<p>Sharon's post about Figaro got my memories flowing....</p>
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<p>Once upon a time, I lived in a townhouse (end of the row -- great apt!), and the neighbor on the other side of my one adjoining wall was a... scavenger is the polite word, I think. He spent part of every Sunday exploring the dumpsters in the apt complex, bringing home lots of functional items people had thrown away. At one point he had almost a dozen vacuums that people had thrown away because they needed new belts. He would repair them, and hand them out to folks who needed one. He brought me a kitchen table one time - only one chair, but I lived alone, so one chair was enough. <br /><br />I put my houseplants out every spring, brought them in every fall. Usually brought in more than I put out, because other plants that were on their last legs would mysteriously appear on my tables. They usually had a long, healthy life with me (until the year we got a very early frost 
)<br /><br />Anyways...I came home one November evening and saw a palm tree sticking out of the top of the dumpster by my apt. Mentioned it to Cliff just in passing, about what a shame it was that they had put this 6ft tall tree IN the dumpster, instead of beside it, cause now no one could give it a new home.<br /><br />Headed out to run some errands, and when I came home later that evening, Dolly the Dumpster Palm was leaning on the wall next to my apt door. Cliff had pulled her out of the dumpster so I could save her life. Unfortunately, he hadn't been able to salvage her pot and soil. Apparently, he just persistently tugged at her until she came free, and pulled her out of the dumpster from the top of it. <br /><br />I put her in the bed of the truck with my other houseplants, and headed down to the car-wash station the apt complex had. Used their high-pressure hose to GENTLY wash her down and get the dumpster crud off of her, and then cleaned the outsides of all the houseplant pots to make sure I wasn't bringing anything into the house with them.</p>
<p>Got to Lowes right before they closed and bought Dolly a new pot and soil, and had sense enough to buy a wheely-deal at the same time, so I wouldn't have to carry her around. </p>
<p>Put the pot on the wheely-deal, added soil & Dolly, watered her in, and wheeled her inside. To my amazement, she survived and thrived. Like Sharon's Figaro, she continued to grow, and it got more and more challenging to bring her inside come winter-time, even with the wheely-deal.</p>
<p>Then came the year of the early frost. I lost about half my house-plants that year, and Dolly was one of the casualties. *sigh*</p>
<p>Still, she had 3-4 more years than she would have if Cliff hadn't been my neighbor, and she was loved during those extra years, so I hope that counts for something.</p>
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