I have a friend in Glenville who views bulk pickup week as a shopping spree. Over the years she’s picked up a garden cart, lawn furniture, a rug, skates and sleds, a kerosene heater and other practical and useful items that needed only a little cleaning. Of course, sometimes you need things that aren’t useful and practical, and this year she found just that: a large display model of a LEGO man, who has been named Jacob and has been showing up in other friends’ lawns under the cover of darkness.

My friend is not the only one mining roadsides for necessary and unnecessary goods. I still have the perfectly good oak library chairs I found on a sidewalk in New York City many, many years ago. (At least, they will be perfectly good if we ever get around to stripping off the anatomical designs someone spray-painted on them in orange and silver. I wonder why those chairs were thrown out.) My coat closet is a wardrobe I found at the end of someone’s driveway with a “free” sign on it. We got my son’s first two-wheeler the same way. And now that he’s outgrown it, we’ll make an identical sign, or find a deserving 5-year-old.

A colleague told me what luck his son has been having cleaning out his garage by leaving things at the curb — an exercise machine, a futon, weights. He puts them outside and — Voila! — they disappear.

For those of you with things to get rid of or things you need, there’s another way, which doesn’t involve serendipity — an Internet swap site called Freecycle. It started in Arizona in 2003, and is now pretty much worldwide. It’s nonprofit, and local groups are run by volunteers. Members post what they’re looking for or what they’re looking to get rid of, then arrange for pickup.

It’s all about reusing useful (or not so useful) stuff, and keeping things out of landfills.

There’s a freecycle group in Schenectady (click here) and Albany (click here). For Saratoga Springs, click here.

There are also groups in Amsterdam, Cooperstown, Gloversville, Rensselaer, and Schoharie. For a group near you, click here.

Do you have advice on getting free stuff, or giving things away? Do you have a treasure you found for free? Add a comment below, or email greenpoint@dailygazette.net.