CALENDAR

Speaker Identification

Speaker 1 - Announcer / Prerecorded Promo Voice
Identified by the formal show introductions, recurring promotional copy, station-style transitions, and closing announcement.

Speaker 2 - Alan J. Cook - Host
Identified by repeated self-identification as Alan Cook/Alan J. Cook, first-person discussion of 1-800 Junk Refund, and references to his work, family, church congregation, vehicles, and live route through Northern Virginia and Washington, D.C.

Speaker 1 - Announcer / Prerecorded Promo Voice:
Welcome to the Junk Refund Show, hosted by Alan J. Cook, founder of 1-800 Junk Refund. Have you ever paid those expensive junk removal companies to take away some of your stuff, only to say to yourself as the truck drives off down the street, "Some of that stuff wasn't junk"? Did they try to sell it for you and give you some money back? No.

Well, now there is a company that can do just that. Listen to our weekly Junk Refund Show on BBS Radio TV to learn how one lady spent $375 on junk removal and got $3,200 back. 1-800 Junk Refund represents the next generation of junk removal. Learn how to not only save money on junk removal, but how to get some money coming back. Plus, purchase one of our radio vouchers during the show to save even more on your junk removal. Let's get the junk out of your home and out of your life. Now, with your host, Alan J. Cook.

Speaker 2 - Alan J. Cook - Host:
Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Junk Refund Show, my favorite time of the week, Thursday at 3 p.m. Eastern. You're going to hear some fun sounds during the show today because I'm driving in Northern Virginia, headed to Northeast D.C. to pick up some scrap metal. I'm basically in between scrap-metal jobs.

I just picked up a trampoline that was disassembled in the Fairfax, Virginia, area. Now I'm headed to Northeast D.C. to pick up some more scrap metal, where a family has been throwing all their extra scrap metal into this big kind of storage area next to the shed on their property. They saw my $5-for-30-days Craigslist ad about picking up scrap metal for free. I'm headed there to get it, and coincidentally it's going to take me about 55 minutes to get there, which is perfect because it shows my ETA at 4:02, and I will stop talking on this show somewhere around 4:00. So, as long as you can hear me, we're good.

The other thing that complicates this a little bit is that I'm driving in what I call vehicle number two. I've got three different trucks that we use in our business. This is a pickup truck. It's been the workhorse for us for 10 years or so. It's got 281,000 miles on it. It's running on seven cylinders because cylinder number five went dead about six months ago. It's up for renewed registration at the end of this month. It probably won't be able to be renewed because it won't pass the emissions inspection due to what's happening with one of the cylinders in the engine, and to fix the engine would probably be eight or nine grand.

But in the meantime, it's registered, it runs, and I'm using it to pick up scrap metal because our big 16-foot stake-body truck is full of stuff that we picked up yesterday. So I am now on my way to Northeast D.C. to pick up some stuff over there. I am having a great time.

I want to have a bunch of different things to talk about. 1-800 Junk Refund is a hauling and junk-removal business headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland. We've been in the business about 20 years. The thing that sets us apart is that not only do we come to your place and pick up the stuff that you want to get rid of - and like most companies, if not all companies, we charge you to do that - but our rates are about 20 to 25 percent below some of the bigger junk-removal businesses in the area. So we try to save you money. That's one thing we try to do.

The second thing is that we do four things with the stuff we've picked up. One is to just junk the junk. That's pretty simple. The second is to recycle stuff like metal and wire, which is the adventure I'm on right now. The third is to donate items and get you a donation receipt. The fourth, and the one that really sets us apart, is that we put the good stuff up for sale, and if it sells, you get some money back. So that's what we do.

The website is 1800junkrefund.com. You can email us at junkrefund@gmail.com or 1800junkrefund@gmail.com. We go all over the United States, headquartered in the Washington, D.C., area, and we're having a blast.

Right now, according to my beloved Dodge pickup truck, it's 92 degrees outside. Not only is the engine running on seven cylinders, but the air conditioning is not working. I think it's because of the problem with the engine, but I'm not 100 percent sure. So I'm cruising down the road with the windows down a little bit. I just raised them a little bit so it'll be a little quieter, but you're getting us live here.

I guess if there's a message in the madness, it's: don't let any setbacks hold you back. Just keep going and keep moving forward, and things should work out well for you.

I'm going to check here as I jump back and forth to see where I'm supposed to go. I've got about 55 minutes to drive to get to the next job, so the timing is actually perfect.

