Yeah, one of them was trash spilling out of the top with flies going around. My grandfather had the extension, though unfortunately, I cannot remember the name nor have access to it.

Good to know I'm not the only one who remembers it, though.

You would modify (a copy of) the Finder in ResEdit to change the Wastebasket icons.

Then there was the extension "The Grouch". Don't be afraid of t, but it caused more file loss (because of small hands) than all the Mac viruses and hard drive failures put together ever. If it's not already on the site on its own page, it should be. It'll be in many of the collections CDs.

I too remember of an utility that could customize the trash can, even allowing for animations to take place... I have to search my software collection to find it... Here again, as for my other proposal in MG, this means I have to have my hands on my old CDs that, for now, are taking dust in my parents' house, somewhere in a paper box
I definitely need to go there and take back all those oldies !

There was a ResEdit hack named "Trash2Loo" for a toilet Trash icon and a Flushing sound when the "Loo" got emptied.

I put it up here if you want to take a look. Its possibly not what the OP wanted, this one is off the Christmas 1996 edition of MacFormat CD. Possibly only usable on OS 7.0 - 7.6.1... maybe.

I think the OP wanted something from the early 1990s. I do remember it...the control panel was a relatively small window and had arrows at the bottom, with the trash icons on either side (empty/full).

I'm positive that the OP and I are thinking of the same thing.

As said before, I don't have access to my oldies right now, but I do found a Tri-Catalog installation filled with lots of my magazines' (is that the proper english word ?) CDs content.
There I searched and found three relevant occurences :
- Kineticon, that is able to replace any icon with animated ones (this is one of the customization software I used along with Kaleidoscope, and it was quite impressive at that time !)
- TrashMan, of which I don't remember anything, but it's name is a hint
- Godot's faces : never used it, but if I remember well it was used to customize some the system's icons

I edited the Trash icon (and changed its name to "Incinerator") on my LC which I think was running System 7.1 at the time.. I did that myself with ResEdit and modified the System file.

A few programs that are mentioned on this this page are Dumpster, iTrashMaker and iControl.

Could be Dumpster.

CONFIRMED. I am 100% sure I found the program I remember, and possibly it is yours.

It's on BMUG PD-ROM C1 under Utilities\File/Disk Utilities.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8243916/Screen%20shot%202010-11-16%20at%205.14.4...

I couldn't get it to work on my copy of Basilisk (it froze)

However, I did use ResEdit to view the icons, and you are indeed correct, one was a toilet.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8243916/Screen%20shot%202010-11-16%20at%205.28.4...

Unfortunately, I think that the one is the unregistered version (which is what my grandpa had, I think) and it is missing some stuff.

He had the 144 and 145 icons for his LC!!

Hey, no problem. Brought back nostalgia for me, too! The help read me said 7.0 or 7.1 (the LC had 7.1, I think my Basilisk has 7.5 or 7.6)

I got it to work on my copy of Basilisk II!

You have to copy it to your hard drive (do NOT run it off the CD!)

Until, however, I find an elusive desktop pattern that resembles yellow wood slats, I want my nostalgia for the old trash can to stay intact.

I have now uploaded it, so you don't have to download the entire 600+ MB CD from Megaupload that takes about forty minutes to download.

@Temporary Joe mused:

Until, however, I find an elusive desktop pattern that resembles yellow wood slats, I want my nostalgia for the old trash can to stay intact.

The screensaver/desktop utility "UnderWare" has a yellow wooden panel desktop pattern. But there was also a much nicer yellow wood panels/slats background that came with the desktop utility called "BeforeDark". I think it could possibly be the BeforeDark pattern that you are thinking of. BeforeDark was in more common use before Mac OS 7.5 introduced Desktop Patterns to the Control Panels. I have BeforeDark if you need it, it probably should go up here anyway.

Heh heh, BeforeDark DID have the desired desktop pattern (on the same CD that Dumpster came on, C1!) but I really can't go home again.

My grandfather really did enjoy that desktop pattern, using it on every Mac up to his G4 (which was his last). My mother grew to hate it however...and I now I have an awesome April Fool's prank in the working.

@Temporary Joe:
I've put up Before Dark if you need it.

No, I got it. It's just that I can never recreate his LC, so why try to dilute my childhood memories?

Hmm... Running System 7.1 on Basilisk II full screen on a modern Mac could get to be "kinda similar" to that LC experience, maybe?

Nah, first off, I'd have to install System 7.1 on it, but Mac OS X also blurs and stretches the screen if I go full screen making it look absolutely hideous. Plus, he had rows of extensions, often having small animations when they loaded up. And I'd never get the feel of that Apple IIGS right next to it (even though I have many games from it too, like Winter Games and The Three Stooges...but Sweet16 isn't recognizing the controllers I plug in as real joypads...)

He had neat stuff running on the IIGS that I can't find either.

Mac OS X also blurs and stretches the screen if I go full screen

This is caused by the display resolution not being exactly the native resolution of the LCD monitor. CRTs don't blur (they don't exactly have native resolutions). And if the aspect ratio is different, it will be stretched, whether CRT or LCD.

but Mac OS X also blurs and stretches the screen if I go full screen making it look absolutely hideous.

For a perfect full screen display you need to choose in the Basilisk (and Sheepshaver) GUI, Video Type; Full Screen, Width; Maximum, Height; Maximum. Then you don't get that stretching or distortion.

Here's my Mac OS 7.1.1 Basilisk II running on my laptop it has a 1366 x 768 display, a display ratio unheard of when 7.1.1 was a puppy and certainly not standard for Macintosh of the time. No distortion here.

The Asimov archives have a good collection IIGS softwares, but yeah it is a lot of work to recreate stuff, 'specially by memory.

Probably considering the last time I saw any of that stuff was in early 2002.

And the last time I thought I started Basilisk in full screen width-height max, I got a black screen. But I'll try it again.

He used the Fish! After Dark module, and I think it is added with Aquarium Kit II, except I can't get Aquarium Kit II to load (it claims there are no fish in the file). I know that one of the things added was a little man in the background falling to the ocean floor with a cinderblock as a foot.

I managed to match my native screen resolution to BasiliskIIGUI and away I went! Neat!

@TJ mentions:

He used the Fish! After Dark module, and I think it is added with Aquarium Kit II, except I can't get Aquarium Kit II to load (it claims there are no fish in the file). I know that one of the things added was a little man in the background falling to the ocean floor with a cinderblock as a foot.

I do recall running the Fish! module and Aquarium Kit II. The 'trick" to using the A K II was you needed to have the After Dark Control Panel up and Fish! selected in the panel. You then needed to use the Fish! options to navigate to where A K II was located and then import any or all of the A K II fish, etc, into the Fish! module itself. You then could have Fish! running as the screen saver with the imported A K II fish added. Of course if thats what you've already been doing, then perhaps your copy of A K II is corrupt.

I haven't come across the man with the cinderblock on his feet but this sounds a bit like it might be found in one of the modules in AD "Totally Twisted" which is available from here.

AK II does work now (oddly) but I can't find the guy with the cinderblock! He wasn't that big (just something in the background, a couple of pixels). Totally Twisted may have it, tho...