I Was Interviewed for the eBay Scavengers Podcast!

A few days ago, I had a really nice time talking on the phone with Jay and Ryanne Dedman, the eBay Scavengers.  They are really nice folks who moved to a rural area where living was cheaper, and they make their living by selling stuff they find at auctions, yard sales and thrift stores.  They also grow some of their food and make things, and they're friends with my friends Wendy and Mikey of Holy Scrap and Good Life Lab fame.

Our phone call was recorded and edited and became the Scavengers' latest blog and podcast post (#91).  For about two years, the Scavengers have been blogging about all different aspects of eBay selling--where to find inventory, how to sell, how to pack and ship, etc. A lot of their blogs and podcasts are about the eBay selling lifestyle, and they've featured Wendy and Mikey in several.  For easy reference, there's an topical index.  

Jay, Ryanne and I specifically talked about my eBay business, operated out of the Beluga, a 35-foot Class A motorhome.  They wanted to know where I find my inventory, how I decided to concentrate on selling vintage scarves, how I ship while I'm on the road, etc.  The podcast lasts about 20 minutes and I hope anyone who is considering selling on eBay while traveling will find it helpful.  (I'm also working on a book, but it is not finished--you will definitely be able to read all about it here when it is published!)  To activate the podcast, just click on the "Play" triangle button that's under the photo of my RV. 



   

Selling Off My Excess Inventory

Be honest with me--Does this chair make me look fat?

Two blog posts in two days! It must be spring! I must be getting invigorated. Maybe it's that big nearly full moon.

Last night I was on the phone with Steve, who is visiting family in Tucson, and I had to put down the phone and close the door because my cat Sonja was trying her darnedest to get out the screen door and play in the moonlight with the coyotes and other creatures of the night.


I spent most of today putting box lots of 50 scarves each out on the kitchen table so I could photograph them. I got the photos all taken, uploaded, and cropped, and then I wrote up the auction descriptions and launched them. I'm offering a total of 400 scarves (8 lots of 50 each) on eBay at bargain prices. My hope is to have less stuff to take back to New Mexico, as well as having a little traveling money.


Normally I list scarves individually. But sometimes they don't sell right away and I have to decide whether to re-list them individually or save them up and sell them in lots like I'm doing today. I also include scarves in these lots that I chose not to list for one reason or another--maybe a minor condition problem or maybe I just am not that impressed with the scarf and I'm not sure it's worth selling on its own.


I am always glad to get some return on my investment when I sell these lots. I am probably going to sell these scarves at a loss, when you consider what I paid for them and how much it costs me to list them online. Then there's the value of my time--huh! Sometimes it's best not to think about that! I had a couple of self-employed friends over last weekend, and we all agreed we probably work for 35 cents an hour. But, regardless, I'll be glad to get something for these scarves, rather than having to just give them back to a charity thrift store.

I'm one day closer to getting back to TorC, and getting these scarves listed felt great. Hurrah!

Man-Cave to Casbah

Happy Hippie indeed.

Hi guys and gals, as well of those of you who are unsure or unwilling to commit. In my last blog post, I shared with you that I was having a busy week listing lots of scarves on eBay during a free listing week for eBay store owners. It was a great success, so the past week I've been packing up the items that sold and getting them to the post office as quickly as I can.

It's been very reassuring to me to see that I really can make a modest living from my business, so long as I'm willing to devote enough time to it and live frugally. I'd previously had some success at this level, but it was back when I had a large suburban home where I could devote an entire room to eBay shenanigans. To achieve the same results in an RV took me a while.

It wasn't just the smaller space--it was also getting to the point of settling down to business. I spent a year kind of treading water in one place after my marriage ended and then another year wandering about, both geographically and in terms of how I made a living. For a while last year, I actually had a job. After a time, I came to realize that working for someone else, even just part-time, was distracting me from my real work, which is self-employment on eBay and as an artist and busker. So I am beginning to buckle down now and do what I need to do.