We just picked up a trampoline from Fairfax. The guy saw our Craigslist ad and said, "Will you come disassemble and take the trampoline?" I said, "I can't take it apart for free because it'll take about 45 minutes to take one of these apart. I know that from experience. But if you want to take it apart, then we'll come pick it up for free." He goes, "Okay, I'll do that."

So he took it all apart, which is the toughest part of this process, took it out to his front curb, and just left it there. I dropped by and picked it up. So that's a pretty good deal, all things considered.

Now I'm headed to job number two. They sent me a photo showing quite a bit of scrap metal. I'm hoping there is some copper, wire, aluminum, and brass, but you never know for sure.

The number-one item that I put on the outline for today is: just do what you're told. That comes into play because I'm in the middle of a job cleaning out a home for a realtor who has used us quite a bit over the years. Her assistant sent me six photos the other day. He said, "Hey, we've got some stuff in the house. Can you come clean it out?" I said yes. He sent me photos of six different items they wanted taken out of the house. He said, "Can you give me an estimate for this?" I said, "Yes. It looks like about a truckload and a quarter. Normally about $900. You guys get 20 percent off. It'll be about $700." He said, "Fantastic." They Venmoed me the money, and then I was able to go pick it up.

Coincidentally, the day before, his boss, the realtor, sent me an email and said, "I need an estimate for all of the stuff in this house except for the clothing." I didn't realize until I got there, having already been paid to do the six items, that this was the same house.

So I show up and, lo and behold, the garage is full of stuff. The basement is full of stuff, but it's all bagged up. Most of the rooms are completely empty. After 20 years of experience, it basically looked to me like the homeowners had taken everything they wanted, and now it was just up to us to get the rest of the stuff out of there.

So yours truly - and again, the motto is just do what you're told to do, right? - was told to get the six items. That's what they paid me for. I was also told to give them an estimate for the whole place. I erroneously made the assumption that the whole place was supposed to be cleaned out. So I started in without calling anybody. I started in the garage and started hauling stuff off, filling up a truck and so forth, thinking this was going to be a lot more than what the estimate was for. But I know these realtors really well, and I was sure it would work out.

Well, the bottom line is that we took some stuff we weren't supposed to take, according to the homeowner. We met her yesterday. Fortunately, we hadn't dumped the trucks. We had three vehicles involved. The 16-foot stake-body truck was full of stuff. The pickup truck I'm in now had been used to load up a lot of scrap metal and was full. Then I went back with my SUV, which had been thrown away at a hauling job and which I love to use to make money, and we filled it with more junk. Then we went home.

The only one I had dumped that morning was the SUV, so most of the stuff was still in the big truck and the pickup truck. Then we found out that, according to the homeowner, we weren't supposed to take anything else except those six items.

So now you've got a problem. We hauled off a couple of TVs - a larger TV and a small TV that were sitting in the middle of a room. We hauled off a PlayStation that was sitting there. We hauled off various items from the garage, most of which was junk. Now we've got a homeowner who is kind of ticked off at us because we took stuff we weren't supposed to take.

I told the realtor, "It was an honest mistake on my part, but it is my fault." The homeowner is now saying, "Okay, I need you to buy me a replacement TV, a big one, a little one, a PlayStation 4," and I get the sense that the list is growing as we speak. It was an honest mistake.

When the homeowner mentioned the TVs to me yesterday, I said, "Hey, those are easy to get. That's not a tough thing to fix." Then, after spending a couple of hours organizing her stuff and separating the rest of the stuff she wanted, the lady told me, "Thank you very much. I appreciate your help."

There was a stepladder that we had in our pickup truck that she wanted us to hang on to. There were a couple of rugs we had taken that she wanted back. All fine. We walked around the 16-foot truck with her, pulling off three boxes of stuff that she wanted and showing her everything else that was on there. If she wanted it, she could take it. No problem.

The problem is that it rained the morning after we loaded the truck, so some of the stuff was obviously wet, but we did our best. She says thank you to me, but then she shoots a text message off to the realtor, which the realtor sent to me, that says, "How can he possibly fix this? He's hauled away two truckloads of stuff," and so forth.

The realtor, who is terrific and who has been a guest on this show, by the way, got back to me and just said, "You know what? I think she's kind of playing us against each other. She tells you one thing. She tells me another, and we'll see what happens."

But I just told the realtor this afternoon, getting back to my theme of this introductory story: just do what you're asked to do. I should have called and verified whether they wanted anything other than the six items hauled away, and they would have said no. That would have solved the problem. Instead, I made the assumption that they did want it all hauled away because they'd asked me for an estimate to haul it all away. That's generally a safe assumption. In this case, it didn't work.

