Gleaning in the Gloaming

My name is Karen and I am a larder-holic.
There, I've admitted it.
They say that's the first step.

I simply cannot resist the urge to stock my larder.
You see, I already had about 27 or so pounds of apples waiting to be turned to sauce and apple butter sitting in my kitchen. I have witnesses.
I've already frozen 4 quarts of applesauce, plus we've eaten some fresh-made sauce in the last couple of weeks.

But you see, there were these apple trees along the side of a house I frequently drive past. Huge, apple trees just bursting with apples.
And they were all just falling to the sidewalk going to waste.
Those trees full of apples have been nagging my conscience - and my consciousness - for a little over a week now.
I couldn't stand it any longer.
Yesterday, late in the afternoon, we tossed our buckets and a ladder into the back of the van and drove over. The house is a rental, and after knocking on several doors with no answer, we decided to go ahead and start picking.
Fortunately, a short while later one resident came out to dump her trash and gave us permission to pick the apples.
Though the adrenaline rush of the "heist" was now over, I felt much better about the example I was setting for Melissa after getting the go-ahead.

We must have made quite a spectacle, as everyone who drove by on the busy street seemed to stare at us. Melissa and I even saw people in the city buses smile and wave at us, though Michael missed it. He was standing on the top of a chain link fence with his head buried in the upper branches of an apple tree at the time, though I thought I heard him mumble something about being "an enabler."
We aren't sure what varieties the apples are, though the ones in the empty kitty litter bucket are likely golden delicious.

So far today, I've made three quarts of apple sauce, using maybe a tenth of the red apples we gathered and about 6 pounds of apples I already had. Melissa and I processed the crab apples into juice for making jelly.
I just can't seem to help myself. Offer me a bushel of fruit - or vegetables - and I'm in.
The problem comes after the acquisition; sort of a buyer's remorse. Having all this produce waiting for me, threatening to spoil at any moment, ratchets my anxiety to Level Red - Severe Risk of Wasting Food.
Of course, my food spoilage anxiety is counterbalanced by the Donner Syndrome; fear of starving to death because I didn't make enough applesauce.
Lest you doubt the severity of my affliction, in the midst of stemming and removing the blossom ends of 6 or more pounds of free crab apples today, I placed an order for 6 bags of organic pears through my CSA.
So, while I'm held firmly in the grip of larder-holism, I know I am not alone in my struggle.
Michael, my enabler, will be peeling and coring right along with me tonight.