Today I got an email from eBay about some upcoming policy changes that present new challenges. Every time I just about figure out how to be a top-notch eBay seller with stars and ribbons showing potential buyers how reliable and trustworthy I am, the rules change. Now I need to decide whether I can provide one-day turn-around on my shipping in order to maintain my privileged status as a Top-Rated Seller. Can I do this, living on the road? I don't know yet. I have a couple of months to practice before the new policy goes into effect.

Silk Ceiling

So, you are probably wondering what all this has to do with my title, "Man-Cave to Casbah." Actually, I have to give Steve credit for this title. While he's been dogsitting in Ajo and I've been living by myself in Why, I've been getting a little creative, bring colors other than brown and design elements besides the bones, feathers, skins and skulls of dead animals into Steve's 5th wheel. While sorting through my many hundred scarves to pull out the best designers and brands, as well as green scarves for St. Paddy's and florals for my spring sales, I uncovered some hippie fodder...hand blocked silk scarves from India. Today I stapled them onto the ceiling of the cab-over bedroom. Hence the title.

Rumi in the living room

I've also been taking down some of the yellowed paper on which years ago Steve printed out some of his most beloved sayings, and I've been painting the words directly on the walls. That's right, commitment. With me constantly finding new ways to improve his home, I'm sure Steve feels trepidation every time he comes out here to visit me. But he still keeps showing up and fortunately he has been happy with the results thus far. My next redecorating projects involve using up some of my vintage fabric cache to cover cushions and make curtains.

My first mandala

For a while this winter, my creativity seemed to be kind of dried up. But the practical art of redecorating has gotten it flowing again, and now I'm spending a little time each day drawing. One of the items on my bucket list was to create mandalas and now I am thinking of making some greeting cards, combining mandalas with the quotations that I've been gathering for daily posts on FaceBook over the past year. Mandalas are a natural for me, because I love to doodle and, like any mosaic artist, I'm mad about geometry. Most types of art work integrate your inside and outside, but mandalas are particularly great for this because you can choose symbols that hold special meaning for you.

Mesquite honey from Indigenous Nutrition

In closing I'd like to rehash some old business from past posts. In my last blog posting, I mentioned that the blooming desert is causing me hay fever, a condition I thought I'd left behind when I came to the Southwest. Who knew that such tiny flowers could cause so much sinus congestion and headache? I sure didn't. I thought about taking pictures of these little blossoming bio-hazards, but Roxanne has already done it for me. So I'll just mention that I'm trying a couple of ancient remedies this time around rather than just popping Zyrtec and they seem to be helping me.

While it's debatable whether local honey actually helps immunize you from the effects of pollen, I sure do enjoy slathering a full tablespoon of mesquite honey on my toast each morning. If nothing else, it soothes my throat while going down. And there is no doubt in my mind that using my neti pot once or twice a day is helpful. Once you get past the revulsion of having stuff coming out of your nostrils, nasal irrigation rocks! I've also begun using lavender oil instead of antibiotics for the rosacea that usually starts bothering me by late winter, and that rocks, too.


On a final note, there was a very interesting article on Yahoo! News today about the reopening of portions of Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, ten years after their closure to the public following the killing of a park ranger by drug runners. For my friends living in other parts of the U.S., this article gives you a little bit of a feel of some aspects of living near the Mexican border. In a short time, though, I have become inured to the loss of civil liberties that occurs each time I travel around here (although I'm sure I would be far more stricken by their lack if I wasn't a pinkish, blondish Norwegian-American). Most days, the beauty and peace of living in the Senoran Desert allows me to forget about politics and crime.

All By Myself

Nicole Miller silk pocket square handkerchief, designed for Absolut

That Celine Dion song, "All By Myself," is such a cry-in-your-beer number. Personally I just don't understand it. When I am by myself, I get to sleep in the middle of the bed and take all the covers and all the pillows and eat whatever I want, whenever I want, and be completely self-indulgent. What's wrong with that?