So the moral of the story is: just do what you're asked to do. Don't go beyond that, and you'll probably be okay. In this case, it has made a problem, but we're dealing with it, and life moves on.

Item number two, I put down "the three-vehicle joyride." I'm really having fun working with the three vehicles that I've got in doing what we do: a 16-foot stake-body truck that we use to do house cleanouts and the big stuff; a pickup truck that I'm in right now that we use to do medium-sized and smaller jobs, like Groupon jobs; and then an SUV that we were paid to take from a job about four years ago. It had been sitting for four years, and we turned it into a money-making little mini pickup truck for us. We take it out to do the small jobs, and it works like a charm.

I just love to drive that SUV around and use it to do more jobs and make money with it, given that we were paid to take it. We didn't have to buy it. So we've taken someone's old vehicle and turned it into a money-making machine for us.

The process that I use is really simple. I go out in the morning with a big truck if we have a house cleanout going on or whatever. I use that throughout the day until it's full. If we're past the 5:00 deadline to empty it, then I take it back to our business, park it, and immediately hop in the pickup truck and go out and pick up scrap metal for people.

It is free for us to pick it up. I give them a business card that gives them 20 percent off regular junk removal, and I pick up more and more clients. I also like to add them to my monthly email list. Plus, in the morning I go into the scrap-metal yard with the metal I picked up, and I get paid for it.

So I go out and fill up truck number two. When it's full, I come back, park it, and hop in the SUV. I take it down into D.C., where we have narrow alleys and narrow streets, and I use that to pick up more scrap metal or do small jobs. I fill that up, and then I go back. That's my goal: fill up all three trucks every day.

Now, that probably sounds nuts to people, but if you love what you do - which is number three on today's outline - it makes a difference. That's a quote from Warren Buffett, a friend of mine. When he would go around and talk on college campuses, people would ask him, "What should I do for a career?" He summed it up in four words. He said, "Do what you love."

I started out as a stockbroker and took a 10-year job as a sales rep for a management company. Then I've been doing my own kind of blue-collar grunt-work business for about 20 years. I've got to tell you, as crazy as it may seem, I really love what I do, and I love the challenge of it. I love keeping three trucks busy. I love the fact that I wasn't planning to do this.

I started it back in 2001 when I lost my job and suddenly had to come up with a way to make a living. So I did. It was not easy, but I did it. Now we go around the country doing junk removal, and we're having a lot of fun.

I'm going to take a break here for a quick minute and drink some root beer from McDonald's. When I come back, I'll tell you about something that just happened at McDonald's that you'll get a kick out of. We're talking about how to get the junk out of your home, out of your garage, and also out of your life on the Junk Refund Show. I'm your host, Alan Cook, on the BBS Radio Network. We'll be back in about a minute.

Speaker 1 - Announcer / Prerecorded Promo Voice:
Have you ever hired one of those expensive junk-removal companies, then wondered what they did with the stuff, especially the good stuff? At 1-800 Junk Refund, we junk the junk, recycle stuff like metal and wire, donate items and get you receipts, and put up for sale the good stuff. If it sells, you get some money back.

Cynthia paid $375 for junk removal and got $3,200 back. Would you like to know how she did it? Tune in to the Junk Refund Show with your host, Alan J. Cook, every Thursday at 3 p.m. Eastern Time to get the junk not only out of your home, but also out of your life.

Speaker 2 - Alan J. Cook - Host:
Hey, welcome back to the Junk Refund Show. I'm your host, Alan Cook. I'm in Northern Virginia, headed to Northeast D.C. to pick up scrap metal. I started about 20 minutes ago. It's going to take me about another 35 or 40 minutes to get there, which is perfect because it allows me to do the radio show on the road in between job number two and job number three. That, my friends, is pretty amazing. You can do a radio show while you're working full-time as long as you have a phone - in my case, an iPhone.

Item number four says, "Love your car." I put this outline together, by the way, this morning as I was out running around doing different things. I just love the SUV that I drive. It is a 2007 Chevy TrailBlazer. It is what I would call a small- to mid-sized SUV. I have found out over time that if you pack the back of it quite full of stuff, you can almost get a pickup truck's worth of stuff in there, and I use it to make money in the evening.

I love to drive it. Number one, the air conditioning works, unlike my pickup truck that I'm in right now. Number two, it has such a small turning radius that I can go down into Washington, D.C. I find people every day on Facebook Marketplace who have some kind of metal item they're trying to get rid of, and as long as they're smaller items, I can go down, pick them up, get where I need to go, and throw them in the back. It gets great gas mileage, and I guess Consumer Reports loves these Chevy TrailBlazers, from what I hear.

