Secondhand Nation

Secondhand Nation's 3 Clam Challenge: Day Three

DAY THREE

I notice several signs for garage sales near my house and my husband is a rare mood for resale, so he accompanies me. 

Our first stop is a moving sale.  Immediately, I sense trouble.  The garage the sale is in is markedly bigger than the house that was just sold.  This is because the family has a bunch of flashy cars, if you think a lipstick-red Dodge Viper counts as flashy. 

(Brief Rambling Aside:  The Viper's license plates were personalized:  VICIOUS.  Ewwww.)

The rest of the sale stank, too.  Mary Kay products.  Beanie Babies.  Porcelain dolphins mounted on rainbow glass.  Real klassy stuff. 

The next sale was held at a house where a couple live who the neighborhood kids have taken to calling "Dick and Bitch."  They are the Childless Assholes who collect over-kicked soccer balls and yell at kids every second they can - every neighborhood has one or two these fun duos.  My husband and I got all excited that Dick and Bitch might be moving, so we went over there thinking that their Reign of Terror might be over.

"Oh, no," said Dick, when asked if he was cleaning out for a move.  He exhaled a big raft of cigarette smoke on us and lounged back in his crappy webbed lawn chair.  "The wife and I do this to clean out, you know, every five years or so." 

Mmm.  How very practical and fascist of you, Dick.  We declined to buy his overpriced pasta machine and windchimes shaped like dolphins (what IS it with dolphins?) and headed to the next sale.

Which was even worse, if this is possible.  It was a gaggle of junky bikes and a one-car garage filled with old winter clothes.  On a 95 degree day, this was unbearable.  The woman was elderly and she had what seemed to be her grand-daughters setting up with her.  After a bit of smalltalk, we graciously beat it.  I don't understand people who bother with garage sales when all they have is clothing.  It's really never worth the effort of a garage sale.   Nobody wants to buy your wool blazer in July.  Either consign it at Turn Style or donate it!    

We walk away, muttering and annoyed, my same 3 wrinkly bucks trying in vain to burn a hole in my sweat-dampened pocket.

To be continued...

Secondhand Nation's 3 Clam Challenge: Day Two

DAY TWO

The next day was Tuesday, which is Customer Appreciation Day at Unique Thrift Store, which means 25% off all purchases. So, same wrinkly 3 bucks in my purse, I went over to see if anything appealed.

Wow, Unique is packed on Tuesdays! The nearest parking spaces were in Outer Guam and once inside, everyone was butts-to-nuts. But I didn't have a kid or cart, so I could weave in between all the gawking hard-core fly catchers blocking all the aisles.

My first mission was to check out furniture. I did see some nice pieces, but nothing I needed. Then I checked out the curtains, because hot weather + naked windows = sweaty house conditions. I came upon some home-made-from-70's-era-sheets curtains that would have fit my sitting room quite nicely: blue and green stripes, three panels, okay condition, cotton. I decided to think about them while I checked out housewares.

But housewares was full of Christian Rock CD's and grody candle holders and twisting between the mouth-breathers was a pain, so I went back to the curtains to give them one last look. They were $3.45, which meant that I'd slide under my 3 Buck Rule quite nicely.

But then A Gross Thing Happened.

While I was looking at the curtains, a trio of three females came by, a mom and her two daughters.  The one daughter was protesting "It wasn't me!  I didn't do it!" and the other daughter was covering her nose.  The mom was saying, "Jeezus, what have you been eating?" and "That's bad enough to gag a maggot."

Clearly the protestor was lying, as her approach wafted a huge cloud of stanky-ass fart.  Combined with my humble mission AND a complete stranger's fart cloud, I got the hell out, buying nothing.  I realize none of this is Unique's fault.  But occasionally thrift shopping's lack of ambiance gets to me.

To be continued...

Secondhand Nation's 3 Clam Challenge

What can you buy for 3 dollars? 

A fancy coffee drink?  Almost a gallon of gas?  A couple of shit-bomb burritos at Taco Bell? 

Considering the fact that minimum wage continues to be 4 and a quarter, and that theoretically, the guv'mint expects us to spend three and take the bus home on a buck twenty-five, what can you buy with 3 dollars here in the U.S., the richest nation on the planet?

(Also interesting is the recent experiment by Senator Barbara Lee who embarked on the Food Stamp Diet to see if she could survive on just 3 smackers a day.  The comparisons are dizzying and I feel a Long Rambling Aside coming on, but this entry is going to be long enough.)

So this week I went out to see what 3 bucks could do for my household in the secondary economy.

DAY ONE

I started the week at Savers, as Monday is their 99 cent day for certain color-tagged merchandise. On this particular day, the blue tags were 99 cents. I didn't find much. For a while, I waltzed around with this milk glass hurricane lamp in my cart (originally marked at $14.99! ha!) but then I realized I'd have to scrape off the crappy painted flowers on it and the metal work was GOLD and I hate gold.

So I put it back. And walked out. Nothing at Savers, 99 cents or otherwise, that my family needed, for less than 3 bucks or otherwise. A huge bummer. Usually Savers has lots of good stuff.  Except, sometimes I wonder if the donation intake people are blind when it comes to furniture.  I don't think actual cats would want some of the scratched-up, hacked-to-hell junk that the staff seems to think is saleable. 

To Be Continued...