Monday Rambles

The problem with doing a mid-week update post, like I did last Thursday, is the potential to take the wind out of the sails of the Monday Rambles post, which is supposed to be my regular weekly update post.  Not that I'm trying to be some kind of kind of strict literalist when it comes to my posting schedule, but I did start doing certain posts on certain days so that readers might have a idea about what was coming up.  Assuming, of course, that I actually do post regularly.

I purposefully kept Thursday's post a little sparse, so that I would for sure have some things to ramble on about today.  Now it is time to expound a bit.

By the way, I am aware that it's Tuesday.  In the afternoon.  Late afternoon.

Bad blogger.

TREATMENT UPDATE

Last Tuesday was treatment number four, so it's time for me to have another scan to see if this immunotherapy thing is working.  I'll do that a week from this Wednesday, then get the results the following Tuesday when I go for treatment number five.

At this point, I seem to be tolerating the drug fairly well.  I'm not having any of the nausea/diarrhea issues, except on infrequent occasions.  The same for the other main side effects.  I'm still having to watch my blood sugar closely, but that's really it.  I do get fatigued, but that is worst on the day of the infusion and the day after.  Otherwise, I really only have fatigue issues when I go too hard too long without rest breaks.  And those can carry over to the next day, usually resulting in a day in.

All in all, if this has to be my condition and status for a while, I can tolerate and live with it.

At this point, the treatment is so new that the docs still don't know how long it will last.  They honestly don't know when to end the protocol.  The first people to receive this drug are still receiving it every three weeks, two and a half years later.  This makes me a little uneasy, mainly from a payment point of view.  What if insurance gets tired of covering a never-ending treatment?

The current line of thinking seems to be that they'll be able to make that call soon, based on the experiences of those earlier patients, but that I should be prepared for at least two years of treatments.  I guess this makes me "cutting edge" or something.

And that makes me think I should dye my hair pink, pierce my nose with a safety pin, and form a punk band called the Gall Bladders.  I've never been "cutting edge" before.

I'm not trying to make any predictions or get any hopes up until I have that scan.

On a related note, I seem to be mostly over that damn cold now.  Thank goodness.  I agree with everyone who said that summer colds are the worst. Because they are.

BOOTH UPDATE

May was a struggle.  I finally ended the month with an okay total.  Not great, but okay and totally acceptable.  Since last June, I have managed to top a thousand in gross sales every month.  Sometimes, it's waaaaaaay over and others it's just barely over.  My goal this year has been to get things to a consistent level every month.  I want that thousand to be my net.

So far, June has been good to me.  Sales have been consistently high and I am way ahead of where I was last month at this time.  Furniture has started moving again, something that wasn't happening last month.  Also, comic books are flying out of the booth in large amounts on an almost daily basis.  I'm cautiously optimistic.

The most surprising part of my sales this month is that my booth has been totally trashed for weeks.  After ten days in SF, plus several days of cold and other distractions, calling the place a "wreck" is an understatement.  I spent today pulling everything out of the end booth and completely rearranging it.  Now, I'll need to get a load of stuff ready to go over, so I can restock and do the big rearrange on the aisle booth.

The mall moved a bunch of showcases that used to be across the aisle from my endcap booth across the store, with the intention of creating more booth spaces.  I requested three of them, hoping to move my aisle booths up closer to my other ones, plus pick up a space to move the books and comics into and expand my selection.  Turns out they're only making six new booths and they've had multiple requests for those spaces.  To be fair, they're going to hold a lottery for the spaces, one per vendor who gets drawn.  I guess we'll see what happens.

Since it's only possible to maybe get one of those spaces, I'll use it for the books and comics if I get it.  That will pull the rest of my book stock out of storage, plus I'll also need a bunch of the shelves I'm storing.  Moving the books and comics out will let me move new shelves into the end booths and get more boxes out of storage, plus a few more pieces of small furniture.  It would be nice to make a dent in that stash.

In case I don't get picked, I went ahead and told the manager that I would like to pick up a space for the books and comics for July.  I think it's a move I need to make, even if I can't get one right near my current booths.  For all the sales, it is really hard to keep the comics and books neat.  They need a space away from my "curated" furniture spot.

WEEKEND UPDATE

Joy posted recently about the advantage of a church sale: lots of good loot in one place.  Usually.  For the first time ever, the largest and best church sale of the year let me down.  Miserably.  Part of the issue was a couple that had somehow managed to snap up all the best furniture within minutes of the sale opening.  Seriously, we got there about ten minutes after it opened and most of the furniture had sold signs on it.  There weren't even that many people there yet!  I watched the buyers loading up as we were leaving.  The furniture that was left was either unsuitable for my needs or overpriced.