So it's a 2007. It's got about 165,000 miles on it. It was thrown away at a hauling job. They actually paid us to take it because it had been sitting for four years. We put a few little minor repairs into it, but it didn't take much, and then, whammo, we're off and running. We've got a vehicle that we use to make money for us in the business.

It is really a fun vehicle to drive, and I just paid, a few months ago, $4,700 to replace the transmission. I was told by a mechanic whom I trust that this particular vehicle, if you just take care of it, should get you 300,000, maybe even 400,000 miles. So I'm hoping that's the case.

My point is: love your car. I just love the vehicle I'm in. Like I said, it's a 2007. It's not a brand-new car, but I love to fix it up. I love to clean it up. I love to try to make it look as good as possible. Just the fact that I didn't have to pay for the car, that it's made us money ever since we've had it, and that it runs great - I love it.

I just took it to North Carolina last weekend. It was kind of its maiden voyage after getting the transmission changed, and it worked like a charm. So anyway, love your car. It just makes life so much fun when you're driving a vehicle that you really enjoy. It doesn't matter what anybody else is driving. You're kind of ambivalent about what someone else is driving. You're in your own little world, and you're happy, right? So who cares what somebody else is driving? I got paid to take the car that I'm driving, and it's making me money. It's a nice little money-making machine for us, and it's officially truck number three. So anyway, I'm enjoying that.

I want to do a shout-out to a guy named Skip, who was probably in his 60s or 70s and passed away recently. He went to our church congregation, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on 16th Street in Washington, D.C. For a number of years, he had a walker that he had to use to get around, so he wasn't moving very quickly, but he was a nice, humble guy who came to church every week and was well liked in our congregation.

About a month ago, he passed away, and I was asked by a good friend of mine to go in and clean out Skip's apartment in downtown D.C. A couple of things struck me when I was doing this job. Number one, because it's in Washington, D.C., and it's in a high-rise, it was 80 yards from where the freight elevator opens up on the main floor to the loading area in the rear parking lot where you pull up your truck. Eighty yards. I stepped it off. That's one way to haul the stuff from the elevator to your truck.

Welcome to D.C. In my opinion, you don't want to go into D.C. with big trucks. You want smaller vehicles that are more flexible. You can get in and out of where you need to go, and you can park much more easily with a smaller vehicle. That was one thing that stood out to me.

I did this one myself because it was just a smaller apartment. I went in and hauled away some of the furniture that was left over. One of the main reasons I wanted to mention this is that when you go in to clean out somebody's place that was their last place of residence on this planet, you can learn a little bit about them from what you see on the walls.

In Skip's case, the thing that caught my eye really quickly was an 18-by-24-inch print of Jesus that was hanging on his wall. I thought, "Good for you, Skip. Through the ups and downs of life, through the trials and tribulations, the joyous moments, and all the things that happened to you on this planet, good for you for having a picture of Jesus hanging on your wall."

That caught my eye pretty quickly, and I want to do a shout-out to him because of the goodness of his heart. His funeral, by the way, is this Saturday morning at 10:00 down on Capitol Hill. I've been asked to say the opening prayer for the service, and I'm tickled that this will be the case. So rest in peace, our good friend Skip, and thanks for your good example. I hope everything is going well for you.

I want to do a shout-out to a lady named Frances Seay - S-E-A-Y, Frances spelled with an E. I don't usually give a lot of people's full names out on this radio show, just for privacy reasons, but this wonderful lady had a brain aneurysm about two weeks ago when she was out in Utah visiting family with her wonderful husband, Michael.

A lot of prayers have been sent heavenward on her behalf, and Michael says that the recovery she's made is nothing short of miraculous. She's in a wheelchair now. She's getting around. She has gotten a lot of her bodily and vocal abilities back, basically. I believe they took the stent out of her brain, and the pressure that was inside her brain is being relieved. That's a good sign. She's starting to talk to people, and that's a great sign as well.

So things are looking up for our good friend Frances. A lot of people are praying for her, for her husband, and for her family. This is just one of those ladies who is a friend to everybody in the congregation. Everybody loves her, and she deserves that love just based on all the goodness that she does for people.

We are thrilled that, even though she's a couple thousand miles away from us, she's getting better and stronger. That's all good stuff. We are praying for Frances and Michael Seay, frankly, because they deserve it. They're just two of the best people you'll ever meet, always doing stuff for other people.

We mention the radio-show vouchers in our commercials. Other than my birthday every year, when I sell a special discounted voucher, the radio-show voucher is the best deal you can buy in the Washington, D.C., area with our company for junk-removal services.

