How I Learned to Sell the Bomb for Five Cents

Why the hell am I awake at six in the morning on a Friday? Oh yeah, I remember... I am awake because I have to watch as crazies meander through my backyard, picking up pieces of my childhood and haggling with my dad to get them for one dollar instead of two. That's because we are having our second yard sale (our first yard sale was back when I was but in 8th grade) and everything must go. It all started when my dad left his job at WQED at the beginning of the summer, this allowed him to start on his dream project: cleaning out our basement. Filled with nothing but old toys, unused exercise equipment and weird beer steins, our cellar was rarely used and reserved for laundry and storage only. That is until Dad, with his heart that doesn't know the definition of "sentimental value," got down there and starting separating the men from the boys... the toys from the collectables... the garbage from the goods. He and I had some run-ins along the way (you certainly can't sell my G.I. Joes or my X-Men figures!) but we agreed on many things... and now we have a yard full of crap to sell.

This is but half of our yard sale-- yea we have a really small yard. Behold the sale of the century!

We had quite a rocky, and interesting road just getting the yard to that condition. Dad, as I mentioned, woke us up at six in the morning, and we began moving all of the stuff from our kitchen out into the back yard. Relatives and neighbors had lent us scores of card and folding tables, all of which needed set up and arranged. Everyone was up by six, the yard sale wasn't scheduled to start until nine so we had plenty of time. Not! Tact does not apply to the average yard sale-goer. I know this because people began showing up at seven in the morning, a whole two hours before we were scheduled to start! Who the hell do these people think they are? My family was going back and forth between the yard and the house, moving things and sticking prices on stuff until we noticed there was a fifth person in our yard.

"Hello?" my dad said to the old woman. "Um, you're two hours early, we have about 90% of the stuff still in the house." She just looked at us and said, "Oh... well you never know when yard sales are gonna start. Some of them start two hours before the time they say they will." What universe are you from, lady? What world do you live in that you go to places two hours before you are supposed to? You don't do that for parties, or weddings, or doctors appointments, so why the hell would you do it for a yard sale? I don't know, but leave it to say, we kicked her out. It was just about forty-five minutes later that five more people showed up. This time we had close to half the stuff out there, and it was good enough for them. And so, an hour before the yard sale officially opened, we had made over $100.

The yard sale was made even cuter by this stray cat that wandered into our yard. A woman offered to buy him, but we decided not to claim him as our own.

The freak show continued, as more and more people streamed into our back yard. We had to have gotten about fifteen people all during the hour before the yard sale even started! And so Danny and I, having moved everything outside, retreated into the house. We then grabbed a camera and started snapping some pictures, I began this blog entry, and Dan discovered the magic that is Yes. It's all very interesting, just sitting here, right next to the sliding door to our backyard, listening to what these people are saying to my dad. One guy tried on a pair of jeans we were selling. Another lady wanted Danny to come outside and test a boombox we were trying to get rid of. A number of people were very interested in the slot car tracks we had for sale; too bad a guy showed up two hours before hand and bought every last one of them!

Okay, the cat was cute, but he wasn't going to help us sell our mini-air hockey table. Dan took action.

I had to make the decision... do I go back to bed and catch a few more hours of sleep before my day start, or do I drink the coffee that my dad's best friend brought us and tough it out. That's when I realized that this sort of event only happens once every couple of years for us (and even longer now that we got rid of the bulk of our crap). I shouldn't just sleep through it, I should document it. Blog it, take pictures of it, and live the day to its fullest! So I drank the coffee, and made plans to stop for coffee in various spots throughout my day's adventures.

I really don't know how this yard sale is going to last us two days. People are buying so much of our stuff! Or at least, people are buying all of the good stuff. Peering outside, I still see many of the board games we are selling (this is slowly breaking my heart, as I love board games no matter if I play them or not) as well as my old computer games and our mini air hockey table. But this party is still alive as long as we have the following two items:

The timeless insight of "Quarterbacks on Quarterbacks." I know it sounds like some weird gay porn, but really it's just a stupid promotional NFL video.

The crown jewel of the yard sale: Shaq Diesel, Shaquille O'Neil's first rap album, proudly purchased by yours truly back in gradeschool. I wanted to put a $25 "Serious Collectors Only" pricetag on it, but Dad wasn't interested.

And so the march of the yard sale-goers carries on. They are marching from up to seventy miles away to dig through our crap, possibly going home with a bucket of old golf balls or a un-used stick of Brute. I'll be sticking this one out for another hour or so, then I'm hitting the road and ridding myself of this grand American tradition. My dad is throwing a few bucks my way, but I really think I deserve a larger cut of the profits, considering that about half of what's out there belongs to me.

Next time we advertise a yardsale, we will be putting the following line in our Classified ad: Early birds will be shot, survivors will be shot again.

Posted by MikeRubino at August 19, 2005 8:19 AM | TrackBack