Yesterday’s task was fairly easy to do. I had decided early on that Saturday was going to be my people task of give.
We were having a garage sale, and we didn’t have lots of furniture to sell (besides my grand mother’s old Singer’s sewing machine), the rest was just “overflow”, as we call it. Things we simply had too many of. Since the weather wasn’t that great to start with, we wanted to get rid of our things. We had decided before hand, that whatever didn’t sell we would give to charity. Having to deal with people all day went much better than anticipated, for me anyway. I’m sure I’ve met some of my "people’s tasks" throughout the day. I listen to some telling me their life stories, I help some carry things to their cars and I gave.
This old Asian couple came by early on. They spoke neither French nor English. The first thing the old man spotted was a pair of ski mitts. Hubby said .25¢. That is when I realised that they didn’t understand our money currencies, either. They didn’t know what .25¢ was. So I took one out and showed them. Then they both got all excited. They bought a big suitcase (that I had bought for the sole purpose to put my wedding dress for our wedding in Hawaii) and basically filled it in. The old lady was funny and excited, picking up little things. I gave them a few things. They left with their new luggage full, and the old man with a winter coat on, despite the heat & humidity! They were a cute couple.
This grand pa and his grand daughter came and walked around for a while – lots of knick-knacks to look at. We had our patio table full of towels, all sizes but mostly beach ones. The old man started telling me how his earring wasn’t was it used to be, and how his wife loved to sew. His wife would cut them into smaller pieces and make rags out of them (I listened!). He wanted to buy the whole lot of towels (over 12) and wanted a good price. I don’t negotiate much (normally) but yesterday I did (for some strange reason!). We agreed on a price and I packed the bunch of them in a big garbage bag and off they were.
Overall it wasn’t a great garage sale (we made about $200.00), but we managed to sell some of the things we really wanted to get rid of like our ping-pong table, an old a/c, a bunch of bed sheets, and lots of other things.
As far as I'm converned it was a good day, where I was aware of my daily task and then some!
Phase Three – Step 19
Today I chose my task to be a “doing” one: Activity.
Since I had to get up early to bring to pooch out, and while I waited for her to do her business, I couldn’t help to think that it was going to be a “glorious” day (yeah, yeah! That’s what I thought!), so I told hubby that we should go for a hike in Oka. We had a quick breakfast, packed a few things and off we went.
What I thought would be one hour or so walk, turned out a bit longer. We were gone for 4 hours! It was such a really nice day. By the time we left the park, there was a line-up, to get in the park, of more than 2 km and it was only 12:30.
We got home, took pooch out for a pee break, then we were off again to run some errands (groceries, good food for the pooch*, rent some movies) then headed home.
Today I really did something different. I normally walk this much on vacation, like in Greece when we walked everywhere. When we got back home I felt exhausted afterwards, and that felt good! That was an interesting way of enjoying spending time out, doing an activity in nature, with no other purpose but to be outside.
* I’ve realised that I’ve became a pet food snob. I want the good stuff for those furry things. Now I’m just hoping that she’ll like her new food!?!
2 comments:
Garage sales are so liberating. I did one last year and definitely ended up selling a lot of stuff for less than I wanted to - but I figured hey, a little money in my pocket is better than none! Plus, I was getting rid of all that STUFF.
That hike sounds great. We walked about 6 blocks to our local Greek Festival last weekend and walked for hours more once we were there. It was great fun!
This is our second one (previous one was in 2003) and that one was really good, but that time we also had a lot more stuff.
Basically I wanted to purge and like you said "a little money in my pocket is better than none!"
The Oka park (national park)is really a nice place. There's a beach (we walked in the woods, along the beach), a BIG camp ground and it's operated year-round. Great for a family pic-nic, the beach has nice sand (not sure about the water), pretty shallow (great for kids), there's a bike path. We went there last winter to snowshoe; nature at about 30 min. from downtown Montreal, not bad!
Post a Comment