My glasses broke the other day, so I'm back to wearing contacts, which I haven't done regularly in years. I've kept my prescription up to dote, but I've gotten to the point in life where I want getting ready in the morning to be as easy as possible, so the hassle of contacts has been just one more thing to do that I don't really want to and so I haven't.
The nerd glasses didn't really go with the longer hair anyway. They'd work if I were planning to actually go the man bun route, but I feel like I am too old and fat for that. I'm actually working on more of a loose, hippie ponytail. I think little, gold-rimmed specs would look better with that.
Without my glasses, I think I look like my mother with a goatee, which kind of makes me nostalgic for my childhood days with the carnival, when I would watch Mom primping and combing her beard before going on stage to do her act is kind of unnerving. Even worse, Keith keeps telling me how much he likes the way I look without the glasses, and in the back of my mind, a little voice is going, "He thinks your mother with a goatee is hot." I think I need therapy.
FROM THE MOUTHS OF BABES
I had a great conversation yesterday at the mall with a 12 year old boy looking for Spider-Man comics. He told me he was looking for "older ones." I said "Old for you? or Old for me?" He had to think about that for a minute, then told me he meant 90's. Old for him, then. I told him to keep checking back and would do my best to find some.
I actually do need to carve out some time for a bad movie/comic bagging marathon. I've been selling a lot of those boogers lately.
SPEAKING OF THE BOOTH
It feels like tax season is finally upon us. Sales are picking up all the time. The weekends have been gold rush city of late. Saturday was my second best day ever. The gravy is flowing and the small furniture is flying out of the door. So is the pricier stuff. Saturday some dude came in and bought all of my vintage metal lunchboxes.
IT'S JUNKER CHRISTMAS!
This is junk set out week for the next neighborhood over from us, which means that we are next. We've already got an early start on our set out pile going. You're not supposed to do that, but my neighborhood ain't much on rules. It's the first time we've ever tried it, though. Watch us get cited for it, while the folks down the street who have had the nasty couches sitting on the curb for a MONTH, get by with nothing.
I made two "practice runs" last night. One to a pile in the other neighborhood. Got some small stuff, but nothing notable, except for two old fishing poles. The other stop was at the magical house down the hill that disgorges all kind of interesting stuff every set out period. They always start early and will be putting out crap right up until the garbage trucks come. Last night it was a bunch of old religious texts and prayer books. SCORE!
There's also a new renovation dumpster on our street, two doors down from us. I told Keith that it was like having junk delivery!
All this is to say:
IT'S ON BABY!
MUSIC FOR MONDAYS
And finally, to set you on your way: The Carolina Chocolate Drops!
So we've gone through a week of freezing temps and snow and are getting ready to go into a week that is supposed to peak at around 70 later on. Sigh. Welcome to the Ohio Valley. Still the warmer weather will give me a chance to do some stuff outside, which is nice.
We've already started making our junk pile for the Feb. set out by the back fence and it's getting a little untidy. I would like to straighten it up a bit. Some of the neighbors have already started throwing things on the curb, even though it's early. We're a bunch of rebels in my 'hood, for sure. I need a nice day to get out and scavenge.
I'd also like to spend an afternoon at storage making a load of furniture for the booth. I'm starting to see I've got a good deal of room for some more big stuff.
SPEAKING OF THE BOOTH
I'm just about finished re-stocking. Sales have been consistent, despite the weather. I have heard that tat returns will be delayed this year until the end of February, which is worrying. I really need that sales boost. At least that gives me more time to prepare.
Today, I have to try and work another bookshelf into the book booth. I think I have figured out how to do it. Keith is getting ready to thin his books and has warned me to get ready for them.
I'm on a crusade right now to get the back log out of my house. We want to swap out my junk room and the bedroom, as the junk room has more closet space. The bedroom will be turned into a workroom/office.
Every morning before I go the mall and every evening after I get home, I try to get together a box or two of stuff, which goes to the booth the next day. I'd rather be figuring out how and where to place it there, where it can make some money, than here, where it is just in the way.
AND NOW A WORD FROM MY MOTHER
I've also been going through old boxes of stuff to see if there's anything that I can sell, donate, or otherwise get rid of. There's just too much crap around here. In the course of doing that, I found a folder of jokes and clipping and stuff that my mother used to stick in with her letters (remember those?) when I was in college. I have a briefcase full of those letters too.
Among them all was this gem, which she sent me while I was in seminary. I promptly taped it to the door of my dorm room.
If you think that my sense of humor is crazy, you should have known my mother. She was a nut!
JUST CALL ME DOPEY
I forgot to tell you all that I'm on Ritalin now to try and deal with my treatment-related fatigue. Apparently my fat, old, tired ass has a lot in common with a sixth-grader who can't sit still. It actually does help a lot, without the side effects I was having with the steroids. It's not the same kind of manic energy boost, but more of a controlled, sustaining effect. I do need to take more than one to keep going through the day. If I miss my afternoon dose, I sure start feeling it!
Sadly, there's no throwing wheel action here, but she kicks plenty of mythological ass! I highly recommend this one and am now super-psyched for the movie this year.
After a kind of moderate last week, the heat is back with a vengeance this week. Ewww! COME ON FALL! Eddie's sweating and waiting! (TMI?)
It's so hot right now that we went to a large outdoor sale on Saturday with dozens of vendors and I just flat gave up in the middle of it all and quit. I ain't built for this any more. I did make one super-fabulous find, though. Check back tomorrow to see it.
Not only is it awesome, but it's a total keeper.
I put off starting my big booth redo for a couple of days to finish up some things here at the house. Part of that work is outdoors, and I am dreading it.
