain color shirt or jacket, then by all means dress similarly. Wear dark colors, not bright pinks, reds, or yellows that everyone's going to be staring at.
Empty soda cans. Some hackers tell security guards or other onlookers that they're searching for aluminum cans to recycle. You might want to fill up the bottom third of one of your garbage bags with cans, or maybe leave an open bag of cans outside the bin so bypassers will be able to figure out for themselves that you're collecting cans for charity.
One time I told a stodgy old guard, "The sci-ence classes at my school are competing to see how many cans we can recycle. For every pound of cans we bring in, our school gets three dollars. The class that brings in the most cans wins a prize. Right now we're in second place, so I want to bring us up to first!" He walked
away and came back with a handful of empty beer cans and bottles. "Are you doing glass too?" he asked.
Remember: don't carry unnecessary things in your pockets, or things like watches that are going to fall off your wrist. You don't want to lose money, wallets, credit cards, notebooks or anything else to the hungry stomach of a garbage bin, so leave all that at home. Before you leave the house, do a pocket check. Make sure you have nothing that could identify you and nothing you can't afford to lose. This seems like obvious advice but I can recall at least four different messages posted by hackers on private BBSs where they said things like, "Jeez! I just came back from the CornpuPhone dump and I forgot to put my ring back on after I climbed out of the can! Now I'll have to go back there tomorrow!"
On the other hand, you might want to take along a cheap watch or something that didn't cost' much but looks expensive. Then if some curious person comes along you can jump up and say, "Here's that stupid watch! I knew that idiot janitor threw it out with the trash!" Also, another good idea: Take a shower when you get home!
