cranky old dude

I opted to take the EZ Sport out today. Having used the Volae Tour yesterday I was in the mood for a LWB ride and my intended route included some pretty bumpy MUP's.



As I rolled through a rather nice housing tract I noticed a couple of 'Garage Sale' signs on a side street and made a split second decision to turn down that road and check them out. They were both drive by's as in they didn't look overly appealing from the road and not worth the time to stop. While turning off the road down at the other end I was noticing a gentleman cutting his grass and I couldn't help but notice how nice his yard looked. I brought my attention back to my direction of travel and I thought I saw something sparkle on the road. I took the time to stop and look back and what I saw convinced me that it might be worth my while to turn back and examine the object. I picked it up and examined it for a minute or two determining that it was still functioning.

By now I had caught the attention of the 'gent cutting his grass. I showed him my find and he assured me that he has never seen it before and can't imagine who might have lost it. He knew enough to heartily congratulate me on my timing and good fortune though.

It had been run over by at least one car as evidenced by the dings and scratches and the deplorable condition of the wristband, or what used to be a wristband. Believe it or not though, it works just fine....


Have I dropped enough clues yet?





















Tick tick tick tick......

NOS88

Nice find. The dings and scratches can be polished out, and a Swiss watch is a Swiss watch.

JanMM

I don't see an LCD time display - do you have to press a button to get that?

Pretty robust watch, it would seem.

David Bierbaum

Thank you for ticking off the salient points of your ride, explaining in enough detail to make things crystal clear. I have to hand it to you, you really managed to dial in on the important parts. Let us band together to congratulate you on your find.

Did you watch what I did, there?

With those glow-in-the-dark hands, is that watch an old-fashioned wind-up watch? I'd imagine those would be collectors items now. At least that's what I tell myself, while keeping two functioning wind up watches of my own...

gforeman 

Great Find!

I have a bag here in my office with 4 gem stones in it I have found on the road. I have no idea if they are real or not. Glass in the road just doesn't sparkle like these (three look like diamonds). I have never had them tested. I always just thought it was cool finding them. One of these days I might take them to a jeweler to see if they are worth anything. Until I do, I'll just dream they are real.




I find money all the time. I stick it in my pocket and have a jar at home. Last year I had almost $50 in change, though it was pretty chewed up from being run over.

I also find tools all the time. I have a drawer with screwdrivers, wrenches and such. I guess I'm a hoarder of some kind

Good find on the watch.

Always keep your eyes open, never know what you will find. Makes the rides interesting!

Jseis 

Does that have the perpetua motion? As I recall mine was ~$400 new.

Gerryattrick

The last time I found anything interesting while on a bike ride was around 1960. A few friends and I were riding in the Brecon Beacons miles from anywhere when one of the gang suddenly stopped and turned back. There on the roadside were a load of girlie mags.

For a bunch of 13 year olds that was like finding gold, and that was the end of the ride for that day.

long john

We must be bicycling scrappers Roads show here we come. I have found an estwing roofing hammer and loads of bunge cords. My road is congested with boaters in the summer.

ka0use

i once worked on the roads. one was a bridge project over 1-25 (thornton parkway bridge). i spent a lot of time on the approaches under construction and they were loooong. between 92nd and 104th aves. the verges seemed paved with panties. now, don't everybody go running up there, hoping to see something naked. all colors/sizes. this was before thongs. never found a bra. ??? also lots of change. chucked out windows by small children? bet i picked up $5/day. passed on the panties. must be a lot of teenagers cruising i-25...

qcpmsame 

Nice find there, those are really good, solid watches. Not to blingy or flashy, just a reliable, solid, nice looking watch. Amazing the things that we find on the road at our level and being out in the open.

Bill

David Bierbaum

Sigh. My "wealth through watches" hopes are dashed. I checked around after posting, and the current value of my Benrus 3 Star self-winding watch (7001 series) is... $40. woohoo. The other was some mystery watch with the Abraham Lincoln Insurance Company logo, and my Dad's name, on the watch face.

Anyhow, was yours a wind up style or a quartz watch?

Rwc5830

Must be the week for finding things...cool watch!

On Tuesday I found an unexpired credit card (Visa BBVA Bancomer), nice and shiny from a bank in Monterrey, MX. It was on the highway about two miles from the International bridge in Los Indios, TX, an area I ride all the time on my bike.

