It’s been a tough week filled with manic deadlines, extra job duties, technical difficulties, sick children, garage sales and a personal bout with the flu. When it rains poop, it pours poop. Big time.
Probably the only thing that has kept me somewhat sane throughout the past seven days has been eBay. Oh yes, I’m never too sick or busy to celebrate the ease of shopping online–on arguably the biggest freaking garage sale of the universe–in the comfort of my very own deathbed.
I’ve always believed that I have an eBay “problem”—meaning I spend way too much time and money buying a bunch of crap that I really don’t need. Granted, there are other people out there—one of my colleagues included—who purchase way more off eBay than I do; but then again, I’m relatively certain that my colleague’s paycheck is considerably larger than mine.
As it stands, in the past 60 days I have spent about $75 on eBay. It’s been a pretty cheap couple of months. Mostly I’ve been buying a bunch of vintage crochet patterns and high-end yarn to fuel my recent obsession with anything and everything crochet. Seems that I’m indeed becoming that elderly Portuguese woman who does handcrafts all night, though I have yet to make any toilet paper covers shaped like dolls.
While $75 may not seem like a lot to some, in our household it’s a decent trip to Safeway. To combat this problem, my husband has taken to obsessing over eBay in a whole new way–by selling stuff on it. Which leads me to the whole garage sale fiasco that went on this weekend.
Usually, I like garage sales and find them all kinds of amusing. But this time, I was coming down with the flu and too damn miserable to enjoy hagling with people over 50 cents. Did I mention I have letting-go issues?
While I hemmed and hawed over whether to sell a used paperback I had already read three times and bought from Friends of the Library for an entire dime, my husband was sticking price tags on things like a madman.
“How much do you think we can get for this?” he asked, pointing to our son’s much used play set.
“Uh, he’s playing on it right now,” I said. “I don’t think we should sell it.”
“He’ll get over it,” he said. “How much do you think?”
In the end, I was too ill to care if he sold the actual child with the play set. What we didn’t sell at the garage sale has gone up on eBay. I even listed a few things, including a pair of True Religion jeans that I originally bought on eBay for about $80 (new selling price: $15). Why? Because when I started making fat jokes about my husband’s ex I got major bachi and gained 10 pounds. I can no longer fit the jeans over my heifer-like thighs.
Guess making fun of people doesn’t burn nearly as many calories as I thought.
Anyway, my beloved True Religion jeans weren’t on the market 24 hours when some skinny bitch snatched them up. Whoops, that comments probably worth an added two pounds.
Of course, now my husband is addicted to selling on eBay. In fact, late last night I heard him sneaking around on the computer.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Nuthin’,” he said, looking totally guilty.
I let it slide, but I’m keeping an eye out for missing family heirlooms and healthy organs. You know how addicts do crazy things.
Starr Begley is currently eating kalua pig with her jeans unbuttoned. MTW
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