The warmer weather brings many seasonal changes to the local landscape.  The hum of lawnmower engines can be heard every weekend, kids is baseball uniforms toddle down the street towards the local ball fields, the ice cream shop lines get longer, and it’s the season for my least favorite warm weather phenomenon – the yard sale.

Now don’t get me wrong, if you have things gathering dust in your basement or attic that you want to get rid of and you feel like plopping some tables in your driveway and starting up a little side hustle on a Saturday morning, by all means – have at it.

Just don’t count on me to stop by and inspect your wares.  I’m just not a fan.

In my area, people seem to live for yard sales.  Every weekend, you’ll easily find dozens that pop-up along major roadways, parking lots, or even on porches along busy city streets.  Just look for the badly written sign with an arrow that may or may not point in the right direction. 

Ahh, yes – you want to hear my other reasons for disliking yard sales.  I have plenty.

First of all, they are a traffic menace.  Just look for the poorly parked cars along the road shoulder (the opening car door into an oncoming traffic lane is my personal favorite), drivers who will pound the brakes right in front of you in order to get a quick look at the available wares, and overweight pedestrians hiding between parked vehicles who will suddenly waddle out into the street and expect every car to yield the right of way to their Houdini-like appearance as they breathe heavily and struggle to navigate sixteen feet of paved highway, much like a thirsty duck trying to make it back to some unseen pond across the road.

Secondly, it’s the merchandise.  Oh, I know the old saying “one man’s junk is another man’s treasure”, but to me it’s always been “it’s just someone else’s junk”.  Do I really need a VHS copy of “Jazzercise” or the “Billy Graham 1982 Crusade”?  Doubtful.  How about an XXXL neon yellow shirt that says “Home of the Whopper” with an arrow pointing down towards my crotch?  Well, I don’t have any job interviews coming up, so no thanks – I think I’m good.  A single bar stool with a broken leg?  Nope.  How about a dusty suitcase with a busted zipper?  A broken dish?  A dartboard with no darts?  Have you people heard of a dumpster?  Again, I’m sure that now and again, there is a real find hidden somewhere among all of this debris, but I seriously doubt if I’m going to stumble across a missing Picasso or a vintage stamp under the piles of this lot.

Third, it’s the clientele.  I don’t care what anyone has written as a price on the item, there’s always that “tough negotiator” that wants to talk them down from what’s on the tag.  It could be an entire cherry bedroom set in beautiful condition with a price-tag of $50, but I guarantee you over half a dozen people have already come up to the owner and said “will you take $25 for it?”  Also, don’t bother neatly folding any clothing and putting it on a table, or setting out a line with shirts or pants neatly arranged on hangers, because in as little as ten minutes, most of these upright hogs with driver’s licenses will have rooted through your hard work and left clothing strewn all over the yard as if a gale-force wind just blew through.  Oh, and guess what?  Now that they’ve stopped in to inspect the merchandise, every potential customer feels entitled enough to ask for a favor. 

“Will you take a check?” No. 

“Can you hold this until I come back in an hour with a truck?”  No. 

“If I buy three shirts, can I have a fourth one for free?  Does this look like a Wal-Mart to you?  No.

“Can you break a $100 bill?”  Sir, its 7:30 in the morning and you bought $2.50 in merchandise – are you being serious right now?  No.

“Does this come with batteries?”  No.

“Do you have any more of these Tito Puente vinyl records?” Why you dog, I was saving the others for a real collector, such as yourself. Actually – no.

“If these pants don’t fit, can I bring them back?”  Uhhh, hell no – and let me save you some time – three pairs of them sewn together wouldn’t fit you, but I do have a comforter we could probably pin together that might make it around your equator.

In the end, the payoff is also not generally that lucrative, once you factor in the set-up time, actual business (you’ll always have more “Lookie-Loo’s” than actual customers), and the tear-down.  

“Wow, that was quite a day, Hilda.  How much money did we garner from all of this commerce?” 

“$120.47 – but I spotted some things at the yard sale next door that I just had to have, so we actually made around $50”.

Don’t worry – we’ll get rid of it all next year.