It
probably comes as no surprise to those of you that read this
column each and every week that one of my favorite topics happens
to be the differences between men and women, or women and men,
whichever is more politically correct. About the time I think I
can’t find anything another thing to write about, something will
happen to restore my faith and show me that all of the articles
I’ve written thus far have barely scratched the surface of
unraveling the mysteries that happen between our two sexes. Point
of discussion for this week, is the approach taken by men and
women when it comes to selling things.
As in selling things that belong to her as compared to selling
things that belong to me. Now, we have had our fair share of
garage sales during our married life. I’m sure you have as well.
Answer me this…..how is it that when women price our stuff (men’s)
it goes for almost nothing, but their stuff is priced almost as if
it was brand new? I’ve seen baseball gloves that I felt were
practically priceless go for $2 or less. Books I felt were
collector’s items…get priced at 50 cents. Good, I mean good tools
that are virtually brand new are pushed out the door at a fraction
of their retail price at the store. Now, on the other hand, look
at how women put value on something like their old purses. Pieces
of leather that saw better days years ago, will be priced within
10-15% of their original value. Dresses, hats, books, kitchen
appliances all get marked up to within retail limits if women are
doing the evaluations.
Our stuff gets marked down to almost worthless status and in some
cases if we aren’t careful, they’ll pay to have our stuff moved
off from the property. Now about two weeks ago, we put my wife’s
car up for sale since it had a bunch of miles on it. She liked
that car, but realized it was at a point in time that we needed to
get rid of it. She priced it way too high, but I didn’t think I
should be the one to tell her she was wrong. It was in the
classified section for 3 weeks without one call. Finally I told
her I thought it was a waste of time to list it this high and she
reduced it, but not by that much. Another 2 weeks goes by and we
get 2 calls, but nobody comes to look at it. In the meantime, the
car is sitting here in the garage, costing me money for the
balance of the note, the insurance and the cost of the newspaper
ad not to mention my mental stress. Last week a fellow calls and
offers to buy the car, but at $1500 less than we had it in the
paper.
He had cash. I said deal and she about had a conniption fit. We
got into the most insane argument going to meet the people and
collecting the money. She said the cash might be counterfeit. I
said that yes, that certainly was possible, but I wasn’t worried.
First off, I’m taking the cash to the bank to pay off the balance
of the note and get the title. Second, it the cash was
counterfeit, then we’d find it out at the bank. Third, the guy
wouldn’t get the car, since we’d still have the title and finally
we’d turn the guy over to the police and besides we had insurance
if it was stolen. So, how can we lose? We end up meeting the guy
who called. He shows up with 4 carloads of relatives who swarm
over the car. It was like a family reunion for all of these
people. The buyer brought his wife and family, then his brother,
wife and kids show up. Then some nieces and nephews arrive, one of
the nieces had just gotten engaged, so everyone (including us) got
to see her ring.
We sign the papers, I tell him I’ll have the title for him in 2
days, we get the cash and go home. Now, the wife thinks we are
going to be robbed that night so we lock everything extra tight
and sleep with the shotgun in the bedroom. Couple of days later,
we meet the buyer and give him the title. Everyone wins. He gets a
nice car and we get our money. Nice people who got a good deal and
I got rid of something we didn’t need. I think we’ve done good.
She still thinks we should have held out for more since it was her
car. We’d still be waiting to sell it if that were the case. When
I bought up the price she put on my Al Dark baseball glove (she
practically gave it away) she couldn’t see the relationship
between that and selling her car.
All she could say was…”It was old and we didn’t want it anymore.”
I think this is exactly what I said about her car, but it somehow
got lost in the translation. The mystery continues.
