"The Concert Tickets"
A few months ago we got tickets to the NIN / Jane's Addiction show at Merriweather Post. Last week we heard that the Beastie Boys were playing at Rams Head Live the same night. We took the gamble and were successful in getting Beastie tix even though the show sold out in 8 minutes. (Ticketmaster still sux tho).
As soon as we got the Beastie tix I posted the NIN / Janes tix on Craigslist. I didn't get any hits until Sunday night but that person never wrote me back. I got two more hits last night so I went with the first guy. I called him - we set up to meet at Little Havana later in the evening - and that was that. Ok so far.
So hubby and I meet up with the guy at LH, I gave him the tix and he gave me the money (which I counted there). Thanks, thanks, and the guy was on his way.
So that was easy. But why? Is it easier when dealing with big ticket items or was it this guy didn't have any drama? I'm at a loss to explain... i'd like to conduct more experiments but the rest of the stuff i have to sell isn't really worth much... i'm about ready to toss some of it. I just need to look up when it is "electronic / hazardous waste" disposal day for the city...
Monday, June 22, 2009
Tuesday, June 09, 2009
ass
I am blogging from the train with a guys ass totally in my face. Not fun. I really wish I could figure out how to turn the sound off when I take pictures with my bberry.
Too funny - these irritating people just realized they are on the wrong train. Good job losers.
Too funny - these irritating people just realized they are on the wrong train. Good job losers.
Monday, June 08, 2009
Adventures with Craigslist: Parts I, II, and III
Prologue:
We have a lot of crap. So much that it is really hard to park in our garage. Ever since we combined households (5 years ago), moved into our new house (3 years ago), and got married (1 year ago) we have so much stuff that we don't use and will likely never need to use again. So what's a person to do? Craigslist of course!
Part I: "The College TV and TV stand"
Hubby purchased this TV in 1996 after moving into a house with a bunch of guys and NO ONE owned a TV. After a few weeks of "getting to know you," board games, and rounds of asshole, he couldn't take it anymore and decided to purchase a TV at Walmart. I was a nice big TV (at the time) and he also bought a Nintendo 64 to go with it. Why not?
This TV made it though college and several moves before ending up in Baltimore. In '02 (i think) hubby decided to purchase one of those fancy flat screen TVs. Although this TV was a flat screen it is also 3 feet thick - a huge TV - and the old TV migrated upstairs and became the bedroom TV (see part II of this story for what happened with the "original" bedroom TV).
On Christmas of 2006 my dad gave us a really nice gift certificate to Best Buy and with that we purchased a new TV for the bedroom. The Walmart TV moved to the guestroom in the new house where it was united with my old TV stand from college that hasn't held up a TV in many years.
After sitting in a room not being used and collecting dust (also not hooked up to cable or DirecTV) we decided to get rid of it last summer.
This was our first experience w/ Craigslist. We posted pics of the TV and stand, all of the relevant info, we still had the original instruction book and remote, etc and we asked for $40.00 for the TV and $15 for the stand. After a few days we got an offer for $50 for both - and they requested that we deliver. I was working in Timonium the next day so I said I could deliver to Owings Mills, no problem.
The next day w/ Hubby's help I loaded the TV and stand into the car and went to work. On my lunch hour I went to deliver the TV.
First of all, the place this family lived was super difficult to find. Of course I google mapped it, etc. but the main road I planned on taking into this neighborhood had a gate across the road. Great. So I had to figure out another way into this neighborhood of apartment buildings and townhouses that ALL look the same. ugh.
I finally find the place and they had to buzz me into the building. I got to their apartment and they showed me where they want the TV. OK.... um... is someone home to help me carry the tv from the car? oh no. Dad is at work and the rest of the extended family that lives in the apartment (2 women, 2 children, and grandpa) couldn't help. really? ok fine.
I went out to the car and carried this super heavy tv into their house. (At least they held the door for me.)
I hooked up the tv to their cable (at least they have cable - see part II) and showed them how to use the remote. Ok works great. Thanks. The entire time I am there they keep asking me why I don't want the TV anymore.
Does it work ok? Yes. Anything wrong with it? No. Then why don't you want it? - It isn't like I can say, "well, I already own 3 tvs and this one has been collecting dust for 2 years and i just don't want it anymore because I can purchase a new tv anytime i want." Geeze. Can I have my $50 bucks so I can get the hell out of this apartment???
After I bring in the TV stand the woman tries to only give me $40 b/c the TV stand is scratched. I told her that the scratches were clearly visible in the pics on the Craigslist ad and that I won't take anything less than $50 otherwise I will carry the TV back to my car. OK she says and gives me the $50. Sweet. I am out of there.
Does it work ok? Yes. Anything wrong with it? No. Then why don't you want it? - It isn't like I can say, "well, I already own 3 tvs and this one has been collecting dust for 2 years and i just don't want it anymore because I can purchase a new tv anytime i want." Geeze. Can I have my $50 bucks so I can get the hell out of this apartment???
