I guess you probably don't know what it's like to almost kill someone but I do. I mean, obviously, I do, I'm sure you assumed that about me the first time we met. I pretty much ooze lethal in the same way a hand grenade does. Or a Long Island Iced Tea.
Lemme tell you how it all happened. My sisters and I loaded into an SUV at 8 o'clock last Saturday morning to head to the Christie Antique Show and Sale where I assumed I probably wouldn't be almost killing anyone. We do it every year, head out to Christie's. Sometimes it's both sisters, sometimes it's one sister and Betty, sometimes it's both sisters and Betty. Always it's an exercise in patience, thirst, lust and hunger. So like sexy time, but way more fulfilling because half way through you get to eat French Fries.
Betty didn't come this year because of the temperature. It hit around 37 degrees on Saturday which sounds cold if you're American but for everyone else, it's sounds like maybe I'm describing the oven temperature for baking cookies. 37 degrees celsius is around 98 degrees fahrenheit.
The show is always filled with hundreds of things you didn't know you needed.
... came, she saw, she bought. She also sweated.
Luckily someone was offering free shade.
Thousands. These two iron urns were thousands and thousands of dollars.
Christie's is the place to go for things you didn't know you needed, know existed, or didn't think you'd ever find.
Did I mention the heat? It was SO hot that both sisters and I were crawling along the ground in search of water when we came across this disgusting, filth riddled trash can. ALL three of us stared at it and exclaimed WATER!!!! No, we didn't notice the filth, or the garbage or the fact that all the bottles were empty and smeared with ketchup. All we saw was glorious water.
It was a rare antiquing moisture mirage.
Around noon we decided it was time to break for lunch. That would be the famous French Fry break.
My favourite part of Chip truck fries is the wood fork which I had no idea you could buy.
This is the moment I came close to taking my own sister's life.
Standing in line to order our food, Pink Tool Belt asked me what I was getting. I said "Fries.", paused a little, then repeated "Always Fries". And that simple phrase was the weapon that almost killed Fish Pedicure. At the same moment I said "Always Fries", she was taking a drink of water and laughed at the same time.
At that point a series of events ensued that would involve choking, laughing, a weird donkey sound, and a most unfortunate incident involving bodily fluid.
I should point out that the Christie Antique Show and Sale is quite a crowded event and the lines for the food trucks are the most congested area in the show. We're all packed in there desperate for a quick meal so we can get back out into the trenches and find that thing we don't need but have to have.
Just after my sister inhaled her water, but before the donkey sound, the man in line next to us, turned to look at what the commotion was at the exact moment she did a good old fashioned spit take. I can still see the entire event as it played out in slow motion. His hand raised up to shield himself, his eyes wide with fear, my other sister jumped aside covering her mouth, but neither one of them moving faster than Fish Pedicure's spray of spit and water.
She spit taked a stranger. A real spit take. The kind you'd learn in an improv class. Or by studying a particularly bad episode of Saved by the Bell.
She continued choking, laughing, coughing and apologizing for the next several minutes as everyone around her looked for napkins to wipe off the spittle.
And THAT is how I discovered I could use humour as a weapon. And a cooling off device when timed perfectly.
This is the exact style of chandelier I'm searching for, for my house makeover. It's am Empire chandelier. But I would prefer one that doesn't measure 4 feet from top to bottom.
Yeah, I mightta tried it on and walked around telling people I wore it to the show while they stared at me through a sweat tears dripping off their eyebrows.
Oh I'm sorry, BACK UP. BACK THE HELL UP.
Recognize that bed?
No?
How 'bout now?
Yup. Sold it off my front porch for $20 or $25. At the show for $95. I'm just glad it's off my porch. But there's something very strange about seeing something of yours, days after owning it for sale at an antique show.
Somebody bought this. They bought the massive mountie! I saw it in the big pick up area as we were leaving.
And that's it.
Somewhere in the pictures from today's post are the things I bought at the sale. Feel free to take a guess. I bought 4 things. Not including the french fries. Always french fries.
Sonia
Go back right now and get the butt jiggler. My friend's rather large mother had one when I was a kid and nothing in my adult life has ever made me laugh like that again.
Therese
After I'd chosen about 20 things I needed, my husband reminded me that I'm in Australia :(
Eileen
hey, I have the goat! or it's little sibling, anyway...found it at a rummagey place on the way back from the beach a few years ago. They're made in Mexico, I think. All kinds of animals and birds, from table-top to life-size (I kinda wanted the life-size giraffe, but I woulda had to raise the height of the porch ceilings. What a fab flea....
Stephbo
I've seen those giraffes, and I'm dying to have one!
