Retro Y'all!

What is your quest?

Post title from the ever classic Monty Python and the Holy Grail:



A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the Saturday where I kept showing up at sales and finding these awesome vintage items at near giveaway prices that had already been scooped up.  As I was leaving one house, I thought to myself:  "I'm glad I'm not out here looking for vintage items only.  I'd be a wreck after seeing all that."

That got me to thinking about my quest.  What is the driving force that puts me out there every Saturday and as many other days as possible.  Do I have a Holy Grail?  When I walk up to a table and scan my eye over the goodies thereon, what do I want to see leaping out at me?

The short answer is pretty obvious:  Anything that I think I can sell or that I think I might want at a good price.  But that's awfully generic and boring, isn't it?  It's also wonderfully wide open and leaves me so much room in which to roam.  I've gotten several comments lately about the wide selection of items I seem to pick up.  Let's break that short answer down a little more.  Have a glimpse into what's in my head as I go out on the hunt.

I think I have an advantage by selling in a flea market style mall.  I'm not bound to any rules or perceptions of what is or is not "vintage" or an "antique."  If I want to buy and sell that Teletubby, then I can buy and sell that Teletubby.  I also do not have to worry about fighting the myriad of ever-changing eBay rules and regs.   I don't feel bound by what my smart phone might say about what an item is bringing right now in online auctions.  It's incredibly freeing and allows me to take chances and be creative.

Not that there is anything wrong with any of those other venues or styles of doing things,  There's more than one way to be a re-seller.  You have to find what works for you and do it consistently.  I use those tools.  I look things up.  But I also already have a strong innate sense of what is right for me to sell, what my customer base likes, and what my venues will support.  You can't find that in an app.

I'm also a seller, not a maker or re-maker or fixer upper or doer.  I have no, I repeat no discernible talent for that  kind of thing and no patience to try and learn one. I admire those who do, especially the ones with the vision that takes them beyond what they see in front of them and leads them to make it into something classy and timeless, not trendy.  The ones who know when to stop embellishing at just the right moment.  The ones who are quirky and have a sense of humor about what they're creating.  I cannot do this, and it's really better if I don't even try.  I consider myself a sourcer of raw materials for these people.  I have no doubt that there are things that have come out of my booth that are now vastly different from the way they were when they were bought.  I'm happy to have given someone something to work with.

Besides, I battle my own overwhelming sense of procrastination and disorganization every day just to get things priced and placed in a timely fashion.  Like within a week of purchase.  And I still have a store room full of stuff and a mound I call "Mount Backlog" at home.  I shudder to think what it would be like if I were saving things to refinish and repaint and repair.  I think I'd be single for sure!

Somewhere along the path, this turned into a two-parter.  I'm going to cut my general thoughts off here and come back later with something slightly more specific (or at least slightly less general).  If the pics in this post look familiar, it's because they come from previous posts of my hauls.

Anatomy of A Mazda Fill

So you start with a relatively empty van, add a couple of tubs with some paper for the smalls, and take off on your adventure.  Then you buy some things.  At first you just kind of toss them in the back.

Eventually, you reach the point where a rearrange becomes necessary.   We were lucky to be stopped in an empty church parking lot, so we could pull everything out and redo it.

While we were working, a woman stopped and said:  "Think of it like a big puzzle."  Um, thanks, strange woman I have never seen before.

Then you make your last few purchases and top off the lot.

Tah dah!  One full Mazda!

Monday Tuesday Rambles

I'm back!

Please accept my apologies for the lack of content for the last couple of weeks.  Honestly, I just did not have it in me to blog (or do much of anything) for that time.  Losing Kosh triggered the worst depressive episode I've had for quite some time.  I'm coming out of it, slowly, but for a while it just seemed like a heavy weight of sadness had taken everything over for me.

Thanks so much to all of you for the sweet notes about Kosh.  I still owe some of you personal thank you's, which I will be getting to in the next day or so.  I appreciate your concern and sympathies so much.

Due to my funk, I almost skipped out on doing the Highway 60 yard sale on Saturday, but I'm glad I didn't.  It was windy and cold, but I think it did me a lot of good to be out and about.  The sale started in Meade County (near where my dad used to live) and proceeded west through Breckinridge County (near where my mother used to live), so it was kind of like a homecoming of sorts.

