How can they sell that?

[Stinky The Clown]

So I was watching Pawn Stars. These people come in and have the most amazing stuff they want to sell.

Wow! What's that?

Wow, wouldja LOOK at that!

Wow, I remember those!

And on and on. The sellers have some great items. But it amazes me how they can bring themselves to sell such cool stuff. I have all manner of old crap lying around and my wife is worse than me. We collect everything, including the dust.

I once sold an old Mont Blanc pencil made in the 1920s. It used large lead, like used in a china marker (like a grease pencil). I got, as I recall, three $3,000 and a gold fountain pen and pencil set. To this day, I regret having sold it. I've always thought I would rather have paid the value of the pen and pencil set, forgo the cash, and still have the pencil. I cite this as but one of several examples. I have regretted just about everything I've sold or thrown away.

They "why" is inexplicable except to say it is my. I'm a collector. Not a hoarder, a collector. I know every damned thing I have, where I got it, and what I paid for it.

I simply can't imagine selling stuff.

Our kids are now all over us to start clearing the crap out. We wish they appreciated it, but they don't. They see it as clutter.

Anyway . . . . as I watch Pawn Stars I keep thinking about this.

How do you bring yourself to sell this crap?

[grasswire]

1. I don't like to sell many things either...

...but have had to do so because that's how I made money for six years or so in eBay heyday. I've had some extraordinary paper come through my hands. One lot was about eighty pieces of 18th century correspondence in a prominent New England family. Aggghhh! But I sold it. Another group was the journal, papers and photographs of a female professor from Holyoke College who went on expedition in Palestine in the 1930s. Gah! Sold that too. And a bunch of papers and maps from early 19th century Kentucky. Sold that to a museum. In fact I've sold quite a few things to museums.

I don't like to let paper things go.

[Stinky The Clown]

2. We used to find old family photos

that bothered us. Who would not want to keep such stuff? It seemed sad to us.

I once came upon a huge collection of 1/25 scale plastic model cars from the era of my childhood. That bothered me, too.

I dunno. I must be a real sap.

[grasswire]

3. oh I know.....the family photos

How very very sad. I see them all the time. But one time I was walking down the street past a second-hand shop and looked into the window. There on a display was the wedding photo of my aunt and uncle! Ha! That was startling.

One time I bought a postcard collection from the early 1900s composed of several thousand cards sent by a young man to his mother as he worked as a traveling salesman along southern Canada. A slice of life, it was, and very sweet.

I miss picking -- haven't done it much for the last couple of years.

[Kat45]

5. I inherited a lot of family photos, and I have no idea who many of the people are.

In photos from when I was little, I know who most of the relatives are, but not all of them. Then there are really old pictures of people from the generation before my parents', and I have no idea who they are. I assume they're relatives, but I can't be sure. Some of the family photos that you'd find are probably a similar situation where nobody has any idea who is in the photos, thus they don't mean anything to them. Of course in other cases, the people probably just didn't care.

I've kept, and likely will continue to keep, the photos because I like that sort of thing. I'm also a pack rat, as was my mother, and I have a very hard time throwing out lesser things than those. My mother died three years ago and I still haven't finished going through everything, and I'll still have to go through it all again to decide what to do with things. I believe there are a number of things I could sell, but finding out the value and then finding the people who would be interested in buying them will likely be a big job, which I don't look forward to.

[grasswire]

6. Stinky, think of yourself as a curator.

You have ferreted out and preserved many gems. You kept a collection and kept it safe. That's not a sappy thing -- that's a love of design, style, and history. And quality.

[safeinOhio]

4. Use to not want to sell anything.

Now, only if I use it all the time or I have it displayed where I see it all of the time. Yard sale stuff, auction stuff, old family stuff, pretty much all just stuff now that I'm older. No kids to pass it on to anyway. The big kick for me is to see something nice and be able to say "I use to have one of those".

If I can make a buck, I'm happy.

Those that sell it cheap to a pawn shop are just lazy. With graigslist and consignment shops and auctions, why give it away?

I use to have a friend that owned a pawn shop. They never buy stuff for the price you see them offer on the TV shows. They never call in an expert. They just offer what they would pay for a fake. Then sell it for what they can get.

[Stinky The Clown]

7. Hewwo Widdle Lonely Fwankie

Hahahahaha

What a pathetic mess. Must suck to be so lonely, so devoid of human contact, so lacking in social interaction, that you have to invent life narratives of people you encounter in the most casual and chance of ways and peep through the fences at them when you encounter them again.

You're right. I'm done with you, too, you sad little man, but only so long as you and that pack of morons you incite stay on the shunning course. Lesson: leave people alone and they'll leave you alone. You can have your lonely little corner of the internet, but only so long as you leave unwilling participants out of your unhealthy, creepy, flights of fanciful fictionalizing. Treat them as you would be treated. Find a healthier outlet for your fixation on other people's lives.

Maybe date your hand more often. Yanno?

[sufrommich]

8. Um. Either this is in the wrong place or you're being way too

hard on yourself.:smoke:

[northoftheborder]

9. It's great to know there are other people out there who.....

....appreciate old things, and their history, and/or value. When you must sell, due to need for cash, or need for space, or other reasons, what is the best venue for doing that? I used to think E-Bay was terrific, as I have bought a number of things on there; but now, it seems, that many, many items seem to not have any bids at all. I've never sold on E-Bay, but think the overhead costs must be less than consignment shops, which charge 30-50%.