Since I was yard sailing all day Friday, I completely ignored the internet. Nothing personal, of course, it’s just good to get away every once and a while. If anyone spent the day wringing their hands, wondering the fate of my stuff, I’ve got one thing to say to you: get a life. But even if you weren’t, here’s what happened:
The Shower Stool went for $10. I marked it at $25, but a woman wanted it for her 95 year old father, which meant that my naked butt meant nothing as far as increasing the price. I also noticed that most people, when bargaining down more than a dollar or two, liked to include a sob story of why they needed the item at an extreme discount. For instance, my air conditioner was also marked at $25, but a woman offered $10 with the explanation that it was for her divorced friend whose kids were currently dying of heat. Whatever, dude. Just don’t make me put it into your car for you.
The Ansel Adams calendar went for 50 cents, along with my 2001 Brian Froud Fairies calendar, which I marked down to 25 cents.
Mookie Wilson did not sell, because I adamantly priced him at $10 and refused to sell him to anyone who would not admit he was the greatest Met of all time. Perhaps it will be Ebay for him, or maybe my dashboard. Who knows?
Sorry, Sister Alyson, the nail art sold for $3. It was the last thing to go before the skies opened up and ended our sale three and a half hours early on Saturday afternoon. But the man who bought it was really happy, and we didn’t tell him that hours earlier Birmingham had come to visit and used it to make faces with his tongue sticking out.
Wilson Philips and Shari Lewis are still in my possession, even though I priced the tapes at 5 for $1 and 8 for $1.50 (no one fell for the shady 8 tape deal). But, I did sell the “No Son Of Mine” single to a dude who was really excited about it. For his dollar, he also got Tesla, Warrant, Poison and Ozzy Ozborne. Then, as he and his wild hair got back into his pickup, he told me he was “jazzed to go to work because now he had his favorite music to listen to!”
But my biggest success of all was the cookies. Knowing that I wasn’t selling many big ticket items, I decided to have a little bake sale on the side. I made these: Citrus-Drizzled Cranberry-Oatmeal Cookies.
I wrapped them up in cling wrap and a ribbon, and sold them in packages of two for 50 cents. These cookies are madly easy to make, and they’ve garnered me some serious compliments. Sometimes I make extras to give to my neighbor in exchange for the wifi he lets me bum. (I don’t know what I’m going to do when he moves in July.) They sold pretty well over the course of Friday, one guy bought two at once. Then, a few hours later, he returned and bought everything I had left! Lacking the ingredients for more cookies, I made Jenna Fischer’s 88 calorie brownies for Saturday. They were delish, but not as popular. So the extras went down to New Jersey with me on Sunday and became instant father’s day brownies.
All in all, I earned about a third of a stimulus check for my efforts. Nice work if you can get it.
The Daily Tannenbaum 