Salted
So like Sarah mentioned, we headed back to Windsor on Wednesday so I could try to buy those antique moccasins that totally burned me last time. Kudos to Sarah for actually getting to my house on time. We made it to the auction only 15 minutes late, and luckily the moccasins had not been up on the block yet. In fact, the only thing we seemed to have missed was this giant box of VHS tapes:
Here’s how I probably looked waiting for the moccasins to be auctioned:
I won’t keep you all in suspense…I didn’t win the moccasins. I KNOW RIGHT?! Unbelievable. Here is how it went down:
The moccasins went up for sale and the same auctioneer from last time (my mortal enemy) started them at $100. He went down to 50, then 40, and when he got to 30 dollars I bid. I didn’t want a repeat of last time where I think he is going to go lower and instead he ends the item. So here I am, the ONLY bidder on these for $30.
At this point, no one else is bidding and he starts doing his final countdown before he says “SOLD.” All of a sudden, one of the EMPLOYEES starts bidding. (Very fishy I know.) I’ve seen workers bid at an auction before, but this was strange considering how badly the auctioneer did not want to sell these to me last time. And why did she wait so long to bid against me?
So we go back and forth and get up to $85. At this point, I am convinced they are trying to bid me up on purpose, so I bow out. The auctioneer seemed genuinely surprised that I did.
To be fair, I did see this female employee leave with the moccasins, so she probably did buy them. I felt at peace. I got a fair chance to buy these (FINALLY), and $85 was more than I wanted to spend. At least it was my choice, and not someone else telling me I couldn’t bid.
So with that all settled, it was on to more treasures. I bid on and won this amazing old box from the Canadian Salt Company.
There was still a little bit of salt in the bottom of this, which I was sure the border agents would think was cocaine when we tried to reenter the States. I didn’t tell Sarah about this because she already acts like a crazy person at customs. Not really a crazy person actually, but more of a deaf mute frozen in terror.
I then bid on this old bottle from Bright’s Winery, which is the second oldest winery in Canada. I just liked the look of it, but might end up putting it on eBay.
The bottle came with a ton of other glassware that I will end up putting in our garage sale this summer. I also gave some stuff away to the lady next to me, which was great because it lightened the load a lot.
Next, I bought this old glass rolling pin, which Sarah thought looked very suggestive. In reality, I bought this to use while baking, as it was just last week I made pizza dough and realized I had no rolling pin.
The lady next to me said I need to get a cork for the end, and that way I can put ice water in the rolling pin while using it. Apparently the cold will help your dough roll out more easily.
I also bought this cool book for Zach, which has lots of useful information in it.
I’ve been thinking of upping the number of servants in our household, and this book confirmed that I probably should.
Here are some things we didn’t win:
Sarah and I both wanted those green canisters, but they ended up going for like $40 or something. If we got them cheaper, they would have been an easy eBay resell. Oh well.
This hockey game would have also been an easy item to resell, but it too sold for a high price, around $50.
And look at this great, retro table! It wouldn’t fit in my car, otherwise I’m sure Sarah would have bought it.
She also would have bought this Beagle, but she wasn’t for sale.
We waited around until the end of the auction because there was some stuff that Sarah wanted. I got us “2 Pop” again, and then went to wait in line to check out. For some reason, this place has a woman who can’t do math who checks everyone out. It literally takes 10 minutes for each person in line. I waited in line while Sarah bought her last items, and then paid for both of us when I checked out. This let us hightail it out of there pretty quickly so we were home at a reasonable time.
This guy in the background also had some pop, but he obviously brought it with him:
Also of note here is Sarah’s equally hilarious and confusing expression.
-Erin
Update from Sarah: I don’t know why we thought that man with the two-liter was so funny but we did. Also, can you believe that beagle?! Oh my gosh, I was obsessed. Her name was Maggie and she was 7 months old. She also had on red nail polish. Her owner, a hipster-looking guy, told me that she was a “princess” which was sort of an odd thing to hear from a guy like that.
In the end, I got a few cool things. First, this cool map of the Detroit river from 1952:
I also got these cool old rulers:
And I also got this JC to match my Mary from last time.
