Monsters for Sale ©

I love a good garage sale, and when I say good, I don't mean the ones with the dirty second-hand clothes or the one where the items are marked like it's a second-hand store. I refer to the ones where items are reasonably priced and aren't just a bunch of junk that should be taken to the tip and immediately buried.

There's an artist by the name of Tom Zarrilli who has created artwork out of things he has found in garage sales. I can't imagine making anything interesting out of Tupperware, cutlery and a collection of 1964 Reader's Digests, but perhaps he's more creative (or strange) than me.

Have you heard about the 127 Corridor? It's plugged as the world's longest yardsale and stretches for a staggering 1,052km (654 miles). Thousands of people put their items up for sale all along the corridor. They've even started something similar in Australia - the "Garage Sale Trail" where communities or suburbs are encouraged to put on a huge garage sale on one particular day of the year.

Frankly I'd like to be the person who purchased some old glass negatives for $45 from a garage sale and they turned out to be worth more than $200 million. Rick Norsigian thought they might be reasonably valuable when he spotted them, but I'm sure he was blown away when it was discovered they were the long lost negatives of the artist Ansel Adams. If I ever purchased something for $45 from a garage sale, I'm sure I'd find out later that it was probably more likely worth $2.

One garage sale I would love to have attended was the one held by the Melbourne Theatre Company. Can you imagine what kind of interesting things they'd have for sale? Unusual costumes, scenery, and some amazing props I'd imagine. I understand they even had a blue rickshaw up for grabs - I ask you - how many opportunities do you get in this lifetime to purchase a rickshaw, let alone a blue one?

What gets me is the different names they have for garage sales: 

• yard sale - do they charge by the square metre?
• jumble sale - should that be jbulme sale?
• car boot sale - why would you need a spare car boot?
• flea market - I can just ask my dog to find me some fleas.

I know it's childish of me, but I can't help giggling when I see signs for a "Monster Garage Sale." Part of me tries to imagine what kind of monsters they might be trying to sell or what kind of people would want to purchase a monster in the first place. Hopefully they've considered some important questions such as:

• How would they tie it up? Manacles in the garage? 
• What would they feed it? Toddlers? Leeches and scream? Ghoulash?
• What if gets sick and loses its fur or its tail? Perhaps they'd need to refurnish it or go to the retailers. If it gets a sore throat, they'd need to give it medicine for gargoyling.
• What kind of exercise would they give it? Fetch the postman? Squash? Or take it to the football match and let it be the ghoulie.
• Would it need shots? Well, at least a few bullets wouldn't go astray.
• Would they have a sign on their gate something like the following:  

And I don't want to even think about what's required to clean up after it when it goes to the toilet. 

And need I remind you - don't ever pet the monster on a Chewsday. ©