FANG THE WONDER DOG

We hadn’t been married for even eight months when decided to get ourselves a dog. We now lived in a little house with a yard and John had almost always had a dog. So, we answered an ad in the newspaper for a free dog…supposedly a cocker spaniel. Back in those days, you didn’t have to fill out any paperwork, or have your home inspected before you could bring your new puppy home. We brought him home the same day and he was so little he could sit in one of my hands, and my hands are not huge.

He was all black and we decided to call him Fang, Fang the Wonder Dog. He had a terrible first night away from his family, so I brought him into bed with us. Of course, he peed at some point and I had to change the entire bed. Bad dog!!!

Back then, you also weren’t asked how long your puppy would be home alone during the day, so when we returned to work after the weekend, Fang was left alone in the laundry room, the floor covered with papers. It was spring, so it wasn’t long before we allowed him to stay outside on a leash during the day. Two things I remember from this time in Fang’s life. First, I used to hang all my sheets out on the clothesline. Without measuring Fang’s leash, I hung them out and came home to find Fang had amused himself for the entire day by removing and dragging my clean sheets all over the yard. The second thing I remember was that the laundry room imprinted as his bathroom. If the door was open and Fang had to go, he would run back inside the laundry room to do his business.

Fang was our first child. He went everywhere with us. If we visited friends, went for a drive, camping, whatever the excursion, Fang rode along. He was welcomed in all our friend’s homes, even when the first time he saw a Christmas tree he walked over and lifted his leg. Fortunately, he’d just gone outside so there wasn’t much. He didn’t do that again.

When AJ was born and got big enough to go out into the neighborhood by himself, Fang appointed himself AJ’s keeper. Years later neighbors told me they always knew to slow way down because if they saw Fang that meant AJ wasn’t far away. Fang quit sleeping in our room and took up sleeping with AJ once he graduated from a crib to a real bed.

AJ, John & Fang

The vet told us at one point that only one of Fang’s testicles had descended, but that didn’t dampen his desire for a female in heat. His first conquest was an escaped purebred dog from up the street. When her owner came looking for her, John had to tell the owner he’d bring her home as soon as the dogs were finished. Apparently, Fang got stuck and couldn’t disengage. When returned, his first love was immediately taken to the vet and spade. Alas, no cute black and white puppies.

         Much later on, when Fang was really old enough to know better, the ugliest dog in the world went into heat. It was freezing cold and about 2:00 am and Fang hadn’t come back home after being let out. John was sure he was at the neighbors hoping to get lucky and refused to walk down the icy street to get him. So, I did and there was Fang, shivering like he’d never get warm, sitting on their back porch waiting and hoping that he’d get an opportunity. I had to pick him up and carry him home because he wasn’t leaving on his own…isn’t that a male for you!

Actually, Fang did get lucky at least once with this ugly female because the last puppy born to her was black. Immediately AJ and the owners began a campaign to get us to adopt Fang’s progeny, but that’s another story.

Like us all, Fang grew older and older. First he became deaf and then blind. On our last trip to our friend’s farm he went along as always. Fang was the only dog ever allowed in their house because the resident dogs were farm dogs. He took the privilege seriously and never had a single accident.

         Anyway, as always, there was a big get together of our friend’s huge family. At one point all the kids went down the road to the horse pasture. Later on, when it was time for us to leave, we couldn’t find Fang anywhere. You would have thought we had misplaced our two-year-old. Absolutely everyone turned out looking for Fang. He was eventually found down the road in the middle of the horse pasture having followed the kids when they went. He was just standing there waiting and knowing that someone would come and rescue him.

Fang lived with us for 17.5 years and in the end, he was blind, deaf and we had to pick him up and carry him outside so he could do his business. The day before the last trip to the vet John dug a hole under the apple tree. He went to work sad and depressed and AJ went to school sad and depressed.  It was up to me to take him to the vet…how hard could that be? I mean, really, Fang was just a dog. It was then I understood that pets really become one of the family.

I called my neighbor to ask if she’d watch Thor while I did this errand. As soon as she answered the phone and before I could even speak, I began to cry. I had to repeat myself because she couldn’t understand me. I cried all the way to the vet. When the vet came to get Fang, I wouldn’t let him go, but had to accompany him.  I watched while the vet shaved his paw and stuck the needle in, all the while rubbing, reassuring and talking to Fang even though I knew he couldn't hear me. I managed to ask how long after the needle came out and the vet told me it was done. I cried harder.

