Having Fun Finding

There used to be a restaurant in town that was known as much for its kitschy decor as the food.  It closed not too long ago in the midst of a labor dispute.  I had mixed feelings about the place.  The decor was fun.  Some of the food was pretty good, if a little pricey.  It wasn't one of my regular haunts, but I did go there from time to time.

One of the things the place was known for was having toys and doo dads on the tables to amuse customers while they waited for their food.  Usually, it was small plastic animals, toy cars, crayons and the like.  Whenever I ate there, a few of them somehow made their way into my backpack.  Never quite sure how that happened, but it did.

The last couple of years the place was open, they added on a gift shop.  One of the items they sold was an hourglass kind of thing filled with plastic bits.  Hidden in the bits were all kinds of little toys and items.  The object was to shake the hourglass and make the different objects surface.  You were supposed to find as many of them as possible.  This became a pretty popular table toy.  If someone really got into it, they could buy one on the way out in the gift shop.  Pretty clever.

Anyway, I was in Goodwill the other day and I found two of them for sale!  They went home with me, of course.

Okay, so they're more like cylinders than hourglasses.

Let's see what we can find!

Here's a star!

A lot of the hidden objects were these little cubes with letters, etc. on them.

Forgot to do the crappy cell phone pic alert, didn't I?

There's a list on one end, so you can keep track of your finds.

Scotty dogs are turning up in several of my posts these days.

  Okay, maybe only two of my posts.  but that's enough to declare a trend, isn't it?

One of the things I like about junking is discovering bits and pieces from local places that are no longer there.  For some of these places, these bits and pieces are the only record they ever existed.  It's cool to preserve long-ago memories.  I'd never thought about this from the perspective of places that have more recently passed from the scene.  Isn't life interesting like that?

Monday Rambles

The going was a lot slower last week.   I was way more tired all week than I had been the week prior.  Not only that, the bricks were back with a vengeance.  I actually had to take a nap at work a couple of times!  I started coming out of it a little towards the end of the week.  On Friday, I stayed home and rested.  Over the weekend, I could feel things perking up a little bit.  Last week was the "bad" week in the cycle.  This one is supposed to be the "good" one.  We'll see.  I do have a lot to do, as I get fill up #4 a week from tomorrow.

I did learn some things last week, too.  I apparently have large lungs.  That's what the X-Ray Tech said when she had to re-position one of her plates and re-take the X-Ray because they didn't all fit in one shot.  I'm not sure if this is a normal human condition, but I'm calling myself "Large-Lunged Ed" from now on.  Maybe that is my heretofore undiscovered mutant power?  I've always known I have one.

Speaking of mutant powers, from time to time we'll walk into the kitchen and find Kosh sitting on his favorite kitchen chair.  Then, we'll notice that the door to the upper cabinet where we keep the cat treats is open.  I think someone else is hiding his super-powers.

Lots of good sale action going on over the weekend, but we only got to about half of it.  The power steering on the car started acting up after one stop, so I started dropping sales off the list where parallel parking was going to be required.  I left the big church sales on the list, so I did still get some stuff.  Of course, while we were driving to the last one, all of a sudden, the problem cleared up.

I did get a 1921 copy of Science and Health Through the Scriptures.

And a pair of giant plush Dr Pepper cans.

All together now!

 And Hulk Hogan.

Who would win in a fight between HH and Ben Grimm?

So it wasn't a total loss.

I also saw this when we were out.  See what's written below the tail light?  We are everywhere!

I did kind of scare the driver when I shouted "Fuck cancer!" at them when we passed them.

 

Junk set out week was pretty much a loss, though.  Threatened storms held off for most of the weekend, but the stuff just wasn't there.  Lots of real junk in junk set out this time.  Who would have thought?  I did find an awesome primitive cabinet, but that was about it.  Sorry that there's not a pic.  It's on the back porch, and I'm too lazy/tired to go out right new and snap one.  I still need to clean it up and get it to the Rough Room.

