Chaperones
On the way back home tonight, I got into an mild-natured dispute with my wife. She said that Charlie Brown’s sister was named Sally. Everyone knows that Charlie Brown’s sister is Lucy! There’s no Sally. Who ever heard of a Sally? Such a character never existed! I completely derided the notion, berating her for her lack of Peanuts knowledge. Imagine my embarrassment.
Rewind.
Bright and early Saturday morning I was up and at’em. I left for work just as the kids were getting up and indulging in the ritual of Saturday-morning cartoons. My good friend Sky Marshall Anonymo tipped me off to an auction at a local business. He had to come with me because it was for employees of certain companies only. It’s a rather large manufacturing place on the outskirts of town.
When I arrived I saw a mass of office furniture and other miscellaneous related equipment all numbered and arranged about in the shipping bay. There were about thirty people in a gaggled crescent about the edge. There wasn’t an auctioneer per se, just an employee with a laptop. He started the bidding on each item at a dollar, and a LOT of them had no bids, and I just started picking them up at a dollar each. Mostly office chairs. At the end I had picked up twenty-nine lots.
The catch of the day was a set of four leather office chairs with brass studs, tilt-backs and wheels, and also a matching non-wheeled pair. I picked them up for less than a tenth of the normal price. That’s the free market for you.
If you want to start your business, don’t go the bank! The world is full of deals for the bargain hunter. I believe it’s possible to start a business on a shoe-string; build it up a step at a time and carry no debt.
Then I had to figure out a way to get it all hauled off. Sky Marshal Anonymo came through again. His wife came out with their truck, and I placed a call to Dane saying “get on your bathrobe and slippers and get down here!”.
After that the Sky Marshal and I headed out for fish tacos. I had to jet early since I had cleaning duty down at the church. I took K and J, my eldest kids, with me and cleaned the bathrooms. That was really a great bonding time.
Now things really got started. Back at Tamie’s old high school they were having Homecoming, and she and her sister had got some alumni-type invitation. We did the whole shelangadang as if we were going to prom. We had a great time. The student body president greeted us at the door, and I just had to take a pass on his super-prickly hair (see pic below).
Tamie is really quite the murderess on the dance floor. I have no chance of keeping up with her.
I’m trying a new thing where I actually listen to other people. I found out that my brother-in-law has a band called Citizen Fate. www.myspace.com/citizenfate
After eating some ice cream we headed off to my sister-in-law’s house where we found that Tamie’s dad has arrived for a visit this week. We sat around chewing the fat for a while, watching the cats chase a laser pointer all around the living room.