The vet helped me put Fang into a special bag John had readied and I took him back home, but I couldn’t stand the thought of him lying in the garage getting cold and stiff until everyone came back home again. Instead, and perhaps this was selfish of me, I put him in the hole with the Christmas stocking I’d made for him his first year with us wrapped around his head and covered him up.

We went out for pizza that night, and it was a pretty somber dinner except for Thor. Once he understood why we were all sad, he wanted to go home and dig Fang up. The following fall, we harvested Fang apples from our tree and remembered him fondly with stories like those above. Then, too, we had his daughter with us, so he continued to live on and not just in apple pies.

THE FIRST 18 MONTHS...OR SO

        We married, we honeymooned and returned home to our regular lives. There was one big difference…we had a television. Okay, it was black and white Zenith, but this was 1966, remember; and it was a wedding gift from all of John’s buddies. It also included a stand with wheels, so we could roll it hither, thither and yon as we so desired.

          At that time, John was a truck driver and he drove down to what is now the area of the stadiums every morning. I worked in a small detailing office just a few blocks from our apartment and walked. It was all men, and the detailing they did was for structural steel that a plant on the other side of the ship canal produced. I was the entire office, doing all the scheduling, bookkeeping, typing, etc., rather a girl Friday. All these gentlemen, and they were too, had children and more or less adopted me as one of their own. Their combined gift to us was a Hamilton Beach stand mixer which I used for decades.

          It wasn’t long before we gave notice on the apartment because the couple that introduced us told us about a little house in Ballard, just one door from theirs, that was for rent. We interviewed with this much older couple and they agreed to rent to us. It was in the shape of a square with a big porch in front. There was a living room with a fireplace and behind the fireplace was the kitchen. There was a bedroom adjacent the living room and a second bedroom adjacent the kitchen. In between the two bedrooms was a bathroom. Just outside the back-kitchen door was a small space which housed the water heater, washer and dryer. If memory serves, the washer and dryer came with the rental. Our monthly rent was $92.00 and included garbage and water.

          The best part for John was the single detached garage behind the house. You reached it by driving down the alley which pretty much ended at our garage. He and his buddies spent a lot of time working out there doing a wide variety of projects. They all had a great time and I was sort of the den mother or maybe their younger sister. That meant I provided food, cookies, drinks, etc., and pretty much stayed out of the way.

          In return, when it came to painting and decorating, John’s buddies turned to and helped out a lot. It was such fun to decorate that little house which I did as cheaply possible. I don’t know how many of you remember all the house parties a wide variety of companies did back in the late 1960s. In one year, I had six parties, three of them Tupperware some which I’m still using today. I also had a Princess House party, some kind of a knick-knack decorating party, and maybe the last one was a lingerie party. I still have glass from Princess House and some metal birds hanging on the wall. The lingerie disappeared some time ago. I do think family and friends got tired of the parties because the last Tupperware party, I think only one person came. Ah well, I got some good stuff.

          Of course, I couldn’t walk to work any more, so John bought the 1957 Chevy pickup that’s now AJ’s. I took to driving the 1965 mustang convertible until we decided to factory order a 1967 Plum Chevelle Malibu with a big engine and four on the floor. John drove the truck and I drove the mustang/Chevelle. Much later in life John lamented giving up both of those cars and longed to have them in the driveway with all the others.

          The following year we took our vacation after school began and drove south. We planned to end up in Las Vegas, some place we had never been. In the process, John did most of the driving and I navigated. I remember one day we kept driving for far too long and were way out in the sticks someplace. There were no motels, so we ended up going to a drive-in movie where we sort of watched the movie…it was the one with Raquel Welch, One Million BC…and slept until the sun came up. Then, it was onward.

          That day, I navigated us through eastern California. This little two lane road suddenly went through a tunnel. When we came out, we were inside what had once been a volcano. Now, it was completely flat inside and contained a farm. We drove through the middle and back out through another tunnel. It was sunny and whatever the farmer was growing was golden and beautiful.

          On that trip, I made Christmas stockings for everyone in my family. We’d never had stockings, but John always did. I made one for each of us as well. When I wasn’t navigating or sewing or looking out the window, we talked and sang songs and enjoyed our time together. John always did a hell of a rendition of Lonnie Donegan’s song, “The Grand Coulee Dam.” I just looked it up on the Internet to make sure I had the name correct and actually listened/watched Lonnie Donegan sing that song and it turns out I liked John’s rendition much better than Lonnie’s.