Speaking of the booth, I think the summer sales slump is wrapping up. I've had really good sales all last week, except for one day. Lots of potatoes and bigger and bigger ladles of gravy. Yum! I'm going to come out of this month well ahead of where I've been the last three. It's still not where I like it to be, but any improvement over recent history is welcome. LOOK WHAT I FOUND THE OTHER DAY!
Just the table, not the junk on it. It was sitting on the curb at the bottom of the hill the other day as I was rushing to catch the bus. I figured it would be gone by the time I got home, but it was still there. It was kind of hidden by some tree branches. I wouldn't have seen it originally if I hadn't been walking down that side of the street, which is not something I usually do.
I got one of those looks from Keith when he saw it, so I told him that it was "perfectly primitive." That's also what I put on the tag. HEY PAM AT VIRGINIA RETRO!
Okay, so you really did paint yours, and I just found this one, but I thought it was cool and it did make me think of you.
Those that can, paint. Those that can't, buy.
Check out Pam's blog, if you haven't already. THE THINGS YOU LEARN WHILE DINING OUT
Pikachu likes Mexican food.
My last latte appointed me a professor. Of what, I have no clue.
And the most recent fortune cookie wisdom.
DVD OF THE WEEK
This is an absolutely charming short animated film from 1966, directed by the wonderfully talented Gene Deitch. The full title is Alice of Wonderland in Paris. Alice meets a mouse named Francois, who takes her to Paris so she can fulfill her dream of meeting Madeline, of the children's book series. Along the way they swap stories, which become the various segments of the movie. Art for each story is provided by creators such as Ludwig Bemelmens (creator of Madeline), Crockett Johnson (creator of Harold and the Purple Crayon), and New Yorker cartoonist James Thurber. There's not much else in the way of plot, but the whole thing is just too sweet and totally endearing. (I'm also a great fan of both Thurber and Johnson, which adds to the film's appeal for me.) Highly recommended, if you can find it.
By the way, Crockett Johnson is going to pop up here again in a few weeks. WRAPPING UP
Not a whole lot happening this week, it seems. Let's make up for that with some music for Monday.
Have a happy and safe Labor Day weekend. I'll be heading to the Big Flea! It's antique wing time.
Yesterday the high here was 80. Yes. 80! I did some alley exploring for junk for the first time in ages. So nice. Temps this week are not supposed to get above 90 here. I believe Fall may be on the way. Woo hoo!
To celebrate, I put up a fall wreath in my booth. It's my only fall decor item right now, but I'm rooting around looking for the hay bales and gourds.
The wreath itself was a freebie find from in the neighborhood. I had a little trouble getting it off the front door it was nailed to, but a good determined yank finally brought it right off.
Okay, I'm kidding with that little bit. It actually came out of a renovation dumpster a couple doors down. I saw workers filling up a new one last week, when I was on the way to the bus stop, but I was running late. I checked it later that evening, and the wreath was all I could get out because they had piled a mound of icky old mattresses on top of everything else. The wreath came out in great shape, though. Sometimes, you gotta take what you can get and be happy.
The guy who took down our water heater closet told me that all the reno in the area is due to one guy, who is buying up all the old shotguns, gutting them, rehabbing them, and flipping them. If that's the case, there will be dumpsters for a while yet. There are a lot of shotguns in this neighborhood.
SPEAKING OF THE BOOTH
I didn't get sales emails for the first three days last week, so I was freaking out. No gravy! No potatoes! No plate! ACK!
Turned out to be a glitch in the system. Last week was a pretty strong one, all week long. Still not all the way where I want it, but the gravy ladle is coming out more and more. The weekend was especially good. Best one in a while in fact. I was afraid the nice weather might pull people away, but I did pretty good both days. It was the first weekend of the state fair to boot!
I'm planning a complete booth overhaul and massive restock that will probably take me two weeks or so to complete. I'm ready for a new look and I want to connect most of my spaces into one long continuous booth. I'm still working on the ideas, but I intend to start next week. I have treatment tomorrow, so this is my rest week.
CHIQUITO TO THE RESCUE
I had a really bad case of the "I don't give a's" last week. It got progressively worse too. I started out not giving a shit, and then went downhill from there. I didn't leave the house. I didn't blog. I didn't do nothing.
Then the cat started bringing me mice. The first two were still alive. The third one was dead. At that point, I decided that I'd rather face the world than the building carnage at home.
My sweet little boy is a killer. (I think he was getting tired of me hanging out at home and bitching.)
RECORD BUYS
Like I said yesterday, there was a music sale at the comic shop yesterday. Everything was a quarter. I went looking for oddball and fun and I found it. More on that tomorrow. But, for today, a little preview.
I give you Cesar Romero. In all his glory. Complete with the mustache he refused to shave off to play the Joker on Batman. In TRUE HIGH FIDELITY!
I picked up several albums, but only one CD, which was actually for me.
This is the only Anonymous 4 CD I didn't have. (Except for the newest one.) Well, I used to have it, but it was tossed when our much missed and beloved Himalayan Brianna peed on it. She expressed her displeasure with the management that way. This particular bout of ire aimed at me cost me the CD and three comics, one of which I still have to replace. Believe it or not, she was a total sweetheart, except for this one issue.
SPEAKING OF THE JOKER
Since the topic of Batman just came up, I have to share the most wonderful news! There's going to be an animated feature based on the show, with Adam West, Burt Ward, and Julie Newmar reprising their roles. Do I even have to tell you that I am pumped for this?
It's a special day here at the Ramble. I'm combining the regular music for Monday with the DVD of the Week.
