Those Darned Paparazzi!

It’s hard, you know. You bring out a new book, and the next thing you know paparazzi are snapping your picture when you least expect it. Of course they’re sneaky and you’re not even aware your picture has been taken. Until a friend emails you the link to the place on the Web where your casual Friday morning self has been posted for everyone to see.

Craigslist.

Yup, that’s me, front and center. Here’s the story.

My friends Robin and Ken are also garagers, and Ken likes to study the pictures in Craigslist ads to determine if a sale is worth going to. The folks having this sale had posted only a picture of their house in their ad. (Perhaps feeling that the address was not enough? Of course it’s a gorgeous house, and more on that in a minute.) So Ken sent them a polite email suggesting they post pictures of the stuff for sale.

Meanwhile, Judy and I are at this sale (she’s standing in line to pay for something in the picture). A few minutes earlier as I was paying my quarter for a green vase, I heard one of the ladies say she was going inside for a minute to post more pictures on their Craigslist ad. I never gave it a moment’s thought, until later in the morning when Robin emailed me to say ‘take a look.’ And there I was.

Now that I think about it though, it’s more likely that this was a wildlife photographer. Stalking the wily yardsale bird to her native habitat.

So here’s the story about the house: Judy and I went to an estate sale here back in December 2013. The sale where it started snowing while we were there and we had an exciting time getting home. The snow had time to accumulate while we were inside because we both fell in love with the house and kept looking at it. Then, since their sale got snowed out, they had another estate sale a few weeks later and this time I went with my friend Toni. The house stayed on the market for quite a long time, so when I got to this week’s sale I asked if they were the new owners.

“Not us, but our friends,” they said. And went on to describe how their friends saw pictures of this house on Zillow and kept looking at them and looking at them – but they lived in Brooklyn, NY! Finally they asked a relative who lives here to check out the house, got a favorable report, and bought it without ever setting foot in it. And they love it!

Friday wasn’t much of a muchness sale-wise, but I did augment my windowsill vase collection.

I can hardly believe it – I’ve filled up the second window!

Saturday was a washout until I hit the last sale, and it was just fine. Turned out the $10 Cuisinart didn’t actually work (I’ve learned to always ask to plug things in!) but I got some very nice wind chimes, a couple of bottle brush  trees and a cute Santa ornament

and a nifty knitting bag with a book of cute dog knits and some very nice yarn. The bag will be perfect to store some of my overflowing yarn stash, at least if I can figure out where to put the bag!

The big score was a brand new Dale of Norway sweater, still with its tag hanging. Ought to resell well next fall.

If not, Noll says he’d like to have it.

Oh yes, and besides all this good stuff, I learned a valuable lesson.

Be careful where you put your donut…or Judy might sit on it.