          In Las Vegas, we went to see the musical, “Hair,” and were amused by all the much older people in attendance who got up and left once they got a whiff of something aromatic. I’m sure it wasn’t real weed, but they were sorely offended by it anyway. I can imagine the stampede if they’d stayed to the end when the entire cast comes from beneath the parachute silk totally naked. Whoa!!!

          We tried gambling a little bit, but we hated wasting our money. Still, it was quite the experience to be there at that time. The Las Vegas Strip still had all the old neon lights and places like Circus Circus and Caesar’s Palace hadn’t yet been built. We saw “Hair” in the MGM Grand which was fairly new.

          Back home, I wanted to make a ton of stuff for Christmas. I baked and cooked and made all kinds of stuff. Some of it turned out fine and some of it didn’t. I remember this green Jello-like candy that was so gross I just tossed it.  We went to my parents in Chehalis for Christmas and had a wonderful time. They loved their new stockings as well as all the goodies I’d made.

          If memory serves, we celebrated New Year’s Eve at John’s best man’s home. He and his wife had everybody over to celebrate. It was a potluck and we ate and drank and had a wonderful time. When the clock struck midnight, John and I shared a big kiss and then everyone went around kissing everyone else. I don’t think I’ve been to a party like that since, and John remained the best kisser I’d ever kissed.

STOCK MARKET

         So far, the news hasn’t posted anything about people jumping out of buildings or blowing their brains out because of the stock market. At least as far as I know; and since I don’t watch any news beyond the crawl on Good Morning America, I suppose it could have happened. I’m trying not to look at my accounts and dwell on the damage they’ve suffered over the last couple of weeks.

          When I first invested in the stock market on my own, I had just a couple of thousand dollars to play with. I took a couple of classes on investing and did ask one of the instructors if he’d invest my money for me. But it was too little…he was after big money investors. One of the things he did tell the class, however, was that he could put every single penny he had into Starbucks stock and sleep like a baby at night.

          With that instruction in mind, I did a bit of research and signed up for an E-trade account. Initially, I bought Starbucks, Immunex and Esterline Industries, all Northwest stocks. Fortunately for me, Starbucks split a couple of times, so I ended up with the most stock in that company. Immunex was purchased by Amgen, and I received a few Amgen stocks and a bit of money. Just last year, Esterline was bought by some other company, but they only gave me cash. Their stock price was quite high, so I understand why they didn’t want to provide stock.

          Along the way as my account grew steadily, I never took out dividends or any other earnings, but re-invested in companies I researched and decided would be good investments. With the exception of two, which I keep hoping will turnaround, I’ve done very well. At least until the last two weeks. Fortunately for me I’m not sure how to figure out the percentage I’ve lost…and don’t bother providing me with the information on how to do it. I don’t want to know. The last time I looked which was last Friday, I was both saddened and disconcerted because while I’d lost a lot, I’d actually gained some that day.

          When I left City of Seattle employment, I took the funds I’d paid into the retirement system as well as the City’s match. The Zoo Society set up a 403b account and I paid into that for another ten years. When I made the decision to retire, I almost made a huge mistake and signed up for an annuity. Thank heavens I didn’t, because the person doing the sale was selling me the worst annuity you could buy at that time.

          Again, I did some research and bought a couple of books. Using that information, I decided to move my money out of the 403b into an IRA with Fidelity. I’ve been very pleased with the staff and the way my money has done in the last eight years…except for the last two weeks. I also looked at that account last Friday and was pleased to see it had increased by thousands that day. I haven’t looked since because it was already down thousands before last Friday and I’m sure it’s down again.

          In the past in talking about retirement and finances, I often joked about how when I became homeless, I’d cook my cat food on the manifold of my car…do cars even have manifolds anymore? I also joked about knocking on friends’ doors and asking to take a quick shower and do some laundry. I was just joking then and am still joking now. My social security is enough to get me by if the stock market takes an even bigger dive. It just wouldn’t be enough to allow me to spend freely on frivolous stuff or travel much farther than the end of my driveway…which I’m not supposed to do these days anyway.