Pierre Cardin equestrian scarf with knights in armor

Steve is house-sitting for friends in Ajo for five weeks. I am not. I'm staying out at Why with my cat. Sleeping in the middle of the bed, taking all the covers--no, wait, we've been through that already.

YSL pocket square

I thought about taking the Guppy into Ajo and moochdocking in our friends' back yard, but Steve's job involves small dogs who are very excitable about cats, among other things. I would've had to confine Sonja to the Guppy, yet the dogs would probably still bark at her. So I'm staying home.

Is there an Echo in here? No, but there are lots of them in my eBay store

And it's perfect timing to be All By Myself for another reason--I'm in the middle of a Free Listing Week for eBay Store Owners. Uploading an auction listing usually costs me between 35 cents and $1.00 per scarf, depending on how much I'm asking as an opening bid price. I still have to pay other costs to eBay and their Paypal subsidiary, but I am saving some bucks.

D is for Dior

And it's perfect timing to be doing lots of eBay listing, too, because I bought a shitload--wait, can I say that in my blog?--of scarves recently. Okay, make that a Guppyful of scarves.

My buyers seem to like Talbott's mosaic design as much as I do

A couple of months ago, a lady was selling a box lot of scarves on eBay and she mentioned in her auction description that she was downsizing and getting rid of a life long collection. I won that auction and emailed her to ask if I could buy the rest of her collection, which she sold me at a very reasonable price. I think I've gotten 12 Priority Mail Large Flat Rate Boxes of scarves from her, which is something like 1000 scarves. So I'm listing, listing, listing, and am glad the listings are free.

Sometimes I list to the left, but that's about my arthritic knee and my politics, not eBay.

Vera! This is Vera Neumann, not Wang or Bradley

Having this huge inventory of scarves is great. It's like somebody else went to a bajillion thrift stores and already picked out the best scarves and then mailed them to me for a lot less money than it would have cost me to do the same shopping, with gas at $3.69 a gallon here.

Nautical tall ship scarf by AV

So I'm working hard and Steve is, too, and when we're done, it will be starting to get too hot to stay here in southern Arizona, and we'll pack up and go back to New Mexico. We plan to spend the summer in Truth or Consequences, but we may travel somewhere northerly in midsummer when it's hot in TorC. We don't want to get too tied down being wage slaves this time around. And then in the fall, we are thinking of heading east to Florida rather than back west to Why. But who knows? That's a long ways off yet.

And the Oscar goes to...

In the meantime, please enjoy looking at my scarves on eBay.

Steve came out to Why today and made me fish tacos for lunch. Tomorrow he's coming out to make a new door to cover my propane tank compartment, since I keep losing doors along my travels. He's fashioning the new one out of an old metal Stop sign.

So I'm not completely All By Myself--we have visitation.

Nothing comes between me and my Calvins

An update on my son Sly--he has qualified for SSI and is receiving a small monthly check while living with his dad. The amount will increase when he lives elsewhere, and he's actively seeking a place to live. Seattle is expensive, and he's looking at getting some help through mental health organizations that place people in affordable, supported housing. It's all kind of up in the air right now, but at least Social Security has come through.

Hmm...do you suppose Anne and Calvin are related?

And another good thing is that Sly's hallucinations have stopped since his meds were changed, and now it seems unlikely that he is schizophrenic, although he has been diagnosed with Cluster B personality disorder traits as well as severe depression. But it looks like he will get his antidepressants increased once he's completely off of the meds that were giving him scary delusions.

This Scaasi is HTF and EUC in eBayese

It is difficult watching Sly's challenges from afar, but even if I was closer, it is essential that he start learning to find and get help on his own. And he is doing this. I pray every day that he can continue to work towards being independent or semi-independent without any huge crises, but, of course, this is outside of my control and would be even if we lived closer to each other.

Thank you for the kind comments and interest there has been about Sly. I really appreciate knowing that others care.