I spent some time Saturday night watching several Atomic Betty DVD's I picked up at the Peddlers Mall. From time to time I like to try and make up for my misspent adulthood of employment and responsibilities by catching up on more recent cartoons that I had to miss the first time around, like Betty.
Quite frankly, it was a lot of fun. Pop culture always seems to be lacking in heroes for younger girls, and Atomic Betty fits the bill nicely. The first few episodes are a little rushed and don't quite work, but it evens out over time. Betty is an every day school girl, who is secretly a Galactic Guardian, protecting the universe from all kind of menaces. Quite enjoyable. And kick-ass. Very kick-ass.
Here's the long version of the theme. Try getting this out of your head today.
Even better, try this mash-up with Betty and Sailor Moon. Fun!
Well, hello again, friends! I've not had many opportunities for blogging lately, but I have missed you. There's lots to share, so let's get started. EDDIE UPDATE
I haven't talked a lot about the cancer stuff lately, because there really isn't anything changing. I get my treatments every three weeks, and things continue to go well. I had another scan at the end of last month, and everything still looks good. I qualified for an assistance program from the drug company, so my co-pays are now taken care of, which is nice.
I seem to finally have all the steroid withdrawal over with, so things are returning to normal on that front. The blood sugar is lots better, and I've dropped a few pounds. Not many. Just a few.
I had a sinus thing going on last week that kept me out of action for a few days. It seems to be clearing up, although I still have a head full of yucky stuff. I feel like all I do is blow my nose. And cough. A lot. I'm afraid that I may accidentally blow one of my lungs out my nose when I get on a coughing jag. Hate it when that happens.
I've always been prone to stuff settling in my chest, which then takes forever to clear out. I've actually coughed so hard before that strangers have come up to me and told me I need to stop smoking! And I don't smoke!
The sinus thing started last Tuesday, which was also a treatment day. Since I was already planning a stay-at-home low key week, I was in a great spot to just stay in bed and rest. Things really worked out well, and Chiquito liked it too.
BOOTH UPDATE
Well, sales are a little better this month, but not by much. It's very fits and starts right now. I did HUGE over the July 4th weekend, but then took the rest of the month up to this past weekend to double that amount. The crying of the blues will continue until further notice. I'm moving lots of stuff, but it's nearly all small, lower priced items right now.
It seems like on the days when I do sell a larger, higher-priced piece or two, that's all I sell. The mix is off in my sales totals. Still, they are higher than last month, for the most part.
I moved out of the booth with the pole smack dab in the middle of the entrance to a space right next to may other spaces. Less walking for me. I like having all my spaces together.
At the same time, one of my college roommates, who also had a booth in our mall, got a new job and had to give up his booth due to time issues. He gave me and another vendor about 75% of what was in his booth--FOR FREE! I've been kind of awash in stuff from that. Really nice stuff to boot. He does a lot of woodworking and repurposing kinds of stuff, and some of his projects were included in the items he gave us.
Slow sales are causing a lot of vendors to leave, but there's also been an influx of new folks. Open spaces in out store get snapped up pretty quickly, often by existing vendors. The manager told me at the beginning of the month that there wer so many vendors swapping out spaces that it was almost like a jigsaw puzzle.
This was one booth's closing sign.
I had been intending forever to get a pic of the "Buy from the BUNNY" sign to put in the blog, because I just love it. I never got around to it, until it was time to say "Bye Bye Bunny." Sad.
Of course, since I was out all last week, I'm planning on spending all this week at the booth trying to pull things back together. I'm hoping to take new pics, since an update post is long overdue. I just need to remember. That's the hard part. DVD OF THE WEEK
This is a favorite movie of mine and I like to pull it out and watch it from time to time. Martin Sheen and Trevor Howard work so well together and their scenes just shine throughout the whole film.
Religious politics and inner working fascinate me, especially with the Catholic Church. I am constantly reading up on various aspects of the way the church operates. One of my favorite subjects is the tension that exists between the newer course the church has taken since Vatican II and Catholics of a more traditional/conservative bent.
This 1973 TV (!) movie (based on a novel by Bryan Moore) examines that tension with Sheen playing a young priest sent to get a recalcitrant Howard and the monks of his monastery to update and move along with the times. The story is set in a fictional time after two more church councils have brought even more changes, and the monks have become steadfast and reactionary.
Like I said, the acting is exemplary and the story avoids any easy answers as the men strive to understand each other and seek a resolution. The ending is haunting.
Given the current tension that exists between the current, very progressive, Pope and many more conservative bishops and cardinals, this 40 year old movie is surprisingly timely. Well worth hunting down.
STUFF UPDATE
Since sales have been so slow lately cutting back on going to yard sales and such. I'm in "clear out the backlog" mode instead. I did buy a bunch of manga over the weekend, but I was really low on it. That was the first major purchase I've made all month.
Since that means I won't have any new things to share here, I'm taking a different approach to doing finds posts. Check in tomorrow for the first installment.
For once, I was having a halfway decent hair day last week on cancer center day. Good thing too, because I got interviewed by a local TV station for a story about the drug I'm on. I don't know yet when it will air, but I'll post links and such when I do.
New Blog Recommendation:Look What I Found!is another trash-picking and selling blog, but the author lives in the Netherlands, which gives her varied and more interesting outlets for finding and selling stuff. She also makes things to sell, and there are cats. I've read back through the last few years of posts and quite enjoyed it. Give it a look.