          I feel very fortunate to be in okay shape when it comes to my finances. I hope the majority of people who depend on stock market returns are doing okay too   and will continue to do so until it begins to make money again, whenever that may be. Meanwhile, I’m going to refuse to look at my accounts and say a prayer of thankfulness when I see the social security deposit in my checking account.

CORONAVIRUS

Sheesh!!! I guess we’re all in the same boat…well not really since we’re supposed to stay six feet apart from any other human. You know what I mean though. Absolutely nothing to do that is outside our homes. Yes, we can go grocery shopping on an as needed basis, but I imagine everyone is pretty much like me. You wait until you absolutely have to go (out of milk) and then dash in and dash out, using hand sanitizer again and again and then washing your hands when you get home.

          I don’t know how many of you saw the article or televised report about the young man, Avi Schiffman, who lives on Mercer Island. He’s 17, has been coding since he was seven and put together the Coronavirus Dashboard. You can find it here:  https://ncov2019.live/data. 

It’s an amazing piece of work, at least in my opinion, and he updates it on a regular basis. In the upper right-hand corner, there’s a little red button that says, “Buy me a coffee.” I haven’t done it yet, but plan to.

          I honestly don’t know if this accumulation of facts is reassuring or frightening. I’m trying to go about the business of living without actually living beyond my front door. Even though I have email, Facebook and my phone, I’m finding myself feeling a bit cut off from life as I knew it. No meeting friends for lunch or dinner or a drink. No deciding at the last minute to go to a restaurant for a meal on my own. No deciding to go to a movie unless it’s on my own television. I’ve a feeling if it lasts until June or July which I’ve heard mentioned, I may be depressed enough to want anti-depressants.

          On the plus side, however, is I now have all the time I want to do the things at home I’ve put off c I was too busy. Of course it’s also on the down side, since when I was so occupied with outside activities, I could excuse my inability to buckle down and get the job done because I was simply just too committed to other stuff. Now, there’s no excuses for not doing projects I’ve put off for days, weeks, months…years???

          So far, I haven’t delved into a book to while away the time, but I could easily do that. The library may be closed, but I can get books on my I-pad. I also haven’t turned to the television to binge watch shows that my friends and family have told me are absolute must-sees. Before coronavirus, I was much too busy to read and/or watch TV.

          Another desirable event, at least this week, is the weather.  The first day of spring is on Thursday and it’s supposed to be 60 degrees. On Friday it’s supposed to be 61. That’s get out there and muck about in the dirt weather. I just may get all those Mexican grasses transplanted from where they are to where I want them. I may also get all the various other big grasses cut back so they can proceed to grow for this season.

          A woman I know said that she makes a daily list of things she wants or has to get done. I begin a list each Sunday and add to it through the week. Out of 13 things currently on the list, I’ve completed six. I’ve also worked on three of them that are a daily chore, i.e., physical therapy, walking and John’s bedroom. Today, I’m three for three when it comes to those. So, I guess I’ll add grass transplanting and grass cutback to the list for later this week. That just leaves four left that I haven’t yet done, although one of them is almost complete.

          Depending on when coronavirus disappears and I can return to the normality of my previous life, if that happens, I should have completed a whole bunch of projects. Maybe all my windows will sparkle from cleaning, all the floors shine, the dust be totally removed, houseplants repotted and showered, John’s bedroom ready for repainting and redecorating, garage sale items priced and boxed…the list should be endless.

          I hope all of you who are reading this are healthy and as happy as you can be with where you’re located and what you’re doing. I’m making the effort, and I must admit that crossing off an item on my list definitely brings a big smile to my face. What are you doing that brings a smile to your face? Any suggestions for activities I could add to my list?

DONKEY AND CARROT

         Saturday, I spent the entire day going through just one box of John’s gold card collection. I sorted them and produced an Excel spreadsheet with the type of card, series number and worth…if known. I even went so far as to list two of them on E-bay, but I was really just shooting in the dark when it came to listing a price. 

          This is just one small box of cards…there’s lots more, and I’m feeling so very overwhelmed by the work I’ll need to do to sell them as well as a variety of other items I know have value.

          Yes, I have someone coming to take a look at this entire mess and let me know if her company can put together some kind of estate sale. However, some of the specialty items like gold cards won’t be the type of item that would do well in an estate sale. These items I’ll need to get appraised and most likely find a way to sell myself. 

          I know someone who will be looking at the family home once the parents pass away. It is filled from basement to the rafters with stuff. Some of that stuff has to be worth some money, but my friend has said she’d just as soon dribble a little gasoline around, throw a match through the door and walk away. I sort of feel like that myself. 