He’s also busting out the immaculate heart…
Finally, I got two things at the end of the night that I had to wait around for. First up was this cool vintage book of valentines.
Quite adorable!
Also adorable are these vintage doll heads from Japan.
The only annoying thing about these were that the auctioneer made me pay $7.50 for them. Absolutely nobody else was interested in them, but he would not go down to $5 once he knew that I wanted them. Still, I have a feeling they’ll sell on eBay!
2 Pop
Last Wednesday, I somehow convinced Erin to go with me to an auction in Windsor, Ontario. If you’re unfamiliar with the area where we live, Windsor is just across the river from Detroit. This wasn’t the first time one of us had dug for treasures internationally, but it was the first time we had gone to an auction in Canada, so we weren’t sure what to expect. Turns out, Canadians don’t like spending a lot of money at auctions, which was awesome for us.
I reminded Erin to write down some directions since you quickly lose cell service once you cross the border. She obeyed.
I’m particularly thankful that she added this extremely important step: “Straight into tunnel.” I think we might have missed it if she hadn’t written it down.
Turns out, Erin gets the heebie jeebies in tunnels. She kept breathing deeply and asking me if I thought there was too much carbon monoxide in the tunnel from cars idling.
Does that look scary to you? I didn’t think so.
Once we convinced the border agent that we weren’t drug smugglers, we were on our way. When we arrived at the auction, it immediately seemed different than other auctions. Then I realized this was because the auctioneer had a Canadian accent and kept saying DOLEars, instead of dollars.
Here are some pics of the offerings:
Cool table with a built-in ashtray on top that you can’t see.
Erin was obsessed with that hideous chair. I have no idea why or how.
Action shot of me investigating stuff on the stage.
So I really don’t know what this place was, but there was a stage at the front of the room with this rickety old rail-less set of steps leading up to it. The auction started at one side of the room…
…and all of the stuff was on tables along the outer edges of the room. As it progressed, they finally got to the front where the stage was, and Erin was obsessed with watching the employees have to carry these trays of breakable items down that rickety old staircase. It was actually pretty insane.
There’s an example. The woman is holding a tray of breakable figurines that she brought down from that stage behind her. Every time someone had to walk around with one of these trays, it was was like watching a person balance a crystal vase on their head. You were basically wincing the whole time, hoping they didn’t drop the tray.
Here are some pictures of some other items that were up for grabs:
Boom boxes.
A vibrator. Look how pumped he is to be displaying that thing!
Ok in all seriousness, we both came away with some cool stuff. One of the first things I noticed that I wanted was this vintage wall hanging of a boy eating corn on the cob. I thought it would look adorable in my kitchen.
Of course, I left with this little dude in my possession. It has a little hook on it where we could hang keys, so it’s also useful! And Adam likes it! Double win.
This auction lasted forever because there was so much stuff, and the auctioneer milked every last dollar out of people. He started getting annoyed that people wouldn’t bid high, but it’s sort of like, if you immediately let on that you’re willing to sell things low, why would we bid high?!
Anyway, I also ended up with an old, pretty minty copy of Abbey Road. I thought it might be worth a lot but it’s not a first pressing. If you ever stumble across a copy of Abbey Road that is in good shape and the back cover looks like this, grab it.
The two things of note on this are the “misaligned apple” and the lack of “Her Majesty” listed on the sleeve. Some also claim that first pressings are missing “Her Majesty” on the record sticker. Mine doesn’t have these things, but it’s a really nice copy of the record and I only paid $10 for it so I’m happy.
I also purchased a box of records and one of the best covers was this:
I’m a little ashamed of the quantity of stuff I came home with. A lot of it was stuff that came in lots and I only wanted one thing out of the bunch. Oh well, the rest can go in the garage sale.
Overall, I had a blast at this auction. It was really good people watching and I got some cool stuff. A few of the items I’m going to save for future posts because I love them so much.
Hopefully Erin will update you all about the fight she got in with the auctioneer over a pair of dirty moccasins.