And speaking of things that I found that I'm kind of fond of, take a listen to this:
Also, Lara at Pretty Quirky did a round up of blog posts all about the booth business that's worth checking out. (Even if she didn't include a certain handsome, if shaggy, intelligent, if goofy, dude we've all come to love and enjoy. Sniff!)
Also, another fun blog I've been meaning to recommend for a while, but kept forgetting, is Stories of Objects. I really love her sparse, almost minimalist, vibe. Since she's another European, her stuff and her stories have a different flair to them than what you might be used to. I will say that her header photo might unnerve you a bit, so be ready for it. I think it's kind of cool, but that's just me.
One of these days, I shall have to make a blogroll and incorporate all this good reading! (Plus the many blogs that belong to you great people!)
Tuesdays seemed to be cursed, sales-wise, for me right now. I'm in this pattern where I have a good weekend, a strong Monday, and then a really crappy Tuesday. Not at all sure what that's about. It's still a good month overall, though.
This weekend was particularly good. I was there all day on Saturday and the place was packed! Every shopper seemed to have a cart just crammed with stuff. at one point, it felt like everyone in the store was in my aisle at the same time. I had been a little worried, since it was really, really nice both days. I was afraid that after the bad weather we'd been having that people would want to be outside on a nice weekend, rather than cooped up in the mall buying my awesome junk. Happily, I was wrong about that! Junk triumphs over nice weather!
By the way, I'm really kind of amazed by the number of you who say that your sales go UP on bad weather days. It can be hit or miss here. If it's rainy, that'll drive the folks indoors to shop, but if it's wintry, around here they tend to stay home.
I'm also surprised by the stories of how slow it can be this time of year for booth sales. This is our busiest time of the year. Once the tax money starts rolling in, so do the customers. I don't know if it's a regional thing or that fact that I'm in a flea market flea market that makes the difference. Our slump season is the summer.
I spent Thursday and Friday at the booth, bringing my brand of order to my brand of chaos. I went in with a nice load from Sorrow Mountain and the Hillock, thinking that I really didn't have too much to do other than put it all out. With that thought in mind, I decided to tackle a couple of other jobs that I haven't had the time to do lately.
Those jobs turned out to be the proverbial jobs that lead to other jobs, which lead to other jobs, which lead to other jobs. End result? My easy afternoon of stocking turned into three crazy days of work!
At least for once I wasn't out in the aisle with my stuff, because there was an empty booth next to my spaces where I had plopped my boxes. I never block an aisle and I keep my stuff far away from other booths when I work. The end result is that all access to my own stuff is pretty much blockaded until I get done. Despite this, a couple of my neighbors constantly complain about me and my stuff, which is never anywhere near their booths and is crammed as closely up to my own spaces as I can get it.
So, I'm working along, happy for once that no one can complain about anything I'm doing, when along comes the folks who have just rented the space where I'm plopping. Of course, I cleared out right away, but I still got the stink-eye. It seems I am forever cursed to be hated by my neighbors!
At least, I got everything done! All of my religious books are in the booth (finally)! Valentine's stuff is gone. Some Easter is out. (I found a couple of boxes of Easter on the Mount of Sorrows that I had forgotten about.) I still have a few Easter things in the shed to dig out. I have a little more Easter than I really like right now, but I caught a 90% off sale last year where they still had some BIG items left, so I got a couple. We'll see what happens. I have about one more half-load of stuff on the Hillock to take out, and then it will be time to close it down! Woo hoo!
I ended up working from open to close on Saturday. I was exhausted by the end of the day. About midway through the day, one of my favorite vendors came in. He's got two booths, one about halfway down the aisle from me and one the next aisle over. His booths are kind of like topsy-turvy land. Stuff that should be high-priced is super-cheap and the stuff that should be super-cheap is way too high.
I ended up buying this:
It was way cheaper than I would have expected and is the right size for holding board games and puzzles in my booth. I also got some small things from him, including some vintage Fisher-Price. A little later in the day three guys came by looking for glass jars. I know this dealer always has tons of cheap jars, so I sent them to his booths. Later, I saw them checking out with a bunch of them. I felt like I repaid him for all the good stuff I got.
I did hit one garage sale on my way to the mall. It was the only one worth stopping at. I already had Mazda loaded with stuff for the booth, so I didn't take a Mazda shot. It would not have been fair to the new stuff.
This is the sale by the dealer that lives not far from us with great stuff and good prices. I told Keith as we were leaving with Mazda about half full that this would be the day I found a ton of stuff from him, just because the van space was so limited.
Talk about self-fulfilling prophecies!
There were two of these extra large wire baskets. Only this one made it into the pic. The other one turned out to be quite camera-shy.
Fun wrought iron plant stand and a really interesting box. Really interesting. I think the box itself is kind of old. The wood looks like it. It has tiny, old metal casters on the bottom that barely roll. Along the way, someone attached paneling to the ends of the box and carpet to one side. Quirky.
All these books! Two U-Haul boxes full of them. I saw one of them and it was marked five bucks. I pulled the tag off and added it to my pile. Then the seller tells me he's got another one that he'll let me have for four, so I take it too.
Just then, another guy there starts trying to get down in the second box as I'm checking it out and taking it to my stash. "What you got there? Anything good" Not cool, dude!
This one is my favorite book of the batch. It's also the only picture book. There were a lot of old textbooks, several old Bibles (LOVE!), some old religious books, a few novels, and several books from the Five Little Peppers series. All in all, a really nice haul.
This is my second favorite from the lot. Sadly, there are no illustrations inside to match that sweet cover.
This book yielded one of the most awesome surprises I have ever found tucked inside a book.....
....VINTAGE PAPER DOLLS!