For a pickup truckload of junk removal, we typically charge $229. On Groupon in the Washington and Baltimore area, we offer the same service for $99. On the radio show, if you call and just give your name and number to our producer, Don, he will forward it to me after the show. I will contact you and send you a link, and you will get the same pickup truckload of stuff for $79. That's the best deal that we have going.

You do need to call the show. You will not be on the air. You're just going to leave your name and number with our producer, Don. The number is 888-627-6008. Again, it's 888-627-6008. It's only good in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, and you'll get a pickup truckload of junk removal for $79 instead of $229. That's a $150 savings just by calling the radio show.

Now, I've got to tell you, I'm right here on I-395. This is the short freeway that goes north into Washington, D.C. It is backed up, bumper-to-bumper traffic, but it's right next to Reagan National Airport. When the planes land from the north, it's really fun because they're coming right over this freeway that I'm on.

I'm going a whopping four miles an hour. They come right over the freeway, and there is a park called Gravelly Point Park that's at the north end of the runway. When those planes come in to land, they're only a few hundred feet above you. That's quite a thrill and a fun place to be to watch some planes come in and land.

I enjoy going to that park and watching this, and I'm seeing it right now. I'll be seeing it for probably the next five or 10 minutes as planes come in to land at Reagan National. They'll come in right over these beautiful trees just south of the Washington Monument, and they'll land at Reagan National Airport. It's fabulous.

I've always enjoyed planes. They tell me that when I was a kid - I grew up out in Utah by Hill Air Force Base - my first word was "jet." So maybe that's just in my blood. I don't know. I'm kind of thrilled that the traffic's not going anywhere. It's really slow, so I can't do much that way, but in the meantime I'm being entertained by a bunch of airplanes from different airlines coming in.

Here comes another one. It'll come right down over the freeway and land at Reagan National. I'm just amazed that these big, heavy planes stay up in the air, and I'm on them all the time. Here comes a United flight that's coming in. He'll bank slightly to the right. He's descending as he comes in. He'll go right over I-395.

I'm going to roll the windows down a little bit. You might even hear him in just a second. He just crossed over the freeway. He's now getting ready to land, and that's a pretty quiet jet, I've got to tell you. Even I can barely hear it with the windows down.

So anyway, we have fun with life. I hope you get that message.

Keep those radio-show vouchers in mind. I just told you about a trampoline pickup, but I've got another trampoline story to tell you. I don't remember if I told this one last week, but it's worth repeating.

A guy paid us a couple hundred dollars, after being referred by a realtor, to haul away and dismantle a trampoline. This was the first one in about 15 years that was a double-level trampoline. It had two trampoline mats, one about a foot lower than the other one. I don't know why that is, but it just is.

I took it apart about a week ago, and he left me a check taped to the frame of the trampoline. It had my name on it in a little envelope. Directly below the check there was a jar of homemade honey. When I saw it, I thought it had tipped over. I thought maybe one of the kids had left it out there when they were jumping on the trampoline or something. I didn't quite catch on to what was going on.

It turns out that was for me. I realized that a few minutes later. That's why it was directly underneath the check. This guy left me a homemade jar of honey. Then I looked in the back of his yard, and sure enough, there were some beehives back there. On the top of the jar it says, "Bottled 6/26." So I have about a 10-ounce jar of homemade honey right now in my cupboard that I'm using for biscuits and other stuff, and I'm having a great time with it.

Sometimes you just have a blast with your clients. They're really cool, and they think of cool things to do. I think I did tell this story last week, but it bears repeating. Of the hundreds and hundreds - thousands, actually - of jobs that we do over the years, it's just really cool when somebody leaves you a homemade jar of honey as a little tip for taking away their trampoline, which they also paid you $200 to take.

I love that jar of honey. The simple extra things that people do for you are kind of the spice of life, and I just love it when that pops up in our business. I tip my hat to people who are that charitable, that giving, and thoughtful enough to do that for a junk-removal guy. It's wonderful. It just makes you want to live another 200 years, you know? Anyway, it was exciting.

I'm going to take another break. I'm here over the George Washington Parkway, coming up on 14th Street Northwest, right where the planes are coming in to land at Reagan National Airport. Yes, it's in D.C., and I'm telling you, I'm in a pickup truck and everybody who comes by wants to pull in right in front of me. But what do I care? I'm having a good time.

I'm going to come back and tell you about the Upside app and give you an update on how much money I'm making on this free app that you can be using as well. You're listening to the Junk Refund Show on the BBS Radio Network. I'm your host, Alan Cook. We'll be back in about a minute.

