Waste Free Oregon is a husband and wife partnership started in 2007 that offers recycling services and sustainability solutions to events in Oregon.

Waste Free Oregon is hired to protect events from throwing unnecessary materials into the landfill. Waste Free Oregon does this by looking at all the materials generated by an event then separating out those materials that can be diverted from the landfill. Diverted means: recycled, composted, reused … re-anything but thrown in the landfill!  At our last event, the Eugene Saturday Market’s Holiday Market, we managed to divert nearly 90% of the 12,000 pounds of materials generated by the event.

A Very Collectible Mac Worthy of Repair

A very lucky find came into my world this week. Inside a drab little box full of stiff and soggy packing peanuts was a rare little old Macintosh.  This is a 26 year old masterpiece from the Macintosh revolution that created the “Computer For The Rest of Us”.

It is a Macintosh now known as the 128 for the amount of RAM it had (no hard disk) . This one was lovingly upgraded to a 512 model (512KB of RAM). The back still says just “Macintosh”. The front has a stuck on badge proclaiming it to be a Macintosh 512, and the insides were modified with a “512″ motherboard.

It came in booting weirdly. The internal AND the extra floppy drives needed help, being stiff from disuse. Looking inside showed that a part in the power supply was cooked and bulging. I replaced the whole power board using one from a Mac Plus to test the Mac and I will place the original board back in, for authenticity,  once I buy the replacement part.

What makes this particularly “keepable”  is that most 128′s were upgraded to Mac Plus grade. This gave the machine a full Megabyte of RAM, a Mac Plus back cover. and retained only the front cover with the inset Apple logo of the 128.

A truly collectible Rescued Relic VERY worth being Repaired2 Reuse!

Jeff Garrison, Old Geek, Nextsteprecycling

Great and unusual entry into this week’s Rescued Relics. This Philco vacuum tube intercom system called the Philcophone, graced the desks of many companies in the Golden Years of the 30′s and 40′s.

5 station-call buttons, flip-to-talk switch, it currently needs a tube replaced and does not fully power on.

Definitely collectible, it will go to Ebay to help Nextstep’s efforts in carrying out our mission statement.

The Materials Exchange Center for Community Arts presents the 2nd Object Afterlife Art Challenge exhibit.  This challenge is chance for artists to brave a new approach in their creative process while participating in an awareness-raising community event.  In an effort to bridge the worlds of fine art and scrap art, we challenged artists to create thought-provoking, intentional works with scrap materials provided by MECCA.  Artists were given nearly two months to complete their creation. Artwork will be chosen for awards in multiple categories.  This challenge encourages artists to work outside their usual mediums or incorporate scrap materials into their art.  The artist can use all or part of the objects given and is free to involve other materials and mediums as well.  38 artists took the
challenge!

The artwork created for this event will be on exhibit during the Eugene Celebration, August 27, 28, 29 at 43 W. Broadway and then throughout September at the MECCA Gallery at 449 Willamette St. (to right of Amtrak station). Thousands of people attend the Eugene
Celebration.  Our intention is to connect with and promote the local art community, inspire the creative use of scrap materials, and raise awareness of our universal need to re-imagine the objects surrounding us!

This project made possible in part by a grant by Lane Arts Council with support from the City of Eugene Cultural Services Division.

M.E.C.C.A., the Materials Exchange Center for Community Arts, is a non-profit organization based in downtown Eugene, Oregon. Our mission is to divert reusable materials from the landfill and put those items back into the hands of people that can make use of them, from artists and teachers to youth and their parents. We are dedicated to providing access to low-cost arts education and art experiences in an inclusive environment that reflects the personality of our community. We are located at 449 Willamette St, next to the Amtrak station in downtown Eugene.

To learn more, call (541) 302-1810 or visit

www.materials-exchange.org.

Some of Our Receiving Crew

Here’s an inside look at the crew that takes in consumer donations here at Nextstep. I present a tribute on 1320AM Info Radio Wednesday August 18th at 3:15PM.

I’ll share the day to day triumphs of our intrepid staff whose job it is to handle and process  donations.

From tiny cables to huge projection TVs, this bunch has the knack and know-how to get the piles of goodies we get in everyday into the right hands.

Sorting, distributing, testing and recycling are all done here by this diverse and cheerful group.

Your Community Recycling Center. At work for you. Making Re-Use happen; recycling the unusable; keeping the bad stuff out of landfills. We’re the people of Nextstep Recycling.