Cut right out from the newspaper! How fun is that??? They remind me of those wonderful Golden Age Katy Keene comic books. Of course, she wasn't the only comic in the 40's to have paper dolls, but it's one of my favorites. There was a brief Katy revival in the 80's, which I totally loved, even if I did slip her in between the Batman comics in my stash at the comic shop.
There was also another really fun item of great historical interest in another book, but I'm saving it for another day. Those are the highlights from the haul. I also got five toy guitars and a framed golf poster, but didn't get pictures. Combined with what was already in Mazda, I filled it up!
Not much on tap for this week. The weather is supposed to be okay for a couple of days, so I'm going to spend some time in the back yard cleaning the last of the curb finds, so they can head to the booth.
I have a couple of fine-tuning booth touches that need to be done and I need to finish my Easter display. Once I get everything done, I'll take some pictures for you nice people. I haven't done that in a while.
Let me just say right off the top that I am so ready for winter to be over. So ready. We haven't had a bad winter at all, mind you. I'm just tired of the cold and the dreariness. There are things I want to do outside! Shoo, winter!
We had another four inches or so of snow yesterday. Shoo, winter! It's supposed to start warming up this week, so it won't last long. I hope. Shoo, winter!
This is kind of another quickie, mini-ramble. There's just not much to say right now, for real. I'm pretty sure that you all honestly don't want to read about me sitting around in my robe, drinking hot chocolate and petting the cat. Shoo, winter!
Last week was all about getting the big junk from the set out pick to the booth. This week will be about getting the small stuff over. I made a super score on some wrestling action figures, so I'll also be getting those ready to go. And probably bagging some comics. In my robe. While drinking hot chocolate. And petting the cat. Shoo, winter!
My, what a lot of wrestling action figures!
A competing vendor mall has opened up across the street from the Peddlers Mall. I might head over there to check it out later in the week. I've heard it's not very impressive, as it's less than half-rented out and most of the vendors over there have either left our mall or also have booths in our mall. I have to confess that I do not understand paying to compete against yourself like that. It's not like two malls that close to each other are going to draw significantly different crowds of shoppers. In fact, reports have most shoppers leaving there empty-handed and coming over and spending money with us.
Honestly, I'm not worried about competition. Nobody anywhere does this thing the way I do it, if I can say so myself. I've never been that impressed with the other malls that the owners of this new one operate. The staff are unfriendly and none of their stores is ever fully rented it seems. On the other hand, I have found really good bargains in some of them, so it's worth checking out to see if maybe a new close source for stuff has opened up. We'll see.
Speaking of booths and such, February is rolling long well. I had a bit of a glitch last week for a couple of days, but the tax money is now getting to people and they are coming in and filling their carts. Seriously. I see more people walking by my space with huge mounds of stuff in their buggies and think: "Tax refunds."
What's really wild is that there are a bunch of them that have never been in a Peddlers Mall (or a flea market, for that matter) before. You can tell by listening to the conversations. They're the ones that are either amazed at how much stuff there is here or they're appalled that so much of it is secondhand. I really don't know exactly what that last group was expecting when they came in.
As someone who does not sell anything remotely resembling a necessity, I am very grateful for the tax refund folks, since for some of them, this is the only extra money they get all year. The sales boost is always appreciated.
The real issue sales-wise right now is the weather. All of my off days have also been snow days. Shoo, winter!
Tomorrow, it's back to the cancer center. This is treatment number 16, so I'll be scheduling another scan as well. Those come every four treatments. Wednesday will be a day of rest. I keep forgetting to do that, but it makes such a difference when I do it.
If I'm feeling up to it on Thursday, I need to take some stuff from the Hillock to the booth. I still have a hunk of my religious books in storage, because I didn't have room for them. I figured out how to rearrange some things at the booth and make more room, so I need to get them. I have some empty shelves sitting and waiting for them.
Also, I need to take the Valentine's stuff out and replace it with St Pat's and Easter stuff. I really don't ever sell much for any of those holidays, so I never have much to put out. I barely sold anything for Valentine's Day this year. I think I only have about a half-dozen St Patrick's items, but they should go out.
I hope everyone had a nice Valentine's Day full of hearts and flowers and chocolate and whatnot. We stayed in, and I made dinner for us--the kind of big cooking with side dishes and fresh veggies and chopping and peeling and dessert that we hardly ever do any more. It was fun.
This is a post "dig in" pic.
Then I realized that kind of cooking makes dishes to be washed. Lots of them. And I understood why we don't do that kind of thing very often. Oh well.
If you need a little Monday giggle, try this collection of Popes in sombreros. Fashion-forward Pontiffs for the Win!
Not much happening here at the moment, so just a short rundown. With incomplete sentences, yet.
It's junk set out in my neighborhood. I've been prowling the alleys and curbs since Friday and dragging home the bounty. Pics to come.
I have discovered that, if you wander the streets with your head stuck through a big picture frame, people will give you a wide berth.
We've had cold and snow storms for the past couple of days. Nothing major. Just an annoyance. Been staying close to home and drinking hot chocolate.
Booth sales are very good so far this month. Very strong. It's too early to count any chickens, but the potential is strong for this month.
I got a new shirt at the Peddlers Mall the other day.
It's wrinkly because it sat in a pile of clothes after coming out of the dryer.
Snazzy, huh?
Believe it or not, I have always wanted one of these tux t-shirts. Another vendor found it for me while she was looking through some clothes in a booth. She showed it to me and said "This looks like something you need." She was right.
One of my goals for this year is to replace my aging, tired wardrobe. I'm off to a good start.
That's all the news from these parts. What's up in your corner of the world?