Typical roadside view in Meade County. 

 We had planned to make it to Owensboro and then camp on Saturday, but we cut the trip short just shy of Hardinsburg.  The van was full and it would have taken a major repacking effort to make more room for anything else.  We had gotten a later than planned start, because we had both slept through the alarm.  Plus, Meade County had been rich with large group sales and flea markets and treasures.  I was very happy with the load.  It's not about the number of sales you hit.  It's about the treasures you find there.

At the time we turned back, we realized that we still had enough time to stash everything in storage at the Peddlers Mall and get home to Chiquito and our own bed.  And that's what we did.

Here's a little preview of the haul:

The leaf on this desk folds down and collapses the desk to the size of a file cabinet!

Those are the pieces that went to the new Peddlers Mall yesterday.  Here is what I took to the other store:

I love me some school desks!

Shelf and wood podium

That shelf is kind of cool.  There's a note on top that it was made for a social studies project, which I am guessing was something about colonial or pioneer living.  The boards all have these adorable, primitive dovetail notches, and the whole thing is held together with wood pegs instead of nails.  I can totally see someone getting this and staining or painting it up nice and purty.  It needs a little gluing around the pegs, but it's pretty sturdy.

I still need to get pics of the smalls, which were pretty awesome this time around.  I had several good scores.

Booth sales have really bottomed out lately.  I ended September well at my original Peddlers.  Not as high as previous months, but still four digits in the gross.  That construction mess is sure hurting though.  I only did about a third of my normal take during the indoor sale.  We are still waiting on the signage to appear.

At the other space, I did okay for a first month, but not near what I was expecting.  I'm struggling to get off the ground there, and it is fueling my fears that I'm only capable of selling in one location. (Which also really added to my latest depressive bout.) They've offered me a double booth starting in November, and I'm going to take it.  At least I'll have all my stuff together in one spot.

The weekend was really pretty good at both locations, however.  It looks like furniture is starting to move again, which is nice.  I've picked up several pieces cheap from vendors who were moving out, so I have a pretty good inventory of big items right now and I would like to move them on!

The home front is kind of odd right now.  Everyone feels Kosh's absence.  I'm still seeing him out of the corner of my eye.  We're keeping an eye on Chiquito, but in some ways it looks like he's not figured out that he's the only cat now.  For the first couple of days, he kept waiting for Kosh to eat when I put the food down.  He very definitely feels the pressure of being home alone all day.  He's become really super clingy when we get home.  I'm giving him all the extra loving I can to help him through.

Retro Y'all!

Retro Y'all--Saturday Morning Edition!

Kosh is gone.

Some posts are very hard to write.  This is going to be one of those.  We had to put Kosh to sleep yesterday.  My dear, sweet old man is gone. And my heart is broken.  I miss him so, so much.  He was 12 years old, which is old for a cat, but I had been hoping for a few more years with my buddy cat.

We got Kosh when he was a baby.  Keith found him while he was working,  abandoned and alone in an empty apartment.  Later that day, Keith showed up at my office with a cardboard cat carrier and this little head popped out when he opened it.  It was love at first sight.

Keith swears he was trying to find another home for the boy, and was just stopping by to say hello.  I know the truth.  He knew I would be unable to resist this little fellow. He was right.

We named him "Kosh" after one of the aliens in Babylon 5.  I was holding him in my lap, and one of the phrases from the show popped into my head:  "We are all Kosh."  So, Kosh he was.  For the longest time, though, we called him "Boy" since he was our only boy kitty at the time.

He had some of the most interesting habits as a baby.  He was all black, except for two white spots on his chest and belly and one little chocolate brown spot that was kind of on his belly and side.  He used to nurse himself on that spot before he went to sleep.  When he got older that place went away, so we always said that he licked the brown right off.

He used to like to crawl up on Keith's chest and take these long kneading walks, with this intent stare.  When he was done with that, he would stop and literally just plop over, trusting that Keith would catch him.  He'd fall asleep like that, and Keith would hold him while he napped.