-Sarah
Update from Erin: That tunnel is so scary because it is under water…a whole giant lake of water. One day that tunnel will collapse because you shouldn’t build tunnels underwater. You shouldn’t even build tunnels through mountains. In fact, everyone everywhere: STOP BUILDING TUNNELS.
When we walked into the auction I was excited that there was so much stuff. I instantly fell in love with some old tapestries that were described as “Egyptian.” I don’t know if this is true, but I ended up with them. I paid $15 each, which is pricey, but I knew there wasn’t much else in the auction I would end up buying.
Look at that cute little frowny person!
The next tapestry had a fish design. It’s pink, but I still like it.
I appreciate these because 2 years ago I took a weaving class and it was so hard. I made a tapestry that was about 5 inches wide and 3 inches tall and it took about a month to finish. Oy.
I was laughing so hard at the workers carrying huge trays of breakable items because it reminded me of Food Network Challenge. If you aren’t familiar with the show, then this joke is lost on you. Basically, on that show, people spend about 8 hours making huge elaborate cakes, and one is chosen as the best. However, before the cakes can be judged, they have to be carried to the judging table. The whole thing is unnecessary, but the precariousness of it all creates some mega drama. Here’s a clip:
Total bummer.
So anyway, a while into the auction, Sarah and I were super thirsty. The problem was that neither of us had Canadian money to buy drinks (we planned to pay for our purchases on our debit cards). The snack bar didn’t take debit card, so I decided to go cash out all my purchases, and while doing so, have the cashier tack on the cost of 2 drinks to my total. She did this, and then handed me the following:
I looked at her confused. What the hell is 2 pop? And why is it on this paper? Of course, this was my token of sorts to go collect my beverages. Very funny. Also funny is that “2 Pop” was Sarah’s rap name in high school.
I got my 2 pop and joined Sarah back at our seats. Now, this part is important: Because I cashed out, I no longer had a bidder number. That was ok because I didn’t plan to buy anything else, that is, until some great old moccasins went up on the auction block. I had obviously overlooked them. I didn’t take a photo, but the moccasins were similar to these I found online:
The auctioneer started at a price of $30 for these moccasins, but no one bid. He then went down to $20, and still no one was bidding. At that point, I chirped out a, “$10???” asking him if he would sell them for $10 since no one was bidding. Now let me say, that ALL NIGHT LONG people were doing this sort of thing. The auctioneer would be stuck at $10 with no bids, and someone would yell out, “$5?” and he would accept their offer. He even went as low as $3 on many items.
In my case though, he looked at me, ignored me, and then continued to repeat, “$20? $20? $20?” Still no bids. I scrambled to get Sarah’s bidder number from her, and then I raised it and said, “I’ll take them for $20.” I said it like this because he was looking away from me, and I was trying to get his attention. When he heard me, he set the moccasins back on the table and then snapped at me, “TOO LATE.”
I was so angry. This was super rude and idiotic. All night long this auctioneer was milking extra dollars out of people. One person would be bidding at $5 for something and he would incessantly repeat “$6? $6? $6?” This drew out the auction process too long, and the crowd was getting annoyed. The auctioneer was apparently also annoyed, considering how he reacted to me.
I approached the auctioneer after the auction was over. I first said to him that I was very sorry if I offended him by offering $10 for the moccasins, but that I did so because other people were making offers all night. He claimed that he didn’t even hear my offer, which is strange because later in our conversation he referenced me making this exact offer. Whatever. I asked if I could buy the moccasins and he said no (of course) and I explained that it was sad how spiteful he was acting. He told me that the moccasins are “worth WAY more than $20” and I reminded him that that was HIS price he tried to auction them for.
It was clear our conversation was going nowhere, and I knew from the get-go that he was not going to sell me those moccasins now, or ever. I let him know one more time that it was sad how an item that would be cherished by someone was now going to sit unsold, and that I’ve never seen someone make it so hard for me to give them money.
He said that he will auction these moccasins again in the future if I want them, but I don’t know if I will go back. Actually, who am I kidding? I will probably go back. GIMME THEM MOCS.