It is said that there are only two things in life that are certain. Those would be death and taxes. When it comes to this blog, however, there are at least three certainties.
1. At least half the photos will be crap.
2. The blogger will never be very good at his job.
3. Whenever you read that posting will resume "tomorrow," then you can expect at least another two weeks (or more) before a post finally appears.
Is anyone even still out there?
If you look back over the last few years of this blog, you'll find that I inevitably seem to flake out right around the holidays and totally disappear. Sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas, life just overwhelms me and the blog suffers. Interestingly, I don't really do that much holiday celebrating any more. The only gifts to get are for Keith, my brother and Keith's mom. We haven't decorated or done any baking since my mother first got sick. If anyone ever gets a Christmas card for me, guard it like a double-bag collector's item, because that sucker is a rarity for sure! Yet, despite all of this, the end of the year seems to swallow me up like a black hole.
I know my prolonged absence made some of you worry, and I am sorry for that, but deeply touched at the same time. You all are just so sweet and I am lucky to have each of you in my life. I owe several of you emails, blog comments, and post catch ups. I'll get to it, hopefully soon. If I don't, know that I do think about you all a lot. I had no idea that this little blog would bring so many great people into my life.
Speaking of being in touch, any of you that have my mailing address, please contact me by email. After years of declining service, we finally did away with the PO Box. If you want it, I'll be glad to give you the home address.
Okay, so where to begin?
Let's start with this. He always makes people smile.
Keith's mother gave him that quilt for Christmas. One of his aunts made it for a fund-raiser at one of the churches that his mom attends and she ended up winning it. It's really pretty, and Chiquito just loves it! He's claimed it as his own.
In other Chiquito news, Keith relented and made me a 2016 Chiquito calendar. I'll get the Jan and Feb pics up soon. Well, before March, at least. He told me to warn you all that this one might be the last one. He thinks that you're going to find pic after pic of Chiquito to be "repetitive." I told him he didn't know you all.
Speaking of Christmas, I also got this,which of course I love! Two more pairs of socks came with it!
I get tons of compliments when I wear it! He also made me a Kosh calendar, but it makes me kinda sad, so I keep it stashed on my desk. I had asked him to make me a memory book of Kosh pics, like he did for our other kitties who have passed on, but he hasn't had a chance to track down all the pics yet. The calendar was to hold me over until he could.
Something we did not realize about having a Christmas Eve anniversary is that it is awfully hard to find a place to go for dinner. We finally got a corrected copy of our marriage license, so Keith is not the officiating judge any more. He had a couple of our wedding pics blown up and printed out on canvas for me. We're doing some rearranging at the house, so they'll probably go in the bedroom, when it's done.
The other day, while I was searching for a clean pair of jeans, I came across this:
That's the 70's Batman comic logo, by the way. I had forgotten I had that one. Finding made me remember that I also have a shirt with the TV show logo on it, which I now have to find. I have a nerdrobe and didn't even know it!
Ignore my hair in that pic, please. I'm growing it out in hopes of finally having the ponytail I've always dreamed of. I've tried it before, but always got frustrated when I got to this shaggy, unmanageable state. The top and sides aren't long enough to pull back yet, and it's driving me nuts. I'm determined to see it through this time. I think it's a midlife crisis thing. I'm also pondering bleaching it totally white and piercing my nose.
This happened a couple of weeks ago.
It was really the first bad weather of the winter for us and wasn't nearly as bad as it got in other places, but it was enough. The streets in front of and behind our house are kind of major ones, and traffic was crawling along them for a couple of days afterwards. The Peddlers Mall was closed for a day and a half. Sales sucked all freaking week long. Chiquito told me that the best thing to do was stay in, drink hot chocolate, eat popcorn and take naps, so I did. He was right.
Speaking of the booth, some of you all want new pics, but it's going to be a while. Things are a bit rough in all my spaces right now. December was an excellent month for me, but January sucked. My total sales were the lowest they've been in a long while. Bad weather was part of it, but the rest of it was mainly my fault. For some reason (winter blahs?), I just could not seem to pull it together, get the Christmas out, restock everything, and tidy it all up.
Usually, I leave the Christmas in through the first week in January, then spend the next week clearing it all out and redoing everything. Those first two weeks are usually a little slow anyway, and that gives me time to get the booth ready for the end of the month, when the early early birds have gotten their tax refunds.
I could not seem to get moving this year. Part of it was that I decided to leave some bits of Christmas scattered around my spaces. I marked everything that had been through more than two seasons down and shoved them on a couple of bottom shelves. It's out of the way. It fills shelves people don't access a lot, so the booth looks fuller. It also gives the adventurous folks (and holiday lovers) some bargains to hunt for,
I also left all my holiday glasses and dishes on another bottom shelf. I'm down to very few of them, and they've sold year round for me before. The books and music I worked into the book booth. None of that took very long. The hold up came when I decided that I should make a year round vintage Christmas section.
I had already pulled everything, and it was piled in carts. All I needed to do was clear a shelf for it and sort through it. That became the hold up. Three different attempts to designate an existing shelf totally failed. I ended up heading to Sorrow Mountain in hunt for a new shelf, rearranging things a bit, then making my vintage Christmas section. It took forever, as the snow happened in the middle of all this. The result was I had carts of stuff and empty boxes cluttering my booth and scaring off customers.
Sometimes, it's really obvious that I do not have a clue what I am doing.
Three days in, however, and February seems to be doing much better for me. I'm thinking that tax money is trickling in, finally. Thanks to taxes, February and March can be good months.