His appearance did cause some chaos in our social order.  At the time we had two older females, Bennie and Basil.  We had lost sweet, fluffy Brianna several months earlier.  It took some time for the girls to get adjusted to this interloper, but eventually we all gelled into a family unit.

Basil on my lap, baby Kosh beside me and Bennie on a blanket

He was only about four when Basil passed.  She had been the head cat, which was a job that he wanted.  He still had a lot of kitten in him at that point, climbing all over things, getting into stuff, tormenting Bennie from time to time.  About a year later, Chiquito came along and Kosh matured over night.  Having a new kitten in the house really pushed him to grow up.

The night that Basil was put down, he crawled up into bed beside me, just like she used to do.  He pretty much stayed there the rest of his life.  When I was sick last year, he was always right by my side.  We called him my "Doctor Kosh."  He would walk me to the bathroom and lay as close to me as possible and purr to comfort me.

After I came home from surgery

He loved that Sailor Moon blanket

He started acting sluggish over the weekend and stopped eating at all Monday night.  We took him to the vet yesterday and the diagnosis was advanced kidney disease.  Ironically, I was supposed to call this week for an appointment for him to have a six month follow up check up.  The vet said that his levels were so off that there really wasn't any option for treatment.  Even sweet little buddy cats can't get a kidney transplant.  The misery he was already feeling was only going to get worse as the toxins continued to take over his little body.

We held him and loved on him and kissed him and cried over him and made the call that no one wants to make.  I was holding him in my arms as he slipped away.  Now, he's somewhere playing with Basil and Bennie again.

While we're stuck here wondering what to do.

Sweet, sweet Buddy Kosh (2002-2014)

Monday Rambles

First off, lookie here what I done gone and did:

That's my surgical scar in all its glory.

Apparently, the back of my head is a tad misshapen.  Also, misshapen has two "S's" in it.  Who knew?  I also do not know how to do that "S" thing right when there are more than one of them.

Call it a stress reaction or a mid-life crisis or a lark whatever you want, but I got the urge to shave my head last week.  I thought about it for a couple of days, then talked Keith into doing it over the weekend.  It came out better than expected!  I love it!  (We won't talk about how I screwed his up.  At least hair will grow back.)

My hair grows pretty fast, so this won't be too extreme too long.  I do apologize for the semi-nudity.  (Shirltess fat guy alert!)  I trimmed the pic so it wouldn't be too hideous.  I wanted a pic right away when it was done and didn't take the time to find a shirt. 

It is a very interesting sensation when the top of your head feels like sandpaper.  I wanted to go all the way to bare skin, but I don't have the patience to finish this off myself or sit still while someone else does it.  I'm going to add that to the bucket list.

Next time, I'm going to do a school bus yellow mohawk.

With that out of the way, how was the week that just was?

Pretty typical.  Lots of work.  Lots of booth work.  I bought a shark.  Did a little thrifting.  Hit some yard sales.  The usual.  Oh, and I worked.

I spent Friday working at the new booths.  I finally have nearly enough stuff in them that they are looking right.  One more big load there would not hurt.  There are two thrifts near the mall, so I'm going to hit them this weekend and see what I can find.

I'm having a problem finding a sense of balance where the new spaces are concerned.  I'm selling stuff now, but I'm not being very patient.  Now that I have seen what I can get out of a space, I'm kind of wanting/expecting the new spaces to do that too.  Right now.  Two new spaces just can't do what all my long-established spots at the other mall can, no matter how much I want them to.  When I was just starting out with one small booth, I was excited to get the sales I'm having now at the new space.  I need to remember that and stop putting the cart before the horse.

And figure out what my regular work day is going to be over there.  It can't be Friday all the time.  I really need that whole day to tend to the big spaces.  Speaking of the big spaces, it was an interesting sales week over there.  Really big days on Monday (!)  and yesterday.  Good, okay, and so-so days in between.  We're continuing to fight the construction-created appearance that we're closed.  There is supposed to be some signage in the works that will help.  I hope.  I'm moving some furniture again, which is boosting my sales.  It had fallen off a little during the beginning of the month.  I remain optimistic for fall.

Saturday was one of the most flat-out interesting yard sale days I have ever had.  Not just for the finds, mind you.  (Although they were fun.)  Sometimes, you meet the most fascinating people--both good and bad.  It was one of those days, for sure.  I need to finish taking pics of the finds, so you'll get the whole scoop either tomorrow or Wednesday.

