Orleans Weekly Journal
Published: Friday, April 11, 2008 

Spring cleaning with a yard sale

We made it, apart from some leftover flurries, the winter of 2007-08 is done. Give yourselves a hand. Yes, go ahead, savour the ugliness of melting gray snow, mud enclosed bus-stops, potholes every 1.7 metres on Tenth Line, Voyageur Drive or Orleans Boulevard, and the bask in the joy of sending your snow tires into summer hibernation.

But don’t dare relax. Up next is the annual drudgery of moving winter clothes out of the hallway closet. No doubt a trip to the basement is also in store as you search for summer sports items and cushions for the patio set. And finally a jaunt to the garage to find the Adirondack chairs, count how many cases of empties have accumulated (wow, that’s a lot of beer) in five months and survey stuff that has sat in your garage since – well let’s be honest – since you last moved eight months or eight years ago, is in store.

If you’re like me you will vow once again that this is finally the year to have a garbage, er, I mean garage sale. Yes, a garage sale of previously enjoyed rescue hero toys, VCR tapes of Caillou or Dora and paperbacks that you bought when our dollar was worth 63 cents US.

Then there are those two TVs that weigh six tonnes each for some electronics hobbyist (or the Museum of Civilization if they gather dust much longer). And maybe I can unload that old microwave, never-used cappuccino machine and bag of women’s shoes that went out of style after one season or two cocktail parties, whichever came first.

This is the year we empty the youngster’s closet and see if his old jeans and twice-worn dress shirt will fetch a few bucks. He’s growing so fast I bet some of his stuff has never been worn. And I deserve a new desk in the office, so that Ikea table (circa 1986 and 15 pounds ago) is out the door.

Given the Wal-Mart volume of merchandise we’re trying to discard, oops, I mean, offer to fellow citizens at very affordable prices, I’ll need a few days off of work to prepare. Indeed, pricing this trash, scratch that, pricing this treasure trove of goods is important because east-end bargain hunters haggle better than tourists in a Caribbean trinket market.

Then there this the marketing mix to consider: road signs, a classified ad, spam mail or maybe a dancing clown at the intersection? Garage sale competition is cut-throat so we’ll use free Tim’s coffee along with a complimentary toy for each potential customer (no purchase necessary) as our secret weapon. It’s a great way to unload the reams of knick-knacks that occupied my son’s attention for about 24 seconds per toy. And did we really make that many trips to the McDo, BK, and Subway. Yikes!

Our garage sale is still weeks away but I’m exhausted just thinking about it. Maybe we’ll do one in 2009 instead. 

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Comments can be sent to Walter Robinson at orleansouttakes@transcontinental.ca.