          Now, I wish I’d browbeat John into doing something about his mess. Not that browbeating would have led him to sell one single item, but he could have shared where to go to get appraisals and where to look when it comes to selling these esoteric items. It would also have forced him into putting everything into some order. As it is, I have multiple file cabinets and tool cabinets where nothing is sorted. There are boots, screwdrivers, electric saws, and other stuff I can’t even come close to identifying all jumbled together. That also doesn’t take into consideration the four safes, two of them gun safes. The gun safes don’t necessarily contain guns and the other safes have stamps, more cards and who knows what else.

          When fall came along last year, I figured I’d have the majority of the stuff in the house sorted and boxed and labeled in some fashion. I even thought I’d be selling a lot of stuff on E-bay, but yesterday was the first listing after the initial two I did in September 2019…nothing sold then either.

          Of course, sitting at this computer and writing these blog posts allows me to ignore the need to sort and classify and organize. I really resented spending an entire day going through those cards and creating a spreadsheet. I really resent John leaving me with such a mess. We were retired together for seven years and could have organized everything beautifully if he’d been willing to give me the time, or I’d been willing to be super annoyed and demanding.

          I have a new plan for the coming days/weeks. Once I’ve made my daily healthy trek around the neighborhoods with my neighbor, I’m going to spend the next hour (maybe more) in John’s bedroom going through stuff, organizing and making lists. I’ll need those whether I hire someone to do an estate sale or I do it myself. To encourage me toward this effort, I’m not going to allow myself to sit at this keyboard and do what I enjoy so much more…writing whatever comes into my little mind. That will be the carrot before this donkey…I’ll have to see if it works.

DO I HAVE A PROBLEM???

            I had a few days last week taking tours down memory lane. It was fun and the memories great. It served to remind me just what a special young man John was as well as what a great relationship we had at the beginning. Unfortunately, visits like those still require me to return home eventually, return to my real life and feelings for today. 

          I’m wondering if I may have a drinking problem. For most of my life, I avoided alcohol because alcoholics are rampant on both sides of the family. Well, maybe not on my biological father’s side of the family, so that gives me hope. Anyway, a year or two before John died, I began to have a spot of gin with a garlic stuffed olive and a bit of olive water…a dirty martini if you will at 5:00 pm each day. I never got wasted and only had one each afternoon. I could still cook dinner and do whatever needed doing the rest of the evening. n.b. They're now calling these quarantinis on Facebook.

          This became a habit, one I looked forward to each and every day and more so once John died. I watch the clock and wait for it to read 5:00 pm…no drinking before that. Then, I fix my glass and sit down to enjoy, and enjoy I always do. I think perhaps the amount of gin may have increased since John died. I don’t have to make dinner if I don’t want to, or do anything else besides lock the chicken up and water the dogs before I go to bed. My glass isn’t any bigger and I don’t think it’s any fuller, but my reaction seems to have become much stronger.

          The reason I think I may have a problem as well as having increased my gin allotment is that I usually zone out (pass out?) for a while on the couch with the doggies. I don’t spend the entire night, but I find myself not remembering the program, or parts of the program, I was watching on television. I don’t spend hours like that, but while it doesn't happen every night, it seems to have become a more frequent occurrence. Of course, if I had someone to talk to other than the dogs, I’m sure I would be more alert and with it. I know if I get a phone call, I’m perfectly capable of carrying on a conversation without slurring my words or sounding as though I’m drunk.

          Unfortunately, I don’t want to admit or really think my daily gin imbibing is a problem. You see, I like the way the gin takes the edge off the evening. I don’t feel quite so lonely. I don’t feel quite so depressed. I don’t feel quite so alone because all my feelings and thoughts are dimmed and vague. I like that…a lot.

          There are days where I don’t watch the clock or have a drink. I’m doing other stuff or have met family or friends for dinner. Because of those times, I don’t believe I have a serious problem. I don’t come home and hit the gin bottle afterward. Since I am almost always the designated driver, I also don’t have more than one glass of wine or drink if I have anything at all. I’m cheap and hate paying the big bucks for something I can purchase more cheaply by the bottle.