In the meantime, here are some previews.  I forgot to get a full Mazda shot again, so this comes after a large item had been removed.

I also bought a small load of yard sale leftovers from my uncle on Friday.  It was the tail end of the stuff from his junking days, so there was some fun stuff there.  That's always good.

This coming Saturday is indoor sale day at the Peddlers Mall where I have the big booths.  Should be a good time and lots of sales.  I'll be doing 20% off.  It's also sidewalk sale day at the comic shop, so I'll be joining the nerd herd one more time.

Good times all around, huh?

Coming Together!

I am finally starting to get my new booths into something resembling normalcy.  They're finally starting to look like "Eddie Booths."  I still have some more stocking to do and a little more general work before I can give an in depth tour, but I can give you all some previews:

Booth #1

Booth #2

I need more/better shelving for both spaces, to define them better.  I bought a van load from my uncle on Friday night that I am in the process of pricing up so I can get the over there.  Bringing up a foundling booth while not neglecting a thriving one is tricky business!

Look for more to come!

Retro Y'all--Saturday Morning Edition!

Sometimes....

....You just gotta buy a shark!

Theme Music!

It's made of fiberglass and is pretty hefty.  It was also a helluva deal.  I'm gonna walk away from that?  Not this oddball junker-boy!

No need to worry, however.  I have no intentions of jumping it.

How I'm feeling right now.

This is my new theme song.

That is all.

PS Old 97's are totally kick-ass.

PS II  Don't worry.  This is just a mood that will pass in a decade or two,

PS III Send brownies.

From now on....

...This is how I would like to be addressed.

Fun find from Saturday!

Don't forget, pardners!

Now, if you will excuse me, I have to go find a cowboy hat.  And a horse.

Weekend Finds

Welcome back to the internet's worst junk blogging finds rundown.  You know the drill:  pics on the fly, no staging, crappy lighting, etc.  I forgot to get pics of the stuff I left across the river on Saturday, so many of the interesting things from the Mazda shot are not even here.  Sorry about that.  I had a lot of smalls, so I only included the ones that I thought were interesting or blog-worthy.  A couple of things I saved for future posts, because some things just deserve it.  A good day junking should keep on giving, as far as the blog posts go!

Small brown tables with retro desk lamps

Saturday was one of those odd days where the peak came at the very first sales and then everything else was downhill from there.  Whenever that happens, there's a weird vibe that results.  I almost lose the thrill of the hunt as soon as we finish that first sale.  It becomes a struggle to keep going.  Add into this my stress over booth sales and situations, and I was having a really hard time keeping the momentum up.  Nevertheless, I persevered!  Shop on, I say!

So what was that first sale that was so very freaking awesome?  Why, the one put on by my very own neighborhood association!  They rent out spaces in a vacant lot not too far from the house and wonderment ensues!  It's always a good sale and there are bargains galore!  I made three trips back to the car before I finished the first row of booths.  I look forward to this one every year.  It's the sale that sets off the home stretch of fall sales for the year.  There are one or two other awesome mega sales coming and then the season will be over.  Sigh!

Painted shadow box

I had intended to set up at this sale this year, but starting the new booth kind of torpedoed those plans.  I'm starting to realize that I might not get another personal yard sale in this fall either.  Well, there's always next year, I guess!

Many of the large things in the Mazda shot came from this sale, including the orange top tables and the blue wicker bar stool.  They're all set up at the new booth.

Back to the yard sales.  After making like a jillion trips through the neighborhood lot sale, we set off to tackle my list.  Next stop was one that included this tantalizing phrase in their ad:  "vintage(?) comic books."  You know I was there!  I walked off with the whole lot after this little dialogue:

SCORE!  Good stuff in here and I got to take the tub too!

Seller:  Comics are a dollar each or three for two dollars.
Me:  How much for the lot?
Seller:  Count them up.
Me:  There's about 16 dollars worth in this stack.  (I counted by threes.)  The other stack is about the same size.  Could I get them both for $20?
Seller:  Can't do that.  I'd do $25.
Me:  SOLD!

