I was never much of a fan of the activity - too busy, not a fan of spending a lot of time hunting for whatever, and usually no surplus of funds to spend on anything but what I knew I needed right now, often with not enough for even that. Later in life, it was the thought of all that walking and standing around on my crap knees that did the idea in. That all was just the buying part. As for selling, well, too much work trying to rake in cash for stuff thoroughly worn out that nobody else would want anyway. Working Saturdays at an auction company, clerking sitting down while watching the merchandise pass under my nose, turned out to be my thing instead.
So knowing that, naturally we just had a four-day garage sale here. Steve and I took turns sitting on his scooter - best seat in town! - and collecting the loot as folks left. No cash box this time. Being January, we both were wearing hoodies with the kind of front pouch pockets where your hands can go in from both sides and shake each other... or just keep warm. Our masks went in there until we emerged outside in the world of other humans, along with the starting kitty of one and five dollar bills. Sometimes a cell phone joined them, occasionally a cheese stick. A scattered quarter joined them on occasion, but most of the sales were for folding paper. Steve and I would spell each other, usually not before somebody got chilled in temperatures starting in the high thirties, reaching deep into those pouches and swapping the piles of bills to the other's pouch, though on that first day, parts of those piles were peeled off and taken inside so not all of the kitty was vulnerable to possible mischief. The other three days didn't require that step, unfortunately.
Day one was incredible! Of course it mostly happened on Steve's shift, as he took first crack at the customers. I mean first shift serving them. I insist he has a gift for gently persuading them that the nicest thing they could do in the world was walk out with some merchandise... or more than they already had. (I pat myself on the back for managing once to talk a fellow carrying a part can of paint that he might consider a bin full of rags to go with it, bin included, for just a song. His wife liked the bin, so it might be her who really talked him into it.)
No matter what left each day, the place was even fuller the next. Rich had all kinds of merchandise and not all kinds of space, so the dark hours were spend restocking, with just a little bit of sleeping on the side - at least on Rich's part, as Steve and I did just fine on the sleeping front.
By the end of the first day we had made enough for the original kitty to be returned to its sponsor, and well more than enough to restock it for the next day's sale. There is even most of a path through the lanai now to take the dog outside, but things still tumbled into it well into the second day's sale end. Day three was baskets of clean clothing going out, getting hung on hangers (my job) and put up. Rich had a great source for free hangers. By then things were just getting tossed into the laundry, so out came lots of non-sellables. Think unmatched socks, frayed and stained linens which ultimate went in the rags bin, a couple of items rescued after house laundry got mixed in the loads, and bunches of items which had labels from Victoria's Secret. Those last got sent back inside the house, since Rich says he has a "market" for those. There were a few of those items which I tried to figure out how on earth somebody actually got into them: so many spaghetti straps, what a puzzle! (I figured, of course, that taking them off was a two person job, or what's the point?) There were a couple of padded bras that would have been great for Halloween costumes or drag queens, padded so thickly I had to force my fingers to get them to meet from opposite sides of the foam. (Just checking, ya know....) Yep, definitely nixed for the sale, along with a bunch of thongs, particularly since the only table space left was also filling up with kids clothes. Seriously not the same customer base.
I found it interesting over the course of the days how one person showed disdain over an item, say a rug, and so did the next 5 or 8 to look at it, but when I returned from a break, Steve had managed to sell it to a happy customer.
One of Steve's friends showed up, along with his cute and very bitey dog. Thankfully, the owner was mindful and the dog secureed on a short leash. He explained this was a very recent rescue after his last dog had to be put down, and they were still getting acquainted, but trust between this new pairing was becoming established.
One of my favorite visitors showed up every couple hours or more. Next to the clothes there was a fuzzy dog blanket hanging, the kind where two pieces are of fleece are joined by tying fringe into knots all around it. Its pattern was chew bones and hearts, all in brilliant pink, orange and turquoise on a black background. I watched as a very determined hummingbird would hover over it, insisting that somewhere in all those colors was a source of nectar just for it. Occasionally a customer would be paused a few feet away in front of it, and it was brazen enough to swoop and dart in and out, front and back, seemingly sure that this time those flowers would be ready. On the third day of the sale, a woman grabbed it on her way in to see the rest of the merchandise, and I mentioned how much entertainment we'd gotten from the hummer. Sure enough, as she walked out, the hummer trailed behind her watching it's imaginary feast go forever beyond its reach.