Ev Wilcox
I am guessing one of the wooden boxes hanging on the display, and maybe a wooden bowl and spoon. By the way, thanks for the belly laugh about trying to kill your sister. It probably is much less funny to her, but your description of the event was wonderful! Hope you let us know soon what your choices were!
Jane S
Thank you so much for the pictures. Almost like being there without the heat. I wish I had bought your bed when I saw it on your porch. She who hesitates loses the best stuff.
Lynne H
Ok...I HOPE you bought the SHE letters....love them.....and the old blue picnic case....just because I KNOW it caught your eye. And I am thinking you won the antique 'cupie doll-ish' pincushion. And last but not least....I sincerely hope you came home with the crawling toddler in the top hat ....because......just because!
Linda J Howes
I hope it's that ladder. With the right hardware you could set it up to glide across the room on whilst holding onto the ladder with one hand and a book in the other shouting, "By Jove, I've got it!" I've always wanted one of those ladders.
Julie
Could you be our proxy buyer? Show us pics, we pick, you pay, deliver, etc......no, eh!
Would go crazy seeing all this stuff.....but I don't do anything when it's over 75 degrees so need proxy shopper, cheers!
Patsy
I'm thinking that you bought the pizza boards; love and peace chairs (and if you decide not to keep them, I'll take them off of your hands), chicken, and a green glass bowl.
Good times,....ha, ha...
Joslynne
I go with the lion head - just so you!
Sandi
I guess you bought
1. The chicken, to put beside the pen with the real chickens as a decoy for dumb foxes. Or to mark your allotment, so you will remember which one is yours.
2. The library ladder. Because it's gorgeous. Card index drawers to go with the ladder in your new library themed porch.
3.The chandelier, because it's what you want, and you can shorten it, while doing a tutorial and showing the rest of us how to do it.
4. A box of wooden forks.
Phyllis Kraemer
So funny...thank you!
Jody
I hope you bought the four peace and love chairs. I didn't see them but it was so hot I could hardly think straight!!! As my daughter and friend (who has been going since the first show) and I were eating our fries I spotted you and your sisters. Almost spit my fries out saying "there's KAREN!!! you know from the art of doing stuff". So many wonderful and wondrous items to see. We left early because of the heat. Can hardly wait till the fall show.
Karen
:) A few people came up to me during the show. And yes. It was so hot you literally couldn't think straight. I don't think I saw half of what I normally see because it was just so oppressive. ~ karen!
Phyliss Langford
Thanks for all the amazing photos. It,s almost as good as being there. I can,t get there anymore, it was one of my favourite haunts in the summer.
Ronda
so many things I didn't see!! It was just too damned hot! My friend came out of one booth to say a thermometer inside was reading 108F. We dragged ourselves around till 4 in the afternoon, then had to call it quits. Saw you and your sisters walk by as we sat in the shade eating deep fried apple slices. Who bought the yellow enameled pot?
Karen
Ha! Fish pedicure. Great price and it's in perfect condition. I love cooking in those old enamel pots. :) ~ karen!
Sandra Lea
Reminds me of the Brimfield Antique Show here in Massachusetts. Some really cool stuff but why is it those dolls always look so creepy?
Karen
LOL, I don't know. There are always creepy dolls at these shows. ~ karen!
Birgit
Well, I hope you bought the hanging scale and the leather handbag in front of the two ungly chairs Karen. ??
Karen
I already own that exact hanging scale Birgit! Mine is black, which I discovered is brass underneath this winter when I accidentally scraped some of the paint off. I use it for weighing the produce I grow in the summer. :) ~ karen!
Susy
I want it all...then I will sit back in my dragons lair and sort...unlike the other dragons I would have minions to take away the things that aren't exactly right. Dragons are greedy hoarding bastards, but I just want time to appreciate each morsel while deciding which to keep. Then I would graciously gift the rejects. But not to uou, because none of you would want them, as you only want perfect things as well.
Karen
A very well thought out plan Susy! ~ karen!
Kalieris
I don't know what I would do with a giant orange metal sun in my shoebox apartment, but I would love to find out. Perhaps I would paint my ceiling blue, mount it up there, and then tell people I spent the whole weekend outside while really having spent it watching Netflix on my couch.
Marie Anne
I love that sun, and your idea!
Gillian
I was wondering just that same thing! You my friend are brilliant!! LoL
Cheryl
I fell in love with that very same metal goat (and several of his friends) at the Aberfoyle show last month. Unfortunately, I don't have the yard space for even one.
Stephbo
You don't need a yard. I have a metal rooster hanging out in my living room. It's very festive!