That is how negotiations should work, my friends.  Bulk Buy Offer. Counter-Offer.  Boom!

Tin picnic basket.  Repro?

After that, it was hit or miss.  The next few sales yielded little to nothing.  The peak had been reached.  It was 9:30, and we were heading downhill quickly.  And there were too many choices and uncertainties.  Do I go with neighborhood sales that might waste time?  Or drive way out of my usual way for sales that might or might not be good?  I had a real battle with indecision going on.

In the end, I targeted a large adoption fundraiser sale and a small street sale as definite stops.  The adoption sale yielded a cheap Ikea end table and some smalls.  You can see the Ikea table in the Mazda shot post.  It stayed at the new booth, too.  Leaving it we saw a sign for a sale that I had considered going to, but thought it was too far away.  We followed the signs and found two sales.  I piled up so many cool things at one of the sales that the seller stopped totaling me up at 20 bucks and just threw the last four of five things in.  Love it when that happens!

Hulk like Elmo!

One of the things I got there was a very large stuffed Hulk figure.  A woman asked me what I was going to do with it.  Her daughter looked at her and said:  "I would throw it at people on Halloween."  Seems like a good idea to me.  Watch out on October 31!

Across the street, I bought a really odd (for me) item--a weight bench.  It's just one of those plain ones that you lay on and hope you don't end up dropping something very heavy on your throat.  It's totally not me, but it is something I can place other things on it for a display.  It also has no moving parts, so customers won't be tempted to do stupid things in public on it.  And it was only a dollar.  Okay, so that last bit may have influenced me more than a little bit.

On way out of this neighborhood, we stumbled across a fundraiser sale for a Doberman rescue group.  I got a huge pile of enamelware dishes there (most with lids).  Happy dance!  The last sale was a vintage junkie kicking the habit.  I got some nice things there, but there were a couple more things I wanted (chalkware Madonnas!) and she wasn't budging on the prices.

Love the red one! All have lids, except the top one.

We rounded out the day trying to pick up a free sofa from a work friend, only to find out that our wondrous Mazda does indeed have a limit.  Just wasn't going to work.  I ended up putting it on Craigslist for her and hauling it to the end of her driveway.  It's gone now!

Oops!  I am out of things to say.  Photo parade from here on out!

Betty Boop Witch

Love the old hymnals!

Palm Tree Candle Holders

Crafty filled light bulbs

Awesome Oreo tin

Sweet vintage Madonna

Bar stools are quick sellers for me.

Hand-painted wooden elephant/pull toy

Finding Peanuts collectibles is always a plus!

More Peanuts stuff and a Fisher-Price repro

Linking up with:  Thriftasaurus!

Monday Rambles

Let's do this!

Last week was a bit much here, but I think this ones going to calm down a little bit.  I am still struggling to fit the newest booth into my routine.  I have no clue what my regular work day is going to be, but I desperately need to establish one.  Two training days last week knocked out any hope of having a work day.  I don't have that challenge this week, so at least I'll have a work day.  I'm just not certain that it will become my regular day or not.

My sales suffered a lot last week.  I've got the rent made at both spots, but I'm not having the high sales days and rapid growth I've become used to over the summer.  I know that until I get a regular day to stock and prep at both sites, that growth is not likely to come easily.

Seems pretty cut and dry, right?  Get to work and everything is going to be okay, dummy!  If only life were that simple--or at least if only my life were that simple.  Alas!  There are complicating factors.

To wit:

COMPLICATING FACTOR NUMBER ONE:  I'm having a hard time trying to find a balance between the two stores.  I have enough space in my original store that I cannot neglect it when it comes to stocking or working it.  If I weren't so worried about that store lagging, I would have just hauled my van load from Saturday over to the new store, priced it, put it out and been fully stocked and done with it.  Under other circumstances, that's the approach I'd take.  However, there's more to this story, which brings us to:

COMPLICATING FACTOR NUMBER TWO:  Sales are falling off at my original store, by as much as two-thirds on some days.  Last week wasn't pretty.  The owners of the building where my mall is have started doing construction in front of the building.  The parking lot is torn up.  The front of the building beside our area has been completely gutted.  There's a fence up that stops just short of our front door.  Worse, our huge front window has been completely boarded up!  From the road, it looks like we've closed up shop.  We can make all the announcements we want in any forum we want, but the perception created by the front of the building is having an impact.  Add to that the rumors that several competitors are taking delight in spreading and I am really nervous about taking attention away from there right now.  I made rent fairly quickly this month, but at the rate things have slowed down right now, I don't have much hope for a strong month.  Fall is supposed to be a busy time for us!