As far as the other stuff goes, the volume was way down.  This is the place that usually has about six rooms full to the brim with stuff for sale.  There were still six rooms, but they were only about half full.  It was still a lot of stuff, but not in comparison to previous years.  The quality was way down too.  There just wasn't that much to be excited about.  The toy room in particular was a huge letdown.  Last year, I made four trips through this one room alone, buying armloads each time.  This year I didn't buy anything there!  You read that right.  I left a toy room empty-handed.  Me.  Really.

One of the shoppers remarked to one of the church volunteers about the drop in the amount of items for sale.  The volunteer kind of looked over her shoulder, lowered her voice, and said:

"I hate to put it this way, but it kind of depends on how many people in the church have died recently.  Or moved into assisted living."

Talk about killing your shopping buzz.  Now I'm feeling guilty about all the good years of shopping I've enjoyed at this church!  Welcome to the Dark Side of Resale!

Somebody leaving the sale told Keith about another church sale nearby that had lots of stuff, so we decided to hop over to that church, then hop back for the rest of the neighborhood sale around the church.  Yes, Mazda can hop.  Mazda's talents are limitless.

That sale turned out to be a bust--lots of stuff, but way overpriced.  They weren't open to bargaining either, since they were raising money to build a well in Africa.

On the way back to the other neighborhood, we detoured for a different neighborhood sale and ended up spending the day there.  The majority of what was in Mazda came from this neighborhood.  By the time we were through there, the van was full, so we called it a day.  Sometimes, serendipity is good for the soul.  And the inventory.

Most of you all called the green chairs in Mazda.  There were four of them.  They are heavy and quite sturdy.

I didn't realize that this pic of these cool MCM tables came out so badly until it was too late.  Somehow I didn't notice the chair legs flying across the front of the camera when I was taking the picture.  It was hot and I was sweaty. 

The tables are the round things.

We got the tables as part of a package deal with two small cabinets that were nothing special, but the price was right.  I didn't get pics of them.  I also didn't get the two directors chairs and the small book case I bought the funniest little woman.  When Keith walked up to the sale, she grabbed a mirror and shoved it in his face.  "You need to buy this mirror!"  I hope she wasn't trying to make a comment about his beard.

Coming up, I'll show the smalls.  Later in the week, the San Francisco finds.  Finally.  And the junk set out stuff.  And the San Francisco pics.  And some other stuff.  And the path to world peace and inner contentment.  Maybe.

REST OF THE WEEK UPDATE

This is booth week.  Most everything I'm working in is related to getting my booths back in order.  I'm planning in wrapping that up by Wednesday evening, so I can rest on Thursday.  We have tickets to see Todd Snider play Thursday night, so I want to take it easy that day.  Friday, I can see some thrifting happening.  This weekend is Louisville's big annual nerdfest the Derby City Comicon.  I got half price tickets through Groupon.  I'm pretty excited, as one of my favorite cartoonists is going to be a guest.

Of course, I'll be getting my shop on, but I'll be looking for stuff for me and the collection, instead of resale.  Still, if an unbelievable deal pops up...

SHOUT OUTS UPDATE

I forgot to mention that the wonderful Lorraine of Clamco celebrated her fifth blogiversary right before we went on our trip.  That's a lot of good reading!  She offers plenty of good information about re-selling along with entertaining stories about daily life.

Super blog friend Linda celebrated a milestone birthday last week!  Happy Belated Birthday wishes to her!  Woo hoo!

And the ever-awesome Shara recently celebrated her 24th wedding anniversary.

Big virtual hugs to everyone!

EMMYLOU HARRIS UPDATE

Last week, my most beloved and admired Emmylou Harris received what is considered to be the most prestigious music award in the world, Sweden's Polar Prize.  This award is considered the Nobel Prize of music.  Personally, I think this is entirely deserved.  There is simply no one else like her in music.  Watch her acceptance speech here to see what I mean.  One of the coolest things about the award ceremony is that First Aid Kit, an amazing duo from Sweden, got to perform their sublime song "Emmylou" for her.  Awesome.  There are lots of great clips from the ceremony available featuring a variety of artists performing Emmylou's music.  Well worth checking out.

In fact:

Can't think of a better note to sign off on.  Got to go load the van.