After I bring in the TV stand the woman tries to only give me $40 b/c the TV stand is scratched. I told her that the scratches were clearly visible in the pics on the Craigslist ad and that I won't take anything less than $50 otherwise I will carry the TV back to my car. OK she says and gives me the $50. Sweet. I am out of there.
I am barely down the driveway when my cell rings. The sound button on the remote doesn't work. huh? I just checked the damn thing before I left. Damn it! Ok, so I turned around and went back in. The button was just sticky. It worked just fine - you just needed to press really hard to make it work. Again they tried to ask for some of their money back. No way. Once I showed them they just needed to press hard on the button I got the heck out of there and headed back to work.
whew.
Part II: "Grandma's TV"
Hubby's grandmother died in early 2000 and he inherited a small 12 inch TV which became the original bedroom TV. This TV was the bedroom TV until 2002 when hubby purchased the flat screen referenced in Part I.
For the last seven years this TV was brought along on all of our moves but was never hooked up anywhere since we already had more than enough TVs.
Since our last Craigslist adventure was SO successful we decided to finally list a bunch of stuff - an old (and totally unused) Palm Pilot, a diskman w/car adaptor and headphones, an i-river MP3 player w/ headphones, and grandma's old tv for $15. The only hit we got was for the TV. The responder asked if we had an antenna for the tv since they don't have cable. Actually we did have an antenna - an HD antenna - that we didn't need anymore. We said we'll throw in the antenna for an extra $5 - and I volunteered to deliver the TV since I was "working from home" the next day anyway.
The respondent indicated that she only had $18. We said fine. I just wanted to get rid of the thing and we could use the cash to see a movie later that night. So i get to her apartment building - a really fancy building I might add - and she meets me out front. She doesn't want me to bring up the tv to her apartment. She wants me to bring it to the computer lab off of the lobby and plug it in there and hook up the antenna to show her that it works. Really? Ok, if that's what you want. So I hook everything up, turn on the TV and we have snow. Of course we have snow. We are in the basement of a huge apartment building surrounded by computers. uuuggghh.
OK, so I move the antenna around and show her how to get a signal and we sort-of get 3 or 4 channels. I explained to her several times that it will be better in her apartment and oh by the way, i told her that she is going to need cable in an month or a DTV converter box otherwise it won't work (this info was also in the craigslist ad). After 20 minutes! of going over all of this with her - showing her how to use the remote (Apparently she is a Hopkins Grad student from "overseas" and wasn't sure how to operate the thing. great.) she said that since she couldn't get a better picture she only wanted to give me $15 bucks. NO WAY. Look lady - we already came down from $20 to $18 and I delivered it. If you don't want to pay the $18 we settled on then I will take it home. - This was what hubby and i decided. $18 or nothing. - in reality if we didn't get the $18 for it I was going to head straight to goodwill and just donate it. It is the principle of the thing.
So fine - $18 it is. She hands me a wad of $1's which looks like $18 and I leave. I get back to my car (no ticket thank goodness. The woman kept me 10 minutes past my meter) and I counted the money. The woman only gave me $17!!! AAAHHH!!! Geeze - how stingy can you get?? She totally knew that she only gave me $17. It wasn't a mistake. Of course I wasn't going to go back in to get my other dollar - likely she was already upstairs in her apt anyways. Damn. Seriously.
Part III: "the futon"
We have two rooms in our house that we rarely go in. One is the guest bedroom and the other is the "random furniture w/ bookcases" room. This is the room that the Walmart TV and old college TV stand lived in. Also in this room was my futon that I purchased when I got my own apartment in Alexandria after college. The futon hasn't really served any useful purpose for several years but has made all of the previous moves with us... In my effort to eventually turn this "random furniture" room into a study/reading room I decided it was time to get rid of the futon.
I didn't want to deal with haggling over such small amounts of money (like we had to do w/ the TV's) so I decided we would list it for free - as long as the "buyer" picked it up. No delivery this time. We cleaned it up, got all of the cat hair off, took pics and listed it. We got several hits within minutes of posting it. Wow! I wonder if people get notices or something when free stuff gets listed or what. It was super fast. I was kind of surprised at how many people wanted our free futon. One respondent "want to know how much for our stuff?" - um yea. it's free. says so right in the listing in big letters. That guy didn't get it.
We went with the Hopkins student whose boyfriend was going to pick it up later that night. Perfect.
The guy shows up... wait for it.... in a freaking tiny little hatchback civic. Seriously? You do know how big futons are, right? Geeze - nothing is easy around here....
The guy says that actually he only needs the mattress as they already have a frame. Um no. You cannot have only the mattress. Who is going to take a futon frame w/out the mattress? The whole point was to get the entire thing out of the house. AAAAHHH!!!
OK. So the guy says that he will take it but needs to get a different car. So he calls his dad who lives in Columbia and they arrive back at our house around 9 pm. With Hubby's help they get the futon frame and mattress into dad's minivan. Finally - that damn thing is out of the house.
Selling was a hassle 3 of 3 times we tried... These events have made me think...