To switch to a better note, my scans are coming back clear! The treatments continue, of course, but the docs (and me) are really pleased with the results. I'm on the same drug that Jimmy Carter is getting, by the way. I've been referring to it as "the presidential treatment." I'll have what the President is having, please. I'll be due for another scan in a month or so.
It's a bit of a busy week here. I'm benignly neglecting the booth, because it's junk set out weekend in our neighborhood. The winter set out is always a little iffy, but the weather is supposed to be mild all week, so the pickings might be pretty good. I've got a bit of cabin fever, so I am raring to go hunting.
I've also got stuff that needs to go out to the curb. I have two bookshelves that are seriously falling apart and need to go. I have replacements on Sorrow Mountain, of course. I've been putting off dealing with these for a while, partly because I'm convinced that it's only the weight of the stuff on them that is holding them together and upright. Seriously, they're that far gone. I'm afraid it's going to be like playing Jenga on a large scale. One wrong move and I'm buried in books.
At least this time, if you don't hear from me for a while, you'll know what happened.
Let's close out with a backlog of fortune cookie wisdom.
I certainly try to do this one.
Well, thank you!
I was sure this meant I had the winning Power Ball ticket. Alas!
I got all excited at the last one from Po! I never got a fortune from a Teletubby before! Po! Po! Po! Then I realized that it was the Kung Fu Panda dude, which makes more sense from a fortune cookie perspective. Personally, I think what the world needs right now is Teletubby fortune cookies.
I guess now that everyone has forgotten about me, I should start blogging again. This is how you have a blog for over a decade, yet only have a little over 1500 posts. I told you: I'm not very good at this. Never have been. Probably never will be. But, still, I keep doing it. Most of the time.
You can kind of look at the index of my postings and see the gaps in my history. While I do think some of them were understandable, a lot of them were caused by my seeming inability to get back on the horse after getting away from it for a bit. Once I get out of the habit of doing something, it gets harder and harder for me to get back into it, even if it was something I really loved doing.
In the old days, it was usually just Roger who would check on me and urge me back into the fray. These days, there are several of you peering under rocks and wondering where I've gone. It's kind of a nice feeling to know that there are people who miss you, even if your primary contact with them is through a silly little blog.
Truth is, I was having a particularly bad couple of weeks and I just didn't want to set Debbie Downer and Bitchy Betty loose on the blog. I hate to whine here, even though I do it so freaking much. Compound that with the downside of having fantastic sales (which I just discovered): You have to work your space all the time to keep up. All. The. Time.
I ended up not having enough time to process everything else going on, and I didn't want the blog to suffer for it. I started a "Monday Rambles" post two weeks ago, but trashed it when I saw just how negative it was. I can write about the bad things, but I don't want to wallow in them. At least not here.
Everything is better now. At least a little. One of the situations I was dealing with is going to take a little more time to resolve, but it is manageable at this point.
The lowest point came when another vendor actually accused me of stealing from her. That was resolved pretty quickly, but I just wasn't in the mood that day to be called a thief over something I bought and paid for.
Health-wise, I seem to be doing okay. The steroid is messing with my blood sugar, which is not good. This resulted in a very bad conversation with a nurse at the cancer center who basically told me I was stubborn and uncooperative, but in nicer terms. She was acting like I was rejecting her advice over the situation, when she really wasn't giving any. I still have no clue what it was she thought I should be doing. I told her I was going to talk to my PCP about it and left. I was upset about the whole situation for days.
My own sales have kind of crapped out over the past couple of weeks. I've still had some really, really good days, just not one right after the other like I was having. I was having sales, but they were way lower than they'd been running and way below my daily goal. Thankfully, I was far enough ahead that I had a big cushion in my daily average, which softened the blow, but even that was starting to get worn down.
I was seriously worried that I might have some of my best days ever and still end up with the same old check at the end. This business drives me nuts sometimes. Needless to say, none of this really helped with my mood. I seem to be recovering, I think. It looks like, barring a string so low/no sales days that I'll come out well for the month and will even set a record. We'll see, I guess.
It's junk set out time in our neighborhood! The neighborhood next to ours had its set out last week, so I prowled it a little, but basically came up empty-handed. My own neck of the woods is full of early-birds and head-starters, so stuff showed up all week, even though you're not supposed to set anything out until Friday of your week.
I've gotten several great things all through the week, and I've never gotten more than two streets away. Today will be a big sweep, as I try to dodge the scrappers and other pickers. Competition is somewhat fierce this year. It's supposed to storm tomorrow and Wednesday, which will kill everything off. I'll have pics later this week, but here's a teaser.
Wow! What a week! Sometimes you just have to say it.
Before we get started, please wish blog friend Roger a speedy recovery from his surgery last week. Roger is my oldest blog pal, and one of the things I really want to do one day is meet him face to face. Get better soon, buddy.
I'm kind of trapped in the middle of the never-ending booth project from hell right now. I intended to spend two days working on it last week and be done. I ended up spending four--and still not finishing. Every so often, my spaces take on a mind of their own, and I have to muster all my forces of awesomeness and bring them to heel. We're in the middle of one such pitched battle right now. I spent the weekend learning new attack phrases and acquiring new battle points and powering up, so I don't think the rebellious booths will know what hit them.
BOOTH ARRANGE SPARKLE CLEAN UP!
I'll need everything I can muster, because I had the most awesome sales weekend ever. Saturday set a new record for me, much higher than I ever thought I would do on one day. Almost three hundred dollars!! I nearly passed out when I got the email. Before I would believe it at all, I re-added the total myself. I was sure it had to be a mistake or maybe the monthly total got printed in the wrong slot or something. I never have days like that!