          What brought this all up was Tuesday night and Wednesday morning of last week. According to my Fitbit, I went to bed at 7:33 pm and slept deeply for two hours and 12 minutes. I woke up at 12:30 and watched television from my bed for 1.5 hours before going back to sleep. Then, I woke up at 7:10 am. When I woke up, I felt sad and depressed and really didn’t want to get up. But the dogs really needed to go out after almost 12 hours in their crates.

          I wasn’t walking Wednesday morning with my neighbor, but had to be at the dentist by 10:00 am. So, the doggies and I snuggled while I had my coffee and cereal and watched part of Good Morning America before turning the channel to Law and Order. I sat there until 9:00 am when I absolutely had to get in the shower. At the dentist, lying back in the chair, my eyes suddenly filled with tears. I managed to control them so no one noticed, but I was inexplicably so very sad.

          So, is it the gin that’s making me this way? Or, is it just the grieving process? I know when my daddy died it was in November. I held it together, didn’t cry or carry on until the following June. Then, it was like a damn burst and I cried and cried and yelled and yelled and was practically inconsolable. Is the gin keeping that grieving action away or not? Or, is this grieving process different since it’s for a husband and not a daddy?

          With the days getting longer and the weather nicer, I know I won’t be watching the clock because I’ll be outside. I suppose if I’m still watching the clock then and continuing to imbibe, or drinking gin at a much later hour, it will be time to reevaluate my gin drinking.

I really have no idea. I don’t think I need to pour out the remaining gin or sign up for AA meetings, but I’m wondering if other widows or widowers have found themselves in this kind of a quandary? Anyone out there have any wisdom to impart…I’m accepting any and all provided.

MY FRIDAY THE 13TH

         No, I didn’t get out and purchase a lottery ticket on Friday the 13^th. I didn’t leave the house at all, not even to go get the mail. I did open the front door to retrieve an Amazon package and a magazine and cookies my wonderful neighbor left for me. But that was it.

          Instead, I accomplished a lot of stuff. The biggest accomplishment was removing all the glass from the garden window by the computer and running it through the dishwasher for the first time in well over a year. While the dishwasher was working, I cleaned the window on the inside. It will be even better once I clean the outside. I even managed to push the desk my strong granddaughter had pulled away from the window back into place once I’d replaced all the clean glass. My goodness how everything now sparkles.

          If that wasn’t enough, I vacuumed the house and did all the laundry. Finally, I fixed myself a scrumptious dinner. I made the first meatloaf I’ve made in probably 50-some years. John didn’t like it. I didn’t use a recipe, just threw in stuff I thought sounded good. Then I cut up a bunch of vegetables and stirred them up with olive oil and balsamic  vinegar before putting them in a covered pan in the oven. It smelled absolutely lovely and tasted wonderful. Therein lies the problem. It tasted so good I had a second helping of both.

At bedtime a few hours later, I still felt a little stuffed, but went to sleep without a problem. I woke a couple of hours later with a tummy that felt as though it held a very large rock. I ate a few Tums and drank some water, but that didn’t seem to help at all. I watched some TV, tried to sleep again, watched some more TV and eventually went to sleep at maybe 4:30 am. 

          When I woke up a few hours later, my tummy felt fine, but so far all I’ve had this morning is a latte. I think I’m starting to feel hungry. I’m not sure about dinner tonight. I figured I’d eat the leftover meatloaf and veggies, but I don’t want another night like last night. I’ll see how my tummy feels at the end of the day.

          I also called the owner of Ginny’s Girls. It’s a company that helps you with your estate or garage sale. She’s going to come on Monday to check things out and talk about helping me with eliminating the majority of the stuff in my house. They do prefer you not be living in the house when they do this, so I don’t know if it will be a possibility. I’m sure I could spend a night or two in my car…ha ha ha. She told me they usually take $1,500 to $2,500 from the first $10,000 and then a percentage of the rest of the sale. Does this sound like a good idea? Has anyone out there dealt with this company? She may not want me as a client and I may not want to be a client. We’ll have to wait and see. 

          In the 51 years I’ve lived here, I believe I have done two, maybe three garage sales. One or two made good money, but the third was a complete bust with a huge pickup load of remainders being donated. Do you, my faithful readers, or new readers for that matter, have any ideas or suggestions with regard to having a company do all the work? Or, do you know anyone that’s worked with a company that performs this kind of service? If you have or know someone who has, I’d love to know the name of the company. I’d also be happy to have the benefit of your knowledge when it comes to successful garage sales if you’d like to share.