There were some fun customers, some - um, let's just say different - but the truly oddest one came middle of the third day. Part of meeting so many people during this kind of event, for us, is developing a patter to welcome our potential customers. This morphed into letting them know how much we appreciated their putting on masks before walking up. Always it was received well, and often occasioned a brief conversation about how bad the pandemic was getting. If they paused to chat further, it might lead to the "where did you come down here from?" which is pretty standard greeting in snowbird central. It may also lead to discussions of waiting for vaccinations so we could resume our regular lives. This is where the odd one chimed in that she was never going to get one of those. She cited a story about some nursing home in New Jersey where they had come in and vaccinated all the residents, and within two days, 40 of them were dead! The rest were all sick, proof, she claimed, that stuff was put in there to kill off all the seniors, all of which was their plan, getting rid of us.
Sometimes there is simply nothing to say. "You're crazy" or "Which other whacked out conspiracies do you believe in?" or even "Which wingnut station do you get your news from?" just don't meet the needs of the moment. I settled for simply stating that I hadn't heard that, letting her put the blame on me for being ignorant rather than trying to pin my judgment on her. I did note on her way out that she still didn't buy anything, however. By then I was just happy enough that she left.
I could go google it, but why bother? I read/watch enough political stuff I'm sure it would have surfaced were it true. A lot of the weird comes across in entertainment segments as something ridiculous to laugh at, but I miss much of the crazy. Not as in I feel deprived, but as in it doesn't connect. I mean, I never heard the crap about Hillary sponsoring a pedophile ring in the basement of a pizza shop which doesn't even have a basement, not until some deluded soul tried to go in at gunpoint and rescue those alleged kids. The last part was true, and I hope the fellow is getting help as well as whatever separation from society is necessary. I did hear of the pharmacist who pulled out vials to let them warm up, then replaced them as if they were OK to use. He's been charged and removed from a position where more damage is possible, and the recipients of the useless vaccine informed of their need to get a real dose.
Last day of the sale is an experience in itself. Prices come down on most items, and we still don't sell much, making even less. A few things were displayed differently and finally sold. Notable among those were small tables which had been holding small items, not exactly advertising their own availability. Those were separated out and placed near the street end of the driveway, and fairly quickly went away. Rugs we figured would never sell, did. Promises made for returns to purchase nearly never bore out, but those which did often comprised multiple sales each. But the dead times stretched out. During one particularly quiet one, with not even jets from nearby Luke AFB or street traffic to break the quiet, I heard the distinctive hum of my favorite visitor's wings behind me. It seems that since its favorite blanket went away, it turned to hovering over the various pieces of framed art hanging on a 4-sided pegboard stand Rich put together, to see if maybe its nectar had moved there in those pretty colors. Alas.
Day five, today, is cleanup. In this case, Rich had promised everything that didn't sell, with a few exceptions that we pulled out for our own use and some small items he plans to sell online, would be packed up and taken to our favorite thrift store less than a mile away. The way we put it, something had to go and he could choose whether it was all the stuff choking his room and most of the patio, or him. He made a wise choice. The back of my car filled up twice with bagged and boxed conglomerations of stuff to haul over. Fortunately, since the thrift store had no rear dock, they provide large rolling bins outside thier front door which you may take to the car and fill, then roll back. We filled two of their three bins by 1:00, our job done. Now Rich's job is moving shelves inside and folding up tables to clear the carport. Then he can fill up another five or six 30 gallon trash bags to go away in the next trash pick-up, organize and vacuum his area, and spray for all the bugs of whatever varieties we've had no access to for months in order to eliminate them for once and for all. I figure maybe by Thursday?
It was a pretty nice profit as garage sales go. A month of the worst of his uncontrolled chaos, most of two boxes of Tide with the accompanying water bill for all the laundry, and four days of work involving all of us, and he made something less than a week's pay at minimum wage.
Only job in town these days.
Just way too much chaos for all of us.
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