This weekend, I experienced my first ever yard sale, held by my roommates Mark and Selena.

Basically a yard sale is when you clean out your house and closets, gather up all the shit you don’t need, and instead of throwing it out, you sell it to strangers. Apparently, yard sales are a staple of suburban life, but I only learned this recently. Growing up in a rowhome in South Philly, we didn’t have yard sales. I’m guessing this was mostly because we didn’t have a yard, but also because in a neighborhood like the one in which I grew up, everyone knows everyone. There is a certain pride in being poor, and I think that my mom, who still works two jobs because I think she thinks they’re fun, would have rather ingested poison than sold a neighbor my old windbreaker for $2. I mean, why not just dress her kids in t-shirts that say, “Please, sir, can I have some more?” Yeesh.

But in the suburbs, I guess it’s different. For some reason, people with homes with lawns and more than one bathroom have no problem selling their (almost) trash to make a few extra bucks. To me, the concept is still a little foreign – why not save yourselves the time and effort involved and just donate the stuff (which you can get a write-off for)? – but whatever. I’m almost 30 and trying to judge less, seeing as I’m getting closer and closer to death, so I’ll just let this one go.

My role in this particular yard sale was limited. I actually wasn’t even supposed to be in LA this weekend, instead defending my title in the Second Annual West Coast Wine Drinking Competition in Seattle. But only a few days before I was scheduled to depart, the WCWDC was postponed because a competitor had a work emergency. So, somewhat reluctantly, I agreed to “help out” (which turned into mostly drinking Guinness, acting as security and getting sunburned). My friends Mark, Selena and Lisa were the ones selling stuff – old clothes for the most part, but also jewelry, DVDs, household trinkets and even some furniture. Knowing that LA was only a temporary move, I don’t own a whole lot out here, just clothes (all of which I wear regularly), my computer, my guitars and some books. I mentioned previously that one of my main sources of pride in my former fun/NYC life was my library, which was really just a huge bookshelf filled with important and challenging books, all of which I had read, understood and could discuss while drinking bourbon and/or eating steak. Then I moved to LA and began to exclusively read books about murders and FBI profilers, and I eat at least two cheeseburgers a week that make me shit immediately. If I was going to sell anything, it would be these books – no need to bring them and their memories back to NYC this winter, thanks.

The yard sale was supposed to start at 8am, but I was laying in bed at 7am when I heard the pumping of diesel engines outside my bedroom window, which drowned out a conversation going on outside. Shortly thereafter, Selena, who was setting up stuff for the sale, asked me to come outside so that she wasn’t “kidnapped and raped”; even though the signs said the sale started at 8am, the customers were starting to drive by in their trucks, seeing what was available.

Throughout the course of the day, I learned a lot. Some thoughts:

- The people who patronize yard sales fall into two categories: 1) Mexicans (or other Mexico-type people) and 2) creepy middle-aged white men who you are certain have secret sexual perversions beyond your wildest dreams.

- Re: the latter – Holy geez. I can’t even imagine what kind of late 80’s camera equipment some of these guys have in their apartments and what exactly the film with it – and I have some seriously deviant tastes.

- I guess there might have been a third category, but really there were only two people the whole seven hours of the sale who didn’t fall into 1 or 2. One was a woman who drove past the yard sale in her Escalade and then screeched to a halt, jumped out, and bought every piece of denim for sale, mentioning something that the private school her daughter goes to gets credit because denim is used as insulation in Africa or blah blah blah (when Lisa asked “Do you want to know the price?” the woman said “I don’t care” and Lisa, savvy businesswoman, sold her five pairs of jeans for $25. Smooth, Lis.) The other was an attractive late 30’s/early 40’s well-to-do woman who showed up with her going-to-come-out-in-fifteen-years kindergartener son and spent most of the time chatting up Lisa and Selena, sending me into paroxysms of ecstasy about the potential of Lisa or Selena (or both!) going back to this woman’s mansion and having some mojitos while the woman talks about how it’s hard, because her husband is always busy or traveling for work, and she’s left in the house with her finook son, and really all she wants is a little attention, and then she makes a possibly inappropriate joke about her vibrator and all three girls laugh and then she says, “Well, would you like to see it?” and then she brings out the vibrator and, before you know it, some serious hardcore lesbo action is going on right there on the veranda, while the nancy son and I watch from the bushes and exchange high-fives.