Needless to say I cut it up and put it in the shredder/recyler at work.

overthehillmedi

Just think if it was still good you coild have bought yourself a brand new Unobtainium bike with a colour corordinated poser kit on someone elses card, NOT!

blt

My biggest money find yet on Monday -- $20!! Most profitable ride ever!! On a long climb through nothing but scattered ranches, I took my break where there is a concrete wall to sit on by a storm drain, looked in the drain and saw a Sunday supplement with Molly Ringwald on the cover. Only after pondering the fact that Molly Ringwald still exists and wondering how that item could be trash in a storm drain in a place no one but a cyclist would ever be, I notice the muddy $20 in the drain. Grabbed a stick to retrieve it, and now I think I'm going to use it to go buy a beat up Swiss Army watch!!

lee kenney

Cycling in rainy conditions , I found 265 $ in crumpled bills on the edge of the road , in the country. I was singing the rain , but 10 miles down the road , A light bulb went off and I realised that I should have searched that grungy old mattress in the ditch .No matter, I'm coming back tomorrow but on my return the mattress was gone ! The most ugly roadside find is the little lumps of disposible diapers on the road , arrrgh!

dalameda

How do you read your power meter from that thing?

Artmo 

Isn't this called "stealing by finding?" Don't people hand valuables in to the police in case the owner has contacted them? Or am I just old -fashioned?

shelbyfv

I once found a pair of nice leather work gloves, still in plastic package. Way too big for me but they made a nice gift. It would have been an additional 40 miles to turn them over to the Sheriff's office, had I even considered it.

cranky old dude

A noble thought for sure. Unfortunately we happen to live in different realities.

Here is a sampling of the headlines from just todays local news....
"RPD tries to stem violent streak with 'Operation: Enough is Enough' "
"Rochester man charged with shooting pregnant teen "
"RPD Chief: City stabbings on the rise"
"Police ID man stabbed to death on Dewey Avenue"
"Man shot after argument on Orange Street"
"Have you heard of the "knockout game"?"

In this city there are multiple shootings every night, at least one home invasion per week, daily armed robberies, and the list goes on and on and on.

...and this is a small city.

Several years ago we had all of our vehicles broken into one night as they were parked in our driveway. All three suffered major damage from failed attempts to steal in-dash radios with damage in the thousands of dollars. The police are too busy dealing with city violence to respond to car break-ins anymore. We were mailed a form to fill out.

I can just hear the laughter if I walked in with a beat-up watch looking for it's lost owner.

I'm not knocking your sense of honesty, I'm not chastising our local law enforcement, I'm just stating what my piece of the world is like. Believe me, I would very much like to live in Andy Taylor's Mayberry or Beaver Cleaver's Mayfield but I don't.

cyclinfool

Wow Lenny!!
I thought Schenectady was bad. Rochester is still considered to have the highest density of High Tech in upstate - and all that crap to boot.

cranky old dude

If I heard the stats correctly, Rochester youth is the sixth poorest in the nation. I guess that is a major contributor to our high level of violence and crime.

10 Wheels

Op saved a good watch from being run over by the next car or truck.

cyclinfool

If it is true it is sad. Except for churches, your town has some of the classiest architecture in the state/country covering 1800 through the mid 1900's. It was the second generation "Silicon Valley" of the US (Troy/Schenectady being the first). It is a tragedy to loose it all to urban blight and excessive taxation.

h2oxtc

When I read the title of the thread I got excited ... I thought it was one of these ...


After reading a previous thread about finding things while riding I felt I must be riding blind since I never see or find anything on the road. One of the previous posters said that they always see these rubber bungee things on the road. Well today I saw my first one. It brought a smile to my face. Almost as big a smile as finding a Swiss watch.

a77impala

I was working at local Yellow Bike and a guy dropped off like New Schwinn cruiser with 700c wheels, the front one missing. The rear rim was red, we had nothing to match it so put in back room.
I got home and a friend calls and tells me he left me something on my deck, I go out to look and it is the missing wheel for the Schwinn!
He happened to be driving around and found it in the street. He could not believe he had found the exact wheel for our bike. He was not in his neighborhood and very seldom uses that street.
Somethings just can't be explained.