{"id":10388,"date":"2012-06-17T13:32:54","date_gmt":"2012-06-17T20:32:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/ClaireWolfe\/?p=10388"},"modified":"2012-06-17T13:32:54","modified_gmt":"2012-06-17T20:32:54","slug":"garage-sales-provide-again-and-even-a-girl-can","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/2012\/06\/17\/garage-sales-provide-again-and-even-a-girl-can\/","title":{"rendered":"Garage sales provide (again) and even a girl can …"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve noted before how I only have to put an item in my head and eventually it’ll turn up at a garage sale. This works so well that my house and my small “workshopette” are both furnished almost entirely with garage sale & thrift store items.<\/p>\n

One thing that had been on my “GS vibe” for a while is a trickle charger for car batteries. <\/p>\n

This became more urgent when I went to start the XTerra last week and couldn’t.<\/p>\n

So yesterday, right on schedule, there it was …<\/p>\n

\"Garage<\/a><\/p>\n

Kewl. High-tech electronics and everything. A little beat up cosmetically, but since the same model sells on Amazon<\/a> for 100 bucks, I was hardly complaining.<\/p>\n

Got it home. Put it on the battery. Lookin’ good. <\/p>\n

About an hour later the nice guy working on my yard says, “Something’s wrong with that thing.”<\/p>\n

Definitely wrong. He found it blinking oddly and when he tried to get it working, nada. Went completely dark. I tried, too. Nada.<\/p>\n

This morning I reluctantly took it back to the man who sold it to me. He offered my money back with no hassle. (I opted instead to swap it for a fire extinguisher.)<\/p>\n

But a friend of his who was standing there was certain I had done something wrong: “Are you sure your battery wasn’t already fully charged?” “Well, then, are you sure your battery wasn’t so dead that it just wouldn’t take a charge? You know these things are designed to shut down if …”<\/p>\n

“Yeah,” I’d say. “I know. I tried this. I tried that. Really, no matter what you do, it just sits there and hums. No lights. No functioning controls. Go ahead. Give it a shot, I’d be really happy to be wrong because I need one of these.”<\/p>\n

We all trooped over to the wall and he plugged it in and punched buttons and did all those “manly” things we’d already done. And sure enough. Humming but otherwise dead.<\/p>\n

“I guess you’re right,” he conceded. “Yep. dead.”<\/p>\n

He emphasised the final word by thumping its top. Thump.<\/i> Flicker. Hey, what was that? Thump.<\/i> Flicker. Press handle down.<\/i> Glow. Lift handle up.<\/i> Lights off. I set the fire extinguisher on it and the charger’s controls glowed steady.<\/p>\n

“Hm. Something to do with the handle,” said Mr. Mechanic.<\/p>\n

“Well, I’ll just put ‘free’ on it,” said the garage sale guy. “Maybe somebody who’s mechanically inclined will want to tinker with it. Otherwise, I’ll landfill it.”<\/p>\n

I left with my fire extinguisher, thought about it, came back a little later, asked if I could have the charger. “Sure. Take it. I can’t sell it if it’s got something wrong with it and I’m not mechanical enough to fix it.” <\/p>\n

At home, I opened it up & found it full of dust and cobwebs. And there was one tiny plug popped half-way off a circuit board.<\/p>\n

Took me longer to get the case off and back on than it took to fix the thing. I am a “mere girl” when it comes to matters electrical and electronic. I felt like freaking Superwoman.<\/p>\n

Oh. And I also got this:<\/p>\n

\"USB<\/a><\/p>\n

Yes. A USB-powered mini-lava lamp. Which is of course exactly what every computer needs.<\/p>\n

And it’s sitting on this glorious blonde oak desk I bought at some millionaire’s garage sale two weeks ago. <\/p>\n

\"Big<\/a><\/p>\n

It had a sign on the ground next to it: $15. <\/p>\n

I asked, “That can’t be the price for that desk, can it? I know it can’t be that low.”<\/p>\n

“No, that’s not the price for the desk,” answered that<\/i> garage sale guy. “The price is $5. It’s late in the day. I just want it out of here.”<\/p>\n

Thank heaven for garage saling girlfriends with big vans! Cost me more to get somebody to bring it into the house than it did to buy the thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve noted before how I only have to put an item in my head and eventually it’ll turn up at a garage sale. This works so well that my house and my small “workshopette” are both furnished almost entirely with garage sale & thrift store items. One thing that had been on my “GS vibe” for a while is a trickle charger for car batteries. This became more urgent when I went to start the XTerra last week and couldn’t. So yesterday, right on schedule, there it was … Kewl. High-tech electronics and everything. A little beat up cosmetically, but…<\/p>\n

Continue readingGarage sales provide (again) and even a girl can …<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-miscellaneous","category-rural-and-small-town-living","ratio-natural","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10388\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}