(Sorry – give me a minute to catch my breath.)

(…)

(OK. I think we can move on.)

- As I said, I basically stood around crushing pints of Guinness and acting as security, so I did a lot of eavesdropping. I witnessed one such negotiation between Selena and a woman who walked up to Selena with an armful of clothing. Selena went through each piece – maybe four in total – saying, “Oh, this is a nice one – it’s [insert brand name]” and such. Selena then said, “Let’s go with $5, please” The woman shook her head and said, “$4.50.” Selena, surprised, stumbled and said, “I don’t know…I…um…I don’t think so” and the woman then put down the clothes down in anger and walked away – not just from Selena, but from the entire yard sale. She up and left the premises in a huff.

This made me furious. Furious. I mean, 50 cents? Really? 50 cents gets you so angry that you slam down what was once over $100 of clothes and storm off, speaking in bitter-sounding Spanish as you walk away? I wanted to walk up to the cash box in front of Selena, take out two quarters, and yell “Hey, lady – want to see what 50 cents means to me?” and either throw the effing two quarters into the street, eat them or rub them all over my balls.

Even as I write this, while I realize that this is an ugly thought – for some less fortunate than myself or my friends, literally every penny counts – I still think it’s ok that this made me mad. I got nothing but love for the poor and am ok with the desire (or I should say, need) to save money, but if 50 cents makes you comport yourself in such a manner that you put some Honduran curse on someone who’s trying to cut you a reasonable deal, I mean, that’s just messed up.

- Two things didn’t sell well: books and things over $3 (shocking, I know). Of all the books I had, only one sold – my hardcover of Gladwell’s “Outliers” for a whopping $2, to one of the sex offenders. I also had a lamp that I bought two months ago for $60, put a $5 “eco-friendly” light bulb in, and turned on maybe a dozen times. I was looking for $15 for this lamp, but when Mexicans asked the price and I told them “Quince,” they were so disgusted that I thought that maybe “Quince” meant “I like to cook and eat genitals, specifically yours, please.” Still have the lamp.

- I got extremely sunburned. I don’t know what the deal is – this is my fourth or fifth fairly horrendous sunburn in the past six weeks. In the past, mainly when I was a kid, I would get two major sunburns and then maintain a nice, pink “I have high blood pressure” look for the rest of the summer. But so far, the California sun is putting a hurtin’ on my pasty Irish skin. It’s not too bad, since at least I look like I spend some time outside. But I now look (even more) ridiculous when I’m naked – the nearly translucent skin on most of my body juxtaposed to my beat red face, neck and arms does not a sexy sight make.

The yard sale dragged on through the day, more friends showed up, and we wound up having an impromptu barbeque during which I consumed approximately 1500 tortilla chips and was president in a spirited game of Asshole for a dozen hands before the game collapsed completely. Sunday, I was a disaster – I actually called in sick on Friday because I didn’t feel well, then had the yard sale and BBQ – and took a three and a half hour nap. Actually, quite a nice lil’ Sunday.

But as my time in LA is coming to a close (NYC 12/1/09!!!), I’m trying to focus on the positive and the new. This yard sale was an example. Yeah, maybe I did get a really bad sunburn, and sure, maybe Lisa and Selena didn’t get it on with the lonely rich woman, but the yard sale was a fun time, an experience I had never had before and will likely not have again for some time.

(That is, unless one of you doesn’t buy my lamp. $15. Like new and a really cool lightbulb. Inquire within.)