The wildest thing? There's no furniture at all in that total. The most expensive individual item that sold was $12.99. I sold a ton of stuff. Happily, it all seems to be coming pretty evenly from all three of my areas, which is what I really like to see. It also seems to be coming from pretty evenly from various sections in those booths. As much as I like to see a god run on, say, comic books, evenly spread sales mean sustainability.
I hope you all don't think I'm bragging or anything. I'm just really excited and had to share. One weekend into the month, I have rent made. Seriously, this never happens to me. I have to keep reminding myself to stay cautiously optimistic and not get carried away. This is an unpredictable business. I could not sell another thing all week, which would completely deflate all the momentum from the weekend. I don't think it will happen, but I have to keep that thought in the back of my mind.
We had a cold rainy Saturday on Highway 60, but I still found some great stuff. The quantity was down., but the quality wasn't. I'm going to tease out the finds bit by bit this week, then finish it off at the end with a big flourish. I am very behind on sharing my finds here, so I'm designating this as "Eddie-torial Comments Fun Finds Catch Up Week." I'll share some recent finds and stories through out the week, with a little Highway 60 tease, then wrap it up with the rest of the 60 stuff. Deal?
I will say this, I went out with a small list of specific things to find:
Comics
Vintage wooden ironing board
Blow molds
Vintage Christmas
Any Christmas at all
Long sleeved shirts for me
Most of my long sleeved shirts are shot, so it's time to revive the wardrobe. Of course, I'm not going to go buy new! The shirts turned out to be the only thing on the list that I found. I am so low on Christmas, especially vintage stuff, that the fast on-rushing holiday season scares me. I've already put out a dab of stuff, which I plan to add to bit by bit until it's all out. I just hope that the "out" point doesn't come in the middle of October.
Here's a bit of what did come back with me.
I need more shelves and chairs like I need more holes in my head. But that shelf was so sturdy and cute that it had to come back with me. As it turns out, I sold a shelf last night, so this one will slide right in the empty space. I also could not resist the wrought iron lattice work back on that folding chair. (See next pic.) I had to ask my uncle what the thing with the handle was. The prices were definitely right. Everything in this pic cost less than ten bucks!
My uncle had a yard sale over the weekend, and I always buy his leftovers the Sunday after. The cute little plant stand on the end of the cart in this next pic was part of what I got from him.
I'm starting a silly little project for the month of October. It seems like every time I go out for a walk here recently I come home with some kind of find. Junk, it seems, is where you find it. I am challenging myself to find some free, sellable junk every day in October.
The rules are simple:
1. I have to look for something every day that I leave the house.
2. Legitimate finds only! No stealing out of someone's front yard or porch.
3. Stuff in the house also counts, as long as it wasn't something originally purchased to be resold.
I am hoping that last rule will encourage me to keep up with the downsizing that I've been doing.
Calvin and Hobbes were right, you know.
My life motto
I'll do a wrap up post with a list of finds at the end of the month.
I finally hit and then passed my monthly sales goal for the booth. In fact, even if I don't sell anything else this month, I'll now have set a sales record for this store. If I keep selling at the rate I have been (and who can predict such things), I'll have my second or third best month overall anywhere.
Suddenly, a wave of entrepreneurial energy has flooded over me!
Look out wanna-be presidential candidates!
The Donald is over!
It is now the era of The Edward!
Fun fact: The Edward has better (and more natural hair) than the Donald, even if he does still need a damn haircut.
Don't worry. I am not going to start referring to myself in the third person all of the time now. Just some of the time. When I'm feeling cocky flushed with victory.
Strong sales this time of year are not unusual. Fall is a good time for the vendor malls around here. What's weird is that this sales-run is entirely smalls driven. I've sold two pieces of furniture this month. Two. I've only sold a couple of larger-priced items besides that. Everything else has been small stuff that's ten bucks or less, with much of that being in the one-three buck range.
My biggest sellers have been Halloween and comic books. I'm going to have to reshuffle the Halloween again to try and fill in some major holes. I think I'm going to sneak the fall stuff in amongst the Halloween to see if some of it might sell by mistake.
I'm down to my last batch of already priced comics. I priced up everything I got last weekend, but I'm going to have to do some bagging and pricing this week. I'll also need to haul in a box of books.
Once I get the restocking done, I need to spend some time working on the Endcap Booth. It's become a little more disorganized than I like, so I'm going to try creating some sections and "zones." I'm also going to move pull all the furniture out and put it in new spots to try and jump start those sales.
In other good news, my scan was good. Really good, in fact. The docs are happy. I'm happy. Things are definitely moving in the right direction. The treatment will be continuing for some time now, but it's doing what it's supposed to be doing.
The whole visit went really smoothly last week, except that the lab got backed up, which delayed my treatment for a little while. I was out about 30 minutes later than normal, so it wasn't too bad. The Bingo volunteers were there this time. I didn't play, because I was really engrossed in my puzzle book, but there was a woman in my section who was intense about it. Made me realize that Bingo Halls are not places I want to be hanging out. People get cut-throat over their Bingo. Even though I didn't play, they let me pick a prize out of the prize basket at the end.
Still waiting for the arts and crafts lady with the macaroni art.
Celebratory Good News Mexican Food Lunch!
This weekend is the big Highway 60 sale, and I am psyched to go! We'll only go about an hour or two down the road, then turn around and come back. That's usually enough for a full van load. I'd love to make a killer vintage Christmas score. My Christmas stash feels so light this year that it worries me.
It's just going to be a short trip, but it's going to be fun and different and I think I would like that right about now.