Speaker 1 - Announcer / Prerecorded Promo Voice:
Have you ever hired one of those expensive junk-removal companies, then wondered what they did with the stuff, especially the good stuff? At 1-800 Junk Refund, we junk the junk, recycle stuff like metal and wire, donate items and get you receipts, and put up for sale the good stuff. If it sells, you get some money back.

Cynthia paid $375 for junk removal and got $3,200 back. Would you like to know how she did it? Tune in to the Junk Refund Show with your host, Alan J. Cook, every Thursday at 3 p.m. Eastern Time to get the junk not only out of your home, but also out of your life.

Speaker 2 - Alan J. Cook - Host:
Hey, welcome back to the Junk Refund Show. This is your host, Alan Cook, crossing over the 14th Street Bridge in Washington, D.C. I'm crossing over the Potomac River as another airplane coming in from the west looks like it's headed straight for me, even though it's a couple of miles out.

It will come in, basically follow the river, come down the river, bank to the right, and land from north to south on one of the runways - the main runway here at Reagan National Airport. It's just a fun thing to see.

I am almost to the Jefferson Memorial, which is on my left. To the left of that is the Washington Monument here in the nation's capital, which I think is one of the most exciting cities in the United States. There's obviously so much history here, so many museums, monuments, and so forth. It's just a great place to live. I've been here about 36 years.

I love being based out of this city because I have four different airports I can use to fly in and out of here: Reagan National, Dulles, Baltimore/Washington International - BWI - and if I'm desperate, I go two hours north to Philadelphia and I can use their airport as well. But anyway, I'm having a blast.

I want to talk to you about the Upside app. It is a free app. You should go on your phone and download it right now while I'm talking to you. It's a free app that you use whenever you buy gas, groceries, go to a convenience store, or hit a restaurant, and you get cash back if you go to the vendors that are on the Upside app network. There are thousands of them all over the country.

In the Washington, D.C., area, we have a ton of them. Because I have three different trucks in my business and I'm always buying gas, I'm always going to the stations that are going to give me cash back.

Last month they did a promotion where, if you used your app 30 times in a month, then on the 31st time - or at least the first day of the next month - you got a 30-cent-per-gallon increase in refunds when you filled up.

So I timed it just right. I took the big truck in a couple of days ago, went to a Shell gas station, and put $145 of gas in there. At maybe $4.50 a gallon or so - I don't remember how many gallons it was, maybe 30 gallons or something like that - I got $12 to $15 back in cash for buying gas.

I've been doing this for about two and a half years, and right now in my account I have $1,155 sitting there, just waiting for me to grab it whenever I want. I can get it out. They can PayPal it to me. They can send it to my bank. I can get gift cards from a whole bunch of different vendors. I can do whatever I want.

The point is, I've got that money sitting there because I'm using the Upside app when I purchase gas, go to restaurants, and visit other places. The money just keeps compounding and adding up.

You can download the free Upside app. You can put in a promo code that gives you extra savings. It's easy for a golfer to remember. The code says, "Don't Slice, 9 Iron, Pitching Wedge": D-S, the number 9, P-W. Again, DS9PW is your promo code. If you put that promo code in when you use the app, you get additional savings. It's just a great way to go.

I hear ads all the time. I've even seen some TV ads where people are talking about making $200 to $300 in a year. I'm doing double that. I've made almost $1,200 in about two and a half years. I guess I'm making maybe $500 a year, something like that, and I'm in the top 1 percent of all Upside users nationwide.

Because I'm a small-business owner and because I'm buying gas all the time, I love to keep using it. All I do is use a debit or a credit card. It is linked to my phone, so I don't even have to upload a receipt. I just tell them, "Yep, I used that debit card," boom, hit the button, and they do all the work behind the scenes for me. It's great.

They have radio contests where you text some code or number to a radio station, and maybe if you're lucky you win $1,000. They'll give out $1,000 on radio shows throughout the year in the Washington, D.C., area, and people get so hyped about winning an extra thousand bucks. I've got more than that - almost $1,200 - sitting there anytime I want to claim my prize, and I got it by doing nothing outside of my normal business, which is buying gas, going to restaurants, and so forth. It's just so easy to do.

I've gone to restaurants where they pay you 39 percent cash back. That's unbelievable, right? So check out the Upside app. Use it. If you have any questions about it, email me at junkrefund@gmail.com, and I will tell you more about it. I'm a big fan of it, as you can tell, because it's making me money.