Are all Craigslist purchasers totally high-maintenance or did we just pick the wrong people to sell our crap to?
whew.
Part II: "Grandma's TV"
Hubby's grandmother died in early 2000 and he inherited a small 12 inch TV which became the original bedroom TV. This TV was the bedroom TV until 2002 when hubby purchased the flat screen referenced in Part I.
For the last seven years this TV was brought along on all of our moves but was never hooked up anywhere since we already had more than enough TVs.
Since our last Craigslist adventure was SO successful we decided to finally list a bunch of stuff - an old (and totally unused) Palm Pilot, a diskman w/car adaptor and headphones, an i-river MP3 player w/ headphones, and grandma's old tv for $15. The only hit we got was for the TV. The responder asked if we had an antenna for the tv since they don't have cable. Actually we did have an antenna - an HD antenna - that we didn't need anymore. We said we'll throw in the antenna for an extra $5 - and I volunteered to deliver the TV since I was "working from home" the next day anyway.
The respondent indicated that she only had $18. We said fine. I just wanted to get rid of the thing and we could use the cash to see a movie later that night. So i get to her apartment building - a really fancy building I might add - and she meets me out front. She doesn't want me to bring up the tv to her apartment. She wants me to bring it to the computer lab off of the lobby and plug it in there and hook up the antenna to show her that it works. Really? Ok, if that's what you want. So I hook everything up, turn on the TV and we have snow. Of course we have snow. We are in the basement of a huge apartment building surrounded by computers. uuuggghh.
OK, so I move the antenna around and show her how to get a signal and we sort-of get 3 or 4 channels. I explained to her several times that it will be better in her apartment and oh by the way, i told her that she is going to need cable in an month or a DTV converter box otherwise it won't work (this info was also in the craigslist ad). After 20 minutes! of going over all of this with her - showing her how to use the remote (Apparently she is a Hopkins Grad student from "overseas" and wasn't sure how to operate the thing. great.) she said that since she couldn't get a better picture she only wanted to give me $15 bucks. NO WAY. Look lady - we already came down from $20 to $18 and I delivered it. If you don't want to pay the $18 we settled on then I will take it home. - This was what hubby and i decided. $18 or nothing. - in reality if we didn't get the $18 for it I was going to head straight to goodwill and just donate it. It is the principle of the thing.
So fine - $18 it is. She hands me a wad of $1's which looks like $18 and I leave. I get back to my car (no ticket thank goodness. The woman kept me 10 minutes past my meter) and I counted the money. The woman only gave me $17!!! AAAHHH!!! Geeze - how stingy can you get?? She totally knew that she only gave me $17. It wasn't a mistake. Of course I wasn't going to go back in to get my other dollar - likely she was already upstairs in her apt anyways. Damn. Seriously.
Part III: "the futon"
We have two rooms in our house that we rarely go in. One is the guest bedroom and the other is the "random furniture w/ bookcases" room. This is the room that the Walmart TV and old college TV stand lived in. Also in this room was my futon that I purchased when I got my own apartment in Alexandria after college. The futon hasn't really served any useful purpose for several years but has made all of the previous moves with us... In my effort to eventually turn this "random furniture" room into a study/reading room I decided it was time to get rid of the futon.
I didn't want to deal with haggling over such small amounts of money (like we had to do w/ the TV's) so I decided we would list it for free - as long as the "buyer" picked it up. No delivery this time. We cleaned it up, got all of the cat hair off, took pics and listed it. We got several hits within minutes of posting it. Wow! I wonder if people get notices or something when free stuff gets listed or what. It was super fast. I was kind of surprised at how many people wanted our free futon. One respondent "want to know how much for our stuff?" - um yea. it's free. says so right in the listing in big letters. That guy didn't get it.
We went with the Hopkins student whose boyfriend was going to pick it up later that night. Perfect.
The guy shows up... wait for it.... in a freaking tiny little hatchback civic. Seriously? You do know how big futons are, right? Geeze - nothing is easy around here....
The guy says that actually he only needs the mattress as they already have a frame. Um no. You cannot have only the mattress. Who is going to take a futon frame w/out the mattress? The whole point was to get the entire thing out of the house. AAAAHHH!!!
OK. So the guy says that he will take it but needs to get a different car. So he calls his dad who lives in Columbia and they arrive back at our house around 9 pm. With Hubby's help they get the futon frame and mattress into dad's minivan. Finally - that damn thing is out of the house.
Selling was a hassle 3 of 3 times we tried... These events have made me think...
Are all Craigslist purchasers totally high-maintenance or did we just pick the wrong people to sell our crap to?
Today is June 8, 2009
Let's see.... what's been going on? Other than my new job and hubby's new job not much actually.
New job is an extention of what I've been doing on the Hill but from a different angle - i'm now a state employee. woo hoo.
It is an interesting switch. I've been thinking like a federal employee for so long that it is hard to turn around and start looking at the world from a state angle. All of a sudden unfunded mandates mean a lot more.
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