When a Yard Sale Won't Work, Call a Pro

The garage door doesn't want to open at first, and when Frank Coyne finally forces it up, I can see why.

It's embarrassed.

No doubt this garage has held many honorable things -- cars, bikes, lawn furniture -- but now all it's got is junk. And lots of it.

Frank and I are standing in an alley off North Capitol Street NW, and it looks as if a tide of construction debris has washed in. Piled to the ceiling are mounds and mounds of chalky drywall, lengths of shattered molding, broken window frames, rusted pipes, empty caulking tubes, empty buckets of joint compound, empty fast food cartons. . . .

A contractor is renovating the house, and the garage is his dumping ground. Frank has been hired to wrestle everything out and toss it in the 19-cubic-foot bed of his truck. He runs Junk in the Trunk LLC, and today I'm his worker.

"You'll ride through Washington on a big truck (wearing a lime green T-shirt) loading furniture, knick-knacks and misc. junk," Frank had written in his e-mail, making a day spent hauling junk sound like a field trip. Big truck! Green shirt! Knickknacks!

But our first stop is this disaster. Frank hands me a pair of brown cotton gloves -- he prefers to work barehanded -- and we set to work.

Junk removal is trendy now. It's the flip side of that other emblem of America's resolute acquisitiveness: the portable storage unit, so many of which stand sentry in our carports. When the POD is full, people call Frank to dispose of the former heirlooms.

At least, that's the sort of job Frank likes to get: furniture, knickknacks.

"Construction debris is what we hate doing most," he says. "It's a very competitive market, so you have to lower your prices. And it's heavy."

And awkward. Try flinging drywall up into a truck bed, its pulverized innards blowing back in your face like desert sand. Or vertical blinds, the slats wrapping around your arms like the tentacles of an octopus. Every other board I grab seems to bristle with rusty nails. Mr. Lockjaw, white courtesy phone!

There's something archaeological about the debris. When I realize that the clear plastic tray I've uncovered is the crisper drawer from a refrigerator, I predict that we will soon find a refrigerator. And we do, muscling it together into the truck.