One of the main reasons, in the back of my mind, that I haven't cashed out is that I'd like to use the money to take a cruise to Bermuda, which is my number 11 item on this outline today. If you've been to Bermuda, I would love to hear from you on our show: 888-627-6008.

One potential client I talked to this morning is going to have us come by in about a week and give her an estimate to clean out some stuff in her house. She's going to Bermuda for about a week, and then she'll be back. I said, "When you get back, I'd really love to talk to you about it."

It is straight east from the East Coast of the United States. We have cruise ships that leave out of Baltimore. I think they head to Bermuda from Baltimore. I'm going to find out. I have been told by my aunt and uncle, who have traveled around the world and have had more than their fair share of cruises, that the beaches in Bermuda are as good as anywhere in the world. So I'm excited about that.

Bermuda just happened to pop up on the show today because I was in a conversation with a lady recently who's going there this week. I thought, "I've got to talk about Bermuda." The beaches there are supposed to be some of the best. What do I know? I haven't been there. But I would love to talk to you if you have: 888-627-6008.

I put down here, "Put time on your side," item number 12 for today's show. In our society, people are in a hurry. They're generally looking for a shortcut. If you spend 20 years becoming obese, you want to go into a surgeon and in one day get rid of it all, right? Nothing wrong with that. I'm just saying we're kind of in a society that doesn't use a lot of patience sometimes and wants quick results if at all possible. That's okay. That's fine.

But there's a real advantage, like I just talked about with the Upside app, to putting time on your side. Don't fight against it; make it work for you. It's the miracle of compound interest. Let time work for you. Plan what you're going to do, then put time on your side and don't fight against it. I think you'll get some of the junk out of your life.

I went down to North Carolina this last weekend, where my wonderful nephew John and his wife welcomed the newest addition to their family. They now have four girls under the age of seven. It's kind of an even-numbered year, so the girls are six, four, two, and zero. Next year they'll all have odd-numbered birthdays.

It is really fun to go down there and spend a couple of days with these guys, which I did. They gave the youngest, newest baby - she's about five months old now - her official christening, or her naming in church, and I was able to stand in the circle and help out with that. It was a thrill.

Hats off to my nephew John for making some wonderful homemade biscuits. They were large, fluffy biscuits and gravy. Before he made them, he asked me, "Do you like biscuits and gravy?" I said, "Yes. I don't get them that often, but yes, I love biscuits and gravy." So he made some for me, and I had some on Sunday morning, which was fabulous.

My brother-in-law and my sister had flown out from Utah to also be there and congratulate them on the birth of this latest addition to their family.

You might have a little trouble here. I'm going through a tunnel on the I-395 North approach to Washington, D.C. I don't think I'm going to have any trouble with the reception, but I can't tell you for sure. My main concern is that I'm staying on the right freeway here while I'm doing this show, and it looks like, so far, I am headed to my 4:00 job.

If I lose you, it's not intentional. I'm now in the tunnel, and you may not be able to hear me. You might be able to hear me, but I'm going to assume you can hear me as I go underneath downtown D.C. The traffic is moving well. You can tell I'm in D.C.; we've got two police incidents going on. I'm going to go down a mile before I get to New York Avenue, and then we'll see where we are from there.

We'll see just how well the technology works. I'm going to keep talking as though you can hear me. You can probably hear the vibration sounds coming off the walls of the tunnel, but I also see light at the end of the tunnel, as they proverbially say. I'm cruising along at 45 miles an hour, doing just fine.

I am now about three miles from my destination, and my main concern is to just follow the route. So far, I'm good, and I think you can hear me now. But now I'm entering what's called tunnel number two. It doesn't look like it's quite as long. Hopefully you can still hear me.

I'm going to come out on New York Avenue. I'm about two and a half miles away, and I'm bringing you the latest in junk removal live from Washington, D.C.

Let me go back here and see if I can hold up. Okay, so I drove this last weekend in my SUV that I love so much. I drove 605 miles in 36 hours - about 300 miles down, 300 miles back - to visit these four little great-nieces that I have, grandnieces maybe they're called, in this family. It was just a blast.

I've never seen so much lipstick flying around one condo in my life. One of my little grandnieces - the two-year-old - has what looks like a supersized, overstuffed hot-dog-in-a-bun purse, and she carries it under her arm. She has everything but the kitchen sink in that purse, from some Play-Doh in a Ziploc bag to about three different rolls of lipstick to jewelry and little figurines that she plays with. I'm telling you, that sucker is packed full, and she takes that purse with her everywhere she goes.

