Garbage Sale Rant

It’s that time of year again – our neighborhood garage sale weekend. Joy. I’m doing cartwheels.

Seriously – I haven’t had a garage sale in the last 8 years – and for good reason. It’s a lot of work – who knew?

First you have to gather up all of the junk – oops, I mean “treasures” – and then you have to go through and slap a price on everything. More fun.

Here’s where it gets tricky. Do I price high? And take a chance no one will buy my stuff? Or do I price low – and get rid of the garbage – oops, there I go again! Sorry – my “treasures”? I finally decide that I do NOT want to put these “treasures” back in my house – whatever doesn’t sell has to be packed for the big move to the new house – so I go cheap. Really cheap. Absurdly cheap. Hubby rolls his eyes and says, “Why don’t you just GIVE it all away?!” Ha – I’ll show him when I make oodles of money on this sale.

So, everything is priced (cheap!) and staged and the garage doors open and the sale starts. Woo hoo.

Now the worst part…dealing with customers. I am seriously getting cranky in my old age. And having to be up EARLY – and PERKY – and FRIENDLY –ALL AT THE SAME TIME - is asking just a little too much of me, I think. But I do my best – after all, I’m a salesman today. I must sell this. To prove hubby wrong. I WILL smile and be friendly! Even if it frickin’ kills me.

First customer: older man, walks in, looks around, and says, “I’m looking for Thomas. Do you got any Thomas?” I have to admit my ignorance, and say, “Excuse me? Thomas?” “Yeah”, he says. “You know – the Engine.” “OH – Thomas the Tank Engine!” He nods. I, apologetically, say – “I’m sorry – no Thomas.” “Are you sure?” he asks, frantically looking around my garage. Uh, yeah, dude – I think I would know if I had Thomas the Tank Engine in my OWN garage sale! “Yeah, I’m pretty confident I don’t have any Thomas.” He looks around to make sure I wasn’t holding out on him – and then leaves – continuing his frantic search. Good luck with that, dude.

A little later, another man walks up to me, holding a little plastic 2-inch Chiefs football Christmas ornament in his hand– and asks how much I’ll take for it. I go out on a limb, and say, “How about a nickel?” His face fell. Seriously. I couldn’t believe it! He hands over the nickel and walks off. My neighbor, who was visiting with me at the time, says, “What did he think he’d pay for it? A penny?” Folks – I realize we’re in a recession and all – but when you’re crestfallen at paying a nickel for a Chiefs ornament – then times must really be tough. Yowza.

So the day continues – people walk up – people walk out – some buy – some don’t. At 2:30 pm, I gleefully shut the garage doors and counted the minutes until hubby got home from work.

When he walked in the door tonight, I had a Cheshire Cat grin on my face, looking as if I’d swallowed the canary. I love it when I can prove him wrong.

I really AM quite the salesman. I have the nickels today to prove it.

Peace.