While cleaning out the shed to get some of our stuff to set out, I went through another box of Mom's stuff, which only leaves about 8 more to go.  I also found a tub of religious articles that I've been looking for to restock my religion wall.  Combined with the junk I threw out of there, I'm starting to get enough room in the shed to put a couple of pieces of furniture as a reserve.  I think I might make the shed my Memorial Day weekend project and get that finished.  There is a lot of stuff in there I would like to take to the YesterNook Outdoor Sale in a couple of weeks.  All I have to do is resist the siren call of the big flea market and half-price day at a large thrift.  The choices we have to make....

Sales were pretty good last week.  The Little Tikes stuff, the art table, the red chair, and one of the lamps have already sold, putting me in the black for last week's yard saling, before I even get to the small stuff.  That was nice.  I'm pretty much selling out the bulk of what I bring in for every restock at the Peddlers Mall, plus a nice chunk of already existing stock throughout the week.  I'm moving enough larger items to keep the daily take almost at what I would like for it to be, but I still have a few lag days that affect the overall monthly take.  Consistency, it seems, will forever be something I work towards.

It's gonna be a light week at work, which is good, since I do have other stuff to do.  One booth needs a complete do-over, and I'm in the middle of re-doing the other one.  It's the big one, and I'm working it a section at a time.  I'm nearly done with it, so it's time to begin revving up the other one.  I want to have it done by the outdoor sale, complete with a near-total restock.  I'll move most of the stuff that is there to the other booth.

Hopefully, I'll be able to accomplish at least half of what I want.  Still got some of those bricks to contend with.

Mark Your Calendars!

It's gonna be a really fun time!  I'm going to set up with a booth full of special deals.  If you are in or around Louisville, I'd hope to see you there!

Fun Finds: What's Up Doc?

Go ahead!  Try and tell me that you could resist a pair--not one, but two--of giant plastic carrots!  I won't believe you.

Well, maybe you could, but I sure as hell can't.  Not when they're 50 cents for both.

Now I just need to find a giant, plastic rabbit to feed.

Bricks 101

I guess you all have figured by now out that the ton of bricks is my (now overused) metaphor for my chemo fatigue.  Telling (bad) brick jokes here is helping me cope, but I thought I'd share some information that I've been noticing, with the thought that it might help someone in a similar situation some time.

Inconvenience

You see, I have noticed that there are different levels and amounts of bricks.  I call them "Brick Levels."  First comes the couple of bricks that I seem to be carrying with me all the time.  They're not enough to keep me out of the loop, but they mean that I move slower than I am used to in just about everything that I do.  I call this level, "Inconvenience," because it's inconvenient to have to always carry 2-3 bricks with you.  What wants that?

The second level is "Hold on There, Pardner!"  It's a few more bricks, maybe a couple dozen or so.  I can still keep moving, but I have to way slow it down at this point.  If I'm working on something and I'm standing, then I need to work out a way to sit and keep it going.  They'll fade away in a little bit, and I can pick up my pace a little bit.

Hold on There, Pardner!

"Time Out, Cowboy!" is the brick level that calls for a break--usually about 30 minutes--in the action.  They can hit hard and fast or pile up over a period of time until there's about a couple hundred pounds of bricks.  The rest break will usually clear them out, but I have to take it pretty quick.

The last level is "Down for the Count, Mister!"  This is the full one ton pallet and it hits out of the blue, any time, any where.  Sometimes, it accumulates slowly, until I can't go any further, but more often it just drops out of the sky like something out of an old Warner Brothers cartoon.  I can be doing anything, and all of the sudden the feeling comes over me

Time Out, Cowboy!

and I know I need to be laying down pretty soon for an extended period of time.  Usually, I'm able to cut whatever I am doing short, when this one comes around.  I kind of have to.  Lately, though, this one has been holding off until the end of the day when I'm at home.  It still hits hard, but it's not interfering as much with my day.

When I write my "surviving chemo" pamphlet, I'll be putting in a section about dealing with the bricks.  In the meantime, you can consider this my rough draft.

Down for the Count, Mister!

