It really doesn’t bode well when your Saturday starts off with this.

And this.

And this.

It gets even worse when the seller tries to engage you in a conversation about how you might really need that Christmas sweater. (Or is that “seater”?)

Are sales ever good in October? I guess I could look through our archives to find out. Then again, I’m not sure I really want to know, with a few weekends still to go in the month … In any case, last Saturday was mostly full of duds.

One of the few decent sales we hit was listed as “Two Gay Men with Good Taste Clean out the Closets.” They did have an interesting spread, although I would strongly argue that not all of it represented “good” taste.

I did love how this isn’t “As Seen On TV”, but “Similar to items seen on TV.” At least they’re being honest!

We started talking to one of the guys and it turned out that a lot of the items had belonged to an elderly neighbor who’d recently passed away after living alone all his life. Among the things they’d helped to clean out from his garage were several pairs of unworn vintage men’s shoes. Some of them had newspaper ads for the same shoes cut out and stuck into them. There were also shirts, furniture, and a three-foot-high fridge that was apparently the only one in the house — the guy didn’t cook at all and ate every meal at a restaurant. I did buy something here which I declared was definitely in the “Top Five Most Boring Items Purchased At A Sale”: furnace filters! Totally mundane, but I was about to have to go buy them new, so I was happy to snag a bunch for $1 each.

While we were talking this annoying woman came up chirping “Is this the two fabulous gay guys sale? Two fabulous gay guys?” The seller muttered something about “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Then as we left he asked if we had gotten our free squishy house toy. He ran over to a box and handed us each a little foam house, promo items from some window company or something, saying we could use them for stress relief. As we drove away Meghan said “What is wrong with me that I am actually taking unwanted items people give me?” She proceeded to leave her house at the next sale we hit.

We decided to head to the estate sale that Meghan and Karl had hit on Thursday to see what was still there. On the way we encountered this setup.

Everything was suuuuuuuuuuuper crusty, like it had been in those boxes for at least a couple of decades. Meghan managed to fish out a couple of clothing items that she thought could be Oxy-Cleaned into shape. They also had a number of owl items.

I decided my foam house could keep one of them company.

Then we were off to the estate sale, which was lots of fun and still had a ton left (including a musical Last Supper Clock hanging on the wall — two in one day!). We each ended up buying a few things there.

I think the most that can be said for this day is that it wasn’t a total bust.

This weekend was the Olympic Manor neighborhood sale, otherwise known to us as the “season closer. It’s been really good, it’s been really bad, but we have hit this sale for at least the last nine years. The sales have started to meld together over the years and some houses seem to have the exact sale sale year after year.

The very first sale was so bunk that they guy was selling a used, dirty, kitty poop scooper. Are you fucking kidding me? Of all the things in life that I would feel comfortable buying new, poop scooper is at the top of the list. What are people thinking?

This year we hit a few duds, but then we hit one of the more memorable sales. It was crazy shopper lady mixed with all of the preppy daughter’s junk from the ’80s. I really started to lose my mind at this sale. Hobie ’80s bathing suits with screwed up day-glo colors? Check! Yeah, like 8 of them. What about ’80s jazz flats? Tons.

Jenny scratched the surface of the insanity with the Valley Girl’s Guide to Life book and modeling books. How about the Electronic Mall Madness game?!?!

Yes, that ended up in my trunk, since the guy refused to take my money otherwise. “No, I really don’t need that.” “Yes, of course you do. It’s free. I am giving it to you with your items.” I am too polite. Please note this is huge and comes with a fake credit card machine and the record store at the mall is called “Scratchy’s.” At least they didn’t also make me haul off this large painting (dated 1964).

Soon after that we stopped at a sale that they have every year in their garage. This year they had gotten a little crazy with their sign.

They always seem to have a very tidy and organized way of arranging things.

We have all purchased stuff there before so I can’t bag on it too badly, but this year it was a bust.

All in all it seemed a little better than the last few years, but mainly because of that one sale where I went crazy and a few other scores. A lot of houses really just had crap.

At least some of it was free, but even so. Sticking a sign on your old toilet does not magically turn it into “yard art.”

One of the last good sales had some really good books. As I was pulling some stuff out, Jenny pointed to a CD, quietly saying something about not wanting to embarrass the person running the sale. In my mind, it’s your sale — don’t you know what you have?

So, I held it up and the woman says “I don’t know where those CDs came from.” Yes, if that is in your pile of CDs, claiming that you know nothing is the correct answer.

We did hit a few sales outside of the neighborhood, but I think everything we purchased came from Oly Manor sales.

Going to sales on Labor Day weekend — is it ever great? Judging from the last three years I would have to say no. But going to yard sales is like playing slots: you never know when your very next try is gonna get you that big win. So off we went … with skies looking suspiciously greyer every minute.

We made a few stops close to home, then decided to check out an estate sale that had possibilities. We got there about 9:10 and there were about ten people waiting outside. I thought there must’ve been a bunch of people waiting earlier if they couldn’t let everyone in at once, but then it turned out that they weren’t opening up until 10! With so many other sales nearby I failed to see the logic of waiting that long in the cold for this one (which sounded okay, but not amazing) so we went to an estate sale nearby which was already up and running. I was a little baffled by the way they chose to hang their sign.

At least it was a bright color, but it didn’t look any better from the front …

Another interesting set-up choice: placing (or leaving?) this one item outside with a “for sale” sign (but no price).

This sale was pretty much a dud, so we headed off to get coffee, but found a surprise estate sale along the way. It was the kind of sale that was wacky enough that you kept thinking there had to be SOMETHING great there. I mean, with a toilet paper cozy like this, they had to be insane, right?

They had also managed to hold on to this box of Calgon for oh … seventy years or so.

Meghan found a few patterns and someone mentioned there had been tons of old patterns back at the estate sale with the line … so we put off coffee that much longer and headed back up there. It was only about 10:15 so we figured we might as well check it out. The patterns turned out to be a bust (boring and not that old) but they did have some fascinating items here and there.

I left empty-handed and perused the junk in the garage while waiting for Karl and Meghan to come out.

Soon enough, Meghan emerged. She’d picked up a couple things, including this mindblowing 1972 “Hang In There, Baby” poster.

Karl was fascinated by this “Gypsy Music” LP he’d dug out of a pile … mainly based on the song titles.

By this time it was fully raining, and after finally getting coffee we forged on ahead. Our next stop was listed as “vintage yard sale” which is always enticing, even though you know it probably also means “overpriced.” With this one I didn’t ever find out if it was overpriced or not, because everything was just sitting out getting wet. Who is going to want to buy 8-track tapes that have been soaking in the rain?

I couldn’t understand why they weren’t making an effort to keep things dry. They did have a couple of covered areas and it seemed like they would have moved things under them … especially books and things that really shouldn’t get wet. Although with some items, wet or dry wouldn’t really impact their desirability.

Next, we tried to hit a yard sale whose address was at a taco truck (!), but when we drove by there was no sale in sight. (Perhaps they came to their senses and waited for a drier day.) At that point we came to our senses and decided to just give up and get breakfast instead. So the haul was small … but at least there were a few nice (or at least strange) finds.