You Can Learn a Lot from a Garage Sale
I’ve learned a lot of valuable lessons through rummage sales. For example, an effective haggling technique is to hold out what you’re willing to pay, claiming it’s all you’ve got when you still have a couple $20 bills in your pocket.
Me (hiding the $30 in my pocket while holding out a $5): “You’re asking $7 for this Soothing Ocean Lights & Sounds toy, but all I’ve got is a $5 (snicker). Sorry, I had to sneeze. Will you take it?”
Proprietor (hiding the fact that it doesn’t work): Sure (snicker). Sorry, I also had to sneeze.
Then there’s the intimate knowledge I’ve learned about the 2500 or so square block area I cover in my quest for clothes. I used to spend more time looking up addresses on a map than actually visiting the addresses. Now, I can look at the addresses in the newspaper and know vaguely how to arrive at their garages, or at least have a vague idea of where to look for them on the map. Whenever somebody mentions a strange little business in the area, like Farrah’s in Beaverdale, I know exactly where that place is, even if I don’t technically know what it does. I now know that house numbers increase as you drive north, starting around 2200 for our home and going up to about 5000 at I-35/80, and homes beyond that might as well not exist because I don’t drive any further. I now know that Des Moines is actually laid out on a nifty grid, and which streets are great north/south or east/west thoroughfares, and that this grid all goes to hell north of Meredith. I’d do great delivering pizzas if I ever need a real job.
I’m still learning. Yesterday I learned that when a proprietor offers to watch your child while you peruse their merchandise, you should continue to watch your child anyway. While separating clothing into piles of “torn” and “acceptably torn,” Abbie behaved in her standard garage sale manner, which is to say she was screaming and doing her best to run down the driveway. The proprietor, seeing that I was genuinely interested in spending upwards of $2 clothing that she probably couldn’t give away to her relatives, offered to watch Abbie so I could peruse in peace. I gladly accepted and dug into a large cardboard box filled with clothing and stains.
Two minutes later I heard the proprietor running down the driveway imploring “come back, sweetie,” as if Abbie listens to anyone, much less a stranger. The proprietor made the foolish mistake of totaling up another customer’s purchase, and Abbie, sensing her opening, toddled down the driveway, determined to finally navigate the street by herself, doggone it. Fortunately this was one of those 40-foot long driveways that are nice when you throw a party and need parking for 30 and pure hell when you need to clear 10-inches of snow before driving to work, so Abbie was still a long ways from the street when the proprietor caught her. Having learned my lesson, I quickly decided which pieces to buy so I could leave and give her proper supervision for toddling down the driveway and into the street.
Another lesson I learned yesterday is why children’s clothes are no longer made from polyester. One garage sale had boxes of children’s clothes that looked like someone had stored them in an attic and was now airing them out, dusting them off, exposing them to light, killing the vampire moths that had taken residence inside, for the first time in 30 years. They were clean and in great shape, and I liked the retro look, but polyester against the skin feels as pleasant as sandpaper that’s been used on metal. Add that to the fact that Abbie was doing her whine and wander routine, plus the proprietor failed to mark prices on any of the items, preferring instead to work something out, and I didn’t feel like putting forth the effort to find anything worth buying. Good thing, too, because when I told Ellie about them she informed me that children aren’t supposed to wear polyester because of the fire hazard. Apparently when polyester burns it sticks to the skin. She never would have let me hear the end of it if I had bought those shirts; she’d probably cut off my garage sale money, forcing me to support my habit with money from a second job, probably delivering pizzas.
Me (hiding the $30 in my pocket while holding out a $5): “You’re asking $7 for this Soothing Ocean Lights & Sounds toy, but all I’ve got is a $5 (snicker). Sorry, I had to sneeze. Will you take it?”
Proprietor (hiding the fact that it doesn’t work): Sure (snicker). Sorry, I also had to sneeze.
Then there’s the intimate knowledge I’ve learned about the 2500 or so square block area I cover in my quest for clothes. I used to spend more time looking up addresses on a map than actually visiting the addresses. Now, I can look at the addresses in the newspaper and know vaguely how to arrive at their garages, or at least have a vague idea of where to look for them on the map. Whenever somebody mentions a strange little business in the area, like Farrah’s in Beaverdale, I know exactly where that place is, even if I don’t technically know what it does. I now know that house numbers increase as you drive north, starting around 2200 for our home and going up to about 5000 at I-35/80, and homes beyond that might as well not exist because I don’t drive any further. I now know that Des Moines is actually laid out on a nifty grid, and which streets are great north/south or east/west thoroughfares, and that this grid all goes to hell north of Meredith. I’d do great delivering pizzas if I ever need a real job.
I’m still learning. Yesterday I learned that when a proprietor offers to watch your child while you peruse their merchandise, you should continue to watch your child anyway. While separating clothing into piles of “torn” and “acceptably torn,” Abbie behaved in her standard garage sale manner, which is to say she was screaming and doing her best to run down the driveway. The proprietor, seeing that I was genuinely interested in spending upwards of $2 clothing that she probably couldn’t give away to her relatives, offered to watch Abbie so I could peruse in peace. I gladly accepted and dug into a large cardboard box filled with clothing and stains.
Two minutes later I heard the proprietor running down the driveway imploring “come back, sweetie,” as if Abbie listens to anyone, much less a stranger. The proprietor made the foolish mistake of totaling up another customer’s purchase, and Abbie, sensing her opening, toddled down the driveway, determined to finally navigate the street by herself, doggone it. Fortunately this was one of those 40-foot long driveways that are nice when you throw a party and need parking for 30 and pure hell when you need to clear 10-inches of snow before driving to work, so Abbie was still a long ways from the street when the proprietor caught her. Having learned my lesson, I quickly decided which pieces to buy so I could leave and give her proper supervision for toddling down the driveway and into the street.
Another lesson I learned yesterday is why children’s clothes are no longer made from polyester. One garage sale had boxes of children’s clothes that looked like someone had stored them in an attic and was now airing them out, dusting them off, exposing them to light, killing the vampire moths that had taken residence inside, for the first time in 30 years. They were clean and in great shape, and I liked the retro look, but polyester against the skin feels as pleasant as sandpaper that’s been used on metal. Add that to the fact that Abbie was doing her whine and wander routine, plus the proprietor failed to mark prices on any of the items, preferring instead to work something out, and I didn’t feel like putting forth the effort to find anything worth buying. Good thing, too, because when I told Ellie about them she informed me that children aren’t supposed to wear polyester because of the fire hazard. Apparently when polyester burns it sticks to the skin. She never would have let me hear the end of it if I had bought those shirts; she’d probably cut off my garage sale money, forcing me to support my habit with money from a second job, probably delivering pizzas.
posted by Matt at
9:34 PM
1 Comments:
Hmmmm, could I actually enforce such a ban? Could your punishment for garage saling be having to spend $50 for every $5 garage sale at Gymboree? I think having to have our own garage sale in a few years to get rid of all the crap you've brought home from other people's garage sales will be punishment enough.
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Anonymous, at 9:30 AM
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