Saturday, May 12, 2012

GARBAGE...I mean...GARAGE SALE!

Over the past 2 days, I had the problem...I mean...privilege of experience our garage sale (oh, how cursed...I mean...blessed I am)! Do I even need to say it? My wife loves them...I don't. I won't use the word "hate" because it might sound too tame. I guess I don't really hate garage sales, I just don't like them (really, really, really, really, really, don't like them).

Why not? Glad you asked! Here's the top 100 reasons (let's make it the top 10 so that someone might actually take the time to read this): [in no particular order] - 1) It's a lot of work for little money (it just doesn't seem worth it; but once I consider we made over $600 in just 2 days, maybe I should change my mind. 2) It's just junk (I know, I know: those little glass pigeons are really quite; but I just don't get it). I don't think my wife agrees with the "junk" part. 3) There is a lot of lifting and moving involved: there's moving the stuff we don't want to sell so no one buys it; moving the stuff we do want to sell - up the stairs, down the stairs, outside, inside, in the garage, out to the driveway, on the porch, back off the porch, and everywhere else you can imagine. (If it's a garage sale, just put everything in there, piled high, and sell the garage. Isn't that like a popular T.V. show or something?). 4) It's outside. We already have to go outside to get in the air conditioned car. Why would we want to go outside, on purpose, just sit there for 2 days, sweat and get sunburned? As my wife would probably say: Why not! That is one of my wife's favorite parts about the garage sale. 5) The signs: with a garage sale comes putting up garage sale signs.There is the making the signs part, going out to busy intersections, and nailing them to telephone poles; all the while trying not to get run over! Why are we doing this?

6) It's not just a garage sale: it's a bake sale, a lemonade stand; and somehow turns into a fair. We can't just sell the junk...I mean...treasure; but we have to sell everything else we can think of. I think our kids make more selling quarter priced brownies, or lemon bread or snow cone or lemonade or, my favorite: huge chocolate chip cookies (those were actually worth the 75 cent mark-up). O.k.I guess it's not so bad. It is cute to see my kids be so entrprenuerial (sp?). But, I had to have a number 6, right? 7) Haggling. Is that what it is called? You know what I mean, right? The person comes and picks up an item we are selling. It clearly says on the sticker: $1. To me, that means it costs $1. Doesn't that make sense? But NO, not to these people. Would you take 50 cents? My wife then responds: "How about 75 cents?" They come back: How about 60...I'll take 65...Deal! Really? What are we doing here? Is it $1 or not? But, believe it or not, this happens to be one of my wife's favorite things about garage sales. Leave me out of it. When she starts "haggling", I walk away, pretending I never knew the woman. 8) No food. Because we are so focused on the sale, we don't have time to cook any good food. That leaves us eating (and usually buying) our kids cookies, brownies, lemonade and ordering out pizza. Oh, wait a second...I guess I like that part. Oh well...I'll hide it here, in the list of things I don't like, and I'm sure no one will notice it! 9)The aftermath: when the sale is over, it's not over...it's never over (well, I guess it does eventually end, but "it's never over" just sounds better. There is the extra hours my wife and her friends want to sit outside and take in more rays and welcome more customers. Then, there is the "tear down" of the signs, moving the stuff back to where it came from in the first place...there is the placing of some stuff on the curb for people to take for free (tell people on craigslist that something is free and they seem to be there in less than 60 seconds)...then there is the decision of which stuff is going on e-bay, which stuff is going on craigslist for sale, and which stuff is headed to good-will (which all goes back to my great idea about stuffing everything in the garage and selling the garage)! 10) Come on: it's a garage sale

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