Another one of my little grandnieces is four years old and loves to roller-skate. We went to dinner at Chick-fil-A. I took everybody to dinner last Saturday, and that was a blast. We just had so much fun with these four little girls at Chick-fil-A.

So anyway, taking time to spend time with family is my point. It helps get the junk out of your life. I would sum up what I saw over the weekend in a home with a mom, a dad, and four girls under the age of seven as pure heaven with a little bit of chaos sprinkled on top. That's kind of what it is.

Our latest acquisition, which we got two days ago from a closet company called Closet America in Landover, Maryland, is a 670-pound saw - a circular table saw that you use to cut all kinds of items. We looked up the model number on eBay. Brand-new, this model is selling for $5,200. We put it up last night on Facebook Marketplace for $3,000 and already have some interest from people who want to check it out.

We're hoping that will be one of our latest sales and ideally will make us $3,000, which is a lot more than I'm going to make running around town doing these little junk-removal jobs. But hey, it all adds up, and it's all worth it.

Let's see. The last thing we're going to close with is this: when you're driving around and it's 94 degrees right now, the air conditioning is not working because I'm an idiot. It's not working. I have the windows down. I'm just puttering my way through an underground tunnel. The thing that keeps me alive is a large, Big Gulp-sized glass of ice water, which I just took a swig of.

I basically live by cold drinks right now. That's the thing that keeps me going, especially when I'm in the one truck out of three that doesn't have air conditioning working right now. Crazy, right? In humid Washington, D.C., in August, out doing work during the day and your A/C doesn't work - that's just idiotic. Let's be honest. But I still have fun doing what I'm doing, and I love to take a big swig of ice water.

So anyway, that might tell you a little bit about a simple but really fun, enjoyable life. I'm back out from the tunnel, ice water in hand, a large McDonald's root beer here, and I'm about to chomp into a McDouble and a McChicken.

By the way, we'll close with this. Because I switched vehicles just before I left to go down to Fairfax to pick up some scrap metal, I apparently left my wallet in the other vehicle. I went into McDonald's and ordered some food. It was only about $7. I pull up to the drive-thru window looking for my wallet. I can't find it. It's not here; it's in the other vehicle.

I tell the lady, "I'm sorry. It looks like I've left my wallet." This brilliant young lady just says two words. She says, "Apple Pay." "You have Apple Pay on your phone?" I went, "Yeah, I do. I do. Let me pull out of line here. I'll figure it out."

I go inside. I tap on my wallet. There's my debit card. I tap on it, but I don't get the little prompt that comes up for the scanner. There were three young guys sitting over at a table. I walked up to them and said, "Hey, guys, can you do me a favor? How do I turn on Apple Pay on my phone?"

The guy takes my phone, double-clicks the button on the right-hand side, and whammo, up pulls Apple Pay. I went, "Holy crap. That's the easiest thing you could ever do." They said, "You can also pull it up in your wallet." I said, "I know. I tried that, but I still couldn't get it to work."

So, folks, the tip of the day from a junk-removal guy: if you have Apple Pay on your phone and you want to turn it on, just be smart and double-click the button on the right-hand side, and you'll be one step ahead of me automatically.

Well, I'm on New York Avenue. I'm only about a mile or two away from my job, where I'm going to pick up more scrap metal. Then, either this afternoon or tomorrow morning - probably tomorrow morning - I will go in and get paid for it. So, another day of money coming in, using one of my vehicles that I'm just having a blast with, even when the air conditioning doesn't work and it's 94 degrees outside.

All right, folks, it's been great. Thanks for listening to the Junk Refund Show. I hope we said something that helps you get the junk out of your home, your garage, or your life. If so, this has been a winning hour.

Join us next week, Thursday at 3:00, on the BBS Radio Network for another edition of the Junk Refund Show with your host, Alan Cook - that's me - where I teach you how to get the junk out of your homes, out of your garages, and also out of your life. Adios, amigos.

Speaker 1 - Announcer / Prerecorded Promo Voice:
Thank you for listening to the Junk Refund Show, the longest-running junk-removal radio show on the air. Join us next week as we discuss innovative ways to declutter your home, your business, and your life using 20 years of junk-removal experience.

Find out why we give out free ice-cream gift cards to our clients, too. In upcoming shows, we will explore how to get the junk out of your relationships, your spiritual life, your waistline, and even your travel life. Plus, call in with questions and situations you would like some help with.

At 1-800 Junk Refund, we are committed to bringing the next generation of junk removal because not all junk is junk. See you next week on the Junk Refund Show, every Thursday afternoon at 3 p.m. Eastern Time, right here on BBS Radio TV.