(Anti-)Ode to the Bricks

A Fuck Cancer Poem Which I Have Wrote

By Michael Edward Mitchell, Age 48

Bricks!

Bricks!

Go Away!

Come again another day!

(Or even better, don't ever come back again!)

Little Eddie

Wants to Play!

Well, actually Little Eddie ain't so little and he needs to get to work,

but then he'd like to:

Thrift

Work at the Booths

Price and Pack Stuff

Go to Yard Sales

Eat Out

Do Work at the House

Do Work in the Yard

Love on that Kosh
Maybe Take a Walk

Whatever.

The bricks are still in the way, though. 

Shoo, bricks, shoo!

Weekend Finds

I don't normally do these kind of recap posts.  For one thing, others do it so much better than me.  For another, I try to get stuff to a booth so quickly, that it is often not available for pictures.  Every now and then, though, a weekend comes along that is so fantastic that the story has to be told.  This is one such weekend.

To begin with, I'd been feeling pretty good, relatively speaking, all week. I'm still slow-moving and I still get tired, but it created an eagerness in me to get out to the sales.  I never know how I'll feel from one day to the next, so I gotta strike while the iron is hot, as they say.

I think the story is best told through pictures.  They are worth a thousand words, after all.

This mod-style ice bucket is missing a handle, but was too cool to pass by.  It was the only decent item at a sale where I saw the nastiest electric skillet-wok-thing I've ever seen in my life.  Imagine cooking a pound of bacon every day for like a month and not cleaning the thing out in between cookings.  Then, imagine taking it out in the yard and setting it under a tree and leaving it there for another month.  Then, nest a family of chipmunks in it for a month.  It was nastier than that!

 These vintage Star Wars figs came from a sale where a perky blonde missionary-to-be tried to push me into buying more than I wanted.  She said she didn't have exact change and was insistent that I just "get something else" to make it up.  Instead, I put something back to being my total down to the amount she said she had.  She was so rude through the whole shopping experience that I nearly left everything there.

This chair is a modern repro, but still classy and so cool.  I love the button detail.  It was on the worst street for parking in this city.

These next items all came from the same sale.  We pulled up and I just started piling them up.  I needed some larger stuff, because I just sold a cabinet at Peddlers Mall.  Since I really don't have much storage, I have to kind of do the large stuff on an "as needed" basis.

Little Tikes Shopping Cart

Little Tikes Table and Chairs

Adorable Vintage Lamps with Fiberglass Shades

Three Foot Tall Vintage Lamp

This was probably the most fun stop of all.  The actual seller was at the bank getting change, but I kept asking her friend questions, so she had to keep calling.  Finally, she called the seller and just handed me the phone.  Fun times.

The big lamp was on the porch and I bought it with the other stuff.  Then the seller came home and asked if I wanted to see two more she had for the same price.  She brought out the little ones and I just died. Sold!  And Sold!

We got so much stuff there that this was the end result.  The seller and her friend were cracking up that we took a picture.  The shopping cart and a half table are on my lap!  You can kind of see the Little Tikes table through the back window.

I know that goatee is starting to look goofy. I ain't cutting it until chemo is over.

We had to run home and unload after that one.  Then we went to a church that had already had one sale this year, but if they are selling, I'm buying.  I found this child-sized art/drafting table there.

Child-size drafting/art table.

The top raises up like a drafting table!

We had to leave the table and go get my truck to haul it.  The weather looked just iffy enough that we didn't want to chance using the truck unless it was needed.  The color on that table is hideous, but that can easily be changed.  It's got a lot of life left in it.  At least, that's what I am going to say on Craigslist.

I spent Sunday running stuff to the booths, so most of it is out there and priced.  Sunday night, I did Craigslistings for everything as well.  The shopping cart sold on Sunday, and the table and chairs sold yesterday!  I'm definitely keeping Little Tikes on my list from now on.  Fingers crossed on the rest of it.

There were some more little items, but these are the highlights.  I'm saving a couple of things for a "Fun Finds" post in a few days.