COMPLICATING FACTOR NUMBER THREE:  I could probably weather both of those storms, if it weren't for this last one.  Eventually, I would bite the bullet and do what I had to do for store number two.  Maybe, I'd even overstock it a tad, so I could then focus on the first store with some extra energy.  Thing is, my track record is not so good when it comes to second stores.  I've simply never done well anywhere outside of my original store.  My first two forays into other venues turned into disasters, for various reasons.  I thought that since I was moving into another Peddlers Mall, I would not have that same issue.  Instead, I am having to deal with the voice of history and it's whispering some not very flattering things to me right now.

I know I have a tendency to be a Gloomy Gus.  I'm probably over-reacting somewhat.  I know that things ebb and flow and come and go in this business.  I'm being a tad knee-jerky in my reaction right now, but I cannot help feeling more than a little discouraged.  There's a part of me that wants to say that I've had too good of a summer for this to be my fall.  That would also be my overly dramatic whiny voice.  I know that reactionary side of my psyche has been provoked, so I'm trying to quiet that down.  At the same time, the amount of work one puts into this business kind of makes one prone to these kind of reactions.

Of course, I'm also doing stupid things that aren't helping the situation.  I had pulled a tub of stuff to take to the new booth on Saturday.  I left in my storage at the first store, intending to get it when I dropped off the day's haul.  When I got there, I started talking to some other vendors and guess what I forgot to get?  Goofy Eddie, that's me.  On the other hand, I got some new and rocking furniture from Saturday over there. I also put most of the smalls from last Sunday over there as well.  It is filling up nicely over there, I just don't have enough stuff yet.  It's hard to figure out what "enough" is when you're making up a load to take.  I guess I'll get there.

I guess I should apologize for not putting a "Whiny Eddie Warning" at the front of this post.  Sorry about that.

Let's talk about happier things.

The weather has turned deliciously cool and I am digging it with a spoon!  We are nigh upon my favorite time of the year!  Halloween is coming!  So is my birthday!  (Hint! Hint!)  Leaves will be turning!  Thanksgiving is also on the way.  I have always loved, loved, loved autumn.  This time of the year makes me happy.  There are still a couple of awesome annual yard sales yet to come as well.  I think one of them is this coming Saturday.

I'm writing this on Sunday evening, while Keith is outside doing the yardwork.  He just walked in with a curb find for me!  Yay!  It's be junk set out time again in about a month.

Damn cluttered junk room!

 We did have a good day of hunting yesterday.  I'll have more to say about that tomorrow or Wednesday.  I need to get some pics first.

We got a call from the vet the other day.  It's tine for Old Man Kosh to have a check up.  He's thrilled about that.  (Not really.)  I have my own annual check up on Friday.  My doctor's office happens to be just down the street from my favorite thrift and just a hop, skip and jump across the river from the new store, so I guess my agenda for that day is set.

Thanks for indulging me this time around.  I promise much cheerier content to come.  I'm planning on spending my booth work time this week making a super-load for the new store, while still putting plenty of love on the original booth.  It's time to multitask!

In closing, here's an artsy [ic of me pretending that I'm a Cyclops!

What's....um....around Mazda?

Good day yesterday for sure.  It peaked early at a sale in our own neighborhood and went downhill from there, but there were plenty of finds.

Two stores means I have to go back to thinking about what needs to go where.  Since I did not have a chance to get to the second store this week due to the two days of training I had to do, I ended up pulling everything out of the van in the Peddlers Mall parking lot to sort what went where.

Then I realized:  "Doh!  Mazda shot!"  Sorry about that.  Here's the big stuff sitting around Mazda in the parking lot.  The smalls are boxed up at this point.  I'll have them out later in the week, so pics then with the stories.

It's been a rough week.  Sales have been slow, especially at the new spot.  I am getting discouraged.  More later.