If you're alive, a woman, and of a certain age you've been to a craft fair....The ones that are supposed to be the best are the ones advertised as, "Juried" shows. Down here in "God's Waiting Room" (Gulf Coast of Florida) there are tons of these shows. Most of them are the same vendors going from city to city with their little tents and canopies selling their wares to the same people that have seen the same ^%$# before at the other fairs they've gone to down here...But...sometimes you get a bit surprised, that happened today.
The town we stay in was blown off the face of the Earth several years ago with Hurricane Charlie. You can still see signs of damage and the place isn't back to normal yet. The damage was extensive and they lost many of the tourist trap places that brought folks to the area each winter. Consequently, they try all sorts of things to promote the City. There are art shows, wine tastings, evening walk abouts, Arts and culture events (not much art and the culture? well I'm sure they're trying.....). This is the second year they've sponsored a "juried" arts and crafts fair.
Everything here starts in the morning. I guess the old folks like to go and get home before lunch so they can eat, take their naps, have some cocktails, eat dinner, go to bed, then do the same thing again the next day...that is if they haven't gotten killed in a car wreck in the meantime....
I decided to see what this thing was all about. I went alone, because Larry would rather watch paint dry than walk around looking at crafty things. The weather down here has been windy and cold, I knew the place would be quiet. It was. I was the only "live" shopper at the time I arrived. Oh, there were other people there, but I'm not sure they were really "alive".
There were the usual things to see, but there were some very different things as well. A pleasant surprise. I was approached by a woman who dragged me to her booth to look at her wares. She was selling, selling hard mind you, some kind of lotions she guaranteed I would look 20 years younger if I used them...hmmm...snake oil??hmmm...
I let her go through her speech and watched as she smoothed on this lotion stuff on the back on one hand. She spoke to me the whole time she massaged my hand. After about 5 minuted I looked at my hand and it was devoid of all wrinkles and spots....The other hand looked like my grandmother's hand...What could I do? I had to buy the stuff so both my hands looked as thought they came on the same person.....I spent $25.00 on this stuff and ran like Hell away from her before she could get me into her spell again.....
I ran from "snake oil lady" directly into "gadget man". This guy had me mesmerized in 10 seconds flat....He was pushing some kind of grater-scraper thing and a bunch of other "must have" gadgets. Luckily he wasn't as persuasive as "snake oil lady" I only bought one thing from him.....
By that time I was lighter by about $60. and figured I had to make a bee line to my car before I started to turn out my pockets and give them lint....One last person got hold of me and sold me a tee shirt, that said "Group Therapy" it had pictures of my favorite cocktails on the front and a tiny little Martini glass on the back..How could I walk away from that?
All the stuff is in my suitcase...Larry will never know...
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
The Waiting Room
I'm down here in "God's Waiting Room" on the west coast of Florida. I swear each year when I come down here I think it'll be the last...Not that I'm planning on kicking off, but I'm sure I'm going to be killed by some old, really old, shouldn't be driving old, person behind the wheel of a car they can barely see over.....honest.
Coming down here gets us out of the worst part of the winter in the north, but this year I think we brought it with us.... We've seen some pretty odd get-ups on the folks walking around trying to stay warm. The folks at the Goodwill have people coming in there asking if they can "rent" warm clothing. They don't want to buy, just rent....
One lady walking around the Farmer's Market in Punta Gorda had on a ?fur? coat...Now I have to tell you, if I was to guess as to what kind of fur it was I'd have to say, something that should have kept it's coat because it was really bad looking. I followed her around, not so she'd think I was a stalker but long enough to see that the thing she had on her body was a cloth coat (with moth holes) and a fur thing over the top of the coat...It was a black background and the fur stuff was white, gray and black.
As she walked she left a wake of fur balls and strands of something that didn't look natural. Now honestly I'm not being catty, there were other folks looking at her as well. When I got closer to her I noticed she was very old. I'm thinking the coat thing was probably something she got as a present....when she was living in an Igloo in Iceland.
Most of the folks are smart enough to wear layers of clothing and understand the weather is a bit erratic this year. Other folk though, I'm sure they have no idea what they look like when they leave their homes.....
Coming down here gets us out of the worst part of the winter in the north, but this year I think we brought it with us.... We've seen some pretty odd get-ups on the folks walking around trying to stay warm. The folks at the Goodwill have people coming in there asking if they can "rent" warm clothing. They don't want to buy, just rent....
One lady walking around the Farmer's Market in Punta Gorda had on a ?fur? coat...Now I have to tell you, if I was to guess as to what kind of fur it was I'd have to say, something that should have kept it's coat because it was really bad looking. I followed her around, not so she'd think I was a stalker but long enough to see that the thing she had on her body was a cloth coat (with moth holes) and a fur thing over the top of the coat...It was a black background and the fur stuff was white, gray and black.
As she walked she left a wake of fur balls and strands of something that didn't look natural. Now honestly I'm not being catty, there were other folks looking at her as well. When I got closer to her I noticed she was very old. I'm thinking the coat thing was probably something she got as a present....when she was living in an Igloo in Iceland.
Most of the folks are smart enough to wear layers of clothing and understand the weather is a bit erratic this year. Other folk though, I'm sure they have no idea what they look like when they leave their homes.....
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