Tuesday, November 27, 2007

The Key to Yard Sale Buddy's Heart

I finally found out why he's been Missing in Action. And if you haven't noticed, my Blog Material has been suffering miserably. Last time I checked on his whereabouts, he said he had been busy installing a toilet. All I could think to reply was "FOR THREE WEEKS?" So I decided he needed some space for whatever reason, like maybe he saw me standing with Mack in the lunch line or passing notes with Claudia in math class; he tends to be a little oversensitive.

Fast forward another week or two, Mack and I were killing time in the shop on a freezing cold Friday and I decided to call up Yard Sale Buddy and crank him up. He was full of piss and vinegar as they say and while I was giving him the 'Where ya been' business he suddenly retaliated. "I stopped by yesterday but you were closed; I was going to go in and check on things but I don't have a key." I sprang up out of my seat and screamed - no more like yelped - "THAT'S WHY YOU'RE MAD AT ME!?!?!?" Dead silence. Oh. My. God. Way back in SEPTEMBER I borrowed his key because I needed to go to my niece's birthday party and he was working at his real job, so Claudia watched the shop. And I forgot to make a copy and give him back one. Mind you, he never actually USES the key, I guess he just likes the prestige.

So after I found this out I had a new key made ASAP, and have been stalking YSB for the past 2 weeks trying to deliver it. I finally caught him today out front vacuuming his lawn, and made a grand ceremony out of bestowing the key upon him. He pretended it was no big deal, but I could tell all was suddenly right with the world. So much so, he said Wait Right Here I want to show you something and ran inside; then he came out a minute later wearing this giant tiger mascot head screaming LOOK WHAT I GOT, CAN YOU BELIEVE SOMEONE THREW THIS AWAY?? It was so funny I almost wet my pants. Of course, I had no camera... but he PROMISED he will model it again later this week for photos. Stay tuned for further adventures with Yard Sale Buddy, and remember: Please remain seated and keep your hands inside the ride at all times!!

Monday, November 26, 2007

Sconce de Leon

Wasn't he the famous explorer that discovered Bryantville? Last Sunday Mack from Never Open Antiques was over spying, I mean visiting, while I was rearranging my office area. I showed him my Reader's Choice Award that I finally got around to framing and I think he was a little jealous. We had already had the discussion about why his store didn't win, where I told him you have to actually have a NAME for folks to write in and nobody is really sure what his store is really called. Anyway, he leaned in close and said "Not to burst your bubble but..." and proceeded to tell me a story about a woman shopping in his store that day who had some unkind things to say about my prices. Now I only really have one button worth pushing when it comes to my shop and Boy did Mack pick the right one. I could tell he was goading me but I lost my cool anyway and let out a string of unutterables. Then he asked me "do you actually EAT with that mouth?" so I replied YES and I kiss my mother with it too and here's where it got ugly; I had been in the process of rearranging some wall sconces and one of them jumped right off the wall and flew at Mack's head. Honestly I wasn't even touching it at the time, it must have just sensed my irk. Poor Mack hightailed it out of there then who came in but Claudia; now I had to explain not only that it was her sconce globe that broke, but why I was so aggravated; it was more in the snide delivery than what he said. Claudia just looked at me with that patient look mothers reserve for their well-intentioned children who have maybe caught the kitchen on fire while trying to cook Mother's Day breakfast; what she should have said was "HELLO You run that guy up the flagpole on your Blog on a regular basis!!" Um, yeah, there is some truth in THAT. Apparently I can dish it out but I can't take it.

Friday, November 16, 2007

Mickey Moves to Pembroke

"M-I-C... See you've been evicted! K-E-Y... Why? Because it' MY garage!!"

Yard Sale Buddy and I were cleaning out my garage one day and there was this big huge wooden bin full of scrap lumber and shingles that had been sitting there since I bought the place in 2004. As he was tossing the lumber into his truck he reached in the bin at one point and came up with a handful of what looked like dryer lint. UH-OH, I said, that almost looks like a nest. "What? No, that's old, don't worry about it..." and just when I am about to say no, really, look at how that has been lovingly crafted out of scraps of all kinds of things, he lifted out this cardboard box and all of a sudden this mouse came catapulting out, flew straight through the air and landed in the bed of Yard Sale Buddy's truck. "LOOK!" he exclaimed as he set the box down outside and I could hear him counting all the way to TEN as the mice performed a mass exodus. Now mind you at this point I had my eyes squeezed shut and hands over my ears so I would not have to deal with Yard Sale Buddy pretending to throw vermin at me but I opened them long enough to see one wayward mouse who had made his way back into the garage only to keel over and literally DIE of FRIGHT. So I was feeling bad enough about being a homewrecker and mouse killer when later on that night Yard Sale Buddy phoned. "Guess what; I got all that lumber out of my truck and wouldn't you know after the last piece that mouse was still in my truck! He jumped out and ran across the street to my neighbor's." Oh great. One more thing to feel guilty about.

Tuesday, November 6, 2007

Guess Who's Not Coming to Dinner?

So Dice Ken called tonight to alert me that he will be home late because his boss is in town and taking him out to dinner. Then he said maybe we could hang out and have a couple of beers when he gets home. Now, normally it is MY arm twisting HIS but I think I was put off by his news since I had actually PLANNED a dinner so I said Yeah, well, we'll see; I have an early appointment tomorrow. "Early Appointment?" Yes I said I have a Buying Appointment tomorrow at 9. Now I can hear Mister Early-to-Bed-Early-to-Rise choking back laughter at the thought that "Early" and "9 AM" are synonymous in his wife's vocabulary but he bravely presses on. "A Buying Appointment? Like a private viewing of some stuff that is not available for sale to anyone else?" Yes. "Where exactly is this Buying Appointment?" Pembroke. Now he is full blown laughing, "Pembroke, you can't even tell me where in Pembroke? What do you think I'm going to call up Perez Hilton and tell him where your secret buying appointment is so he can blog about it and the Paparazzi can stalk you?" Maybe. (Actually, I just couldn't remember the street name... but it's good to keep him guessing.)