Storage unit crap

It’s been several years since I bought my first and only storage unit.  It was huge and full of crap. On Saturday, I bought another unit.  It was smaller, and, unfortunately, full of crap.

To be fair, it looked like crap from the outside, but it did have two nice looking portable display cases, the kind that you see at estate sales in which the proprietors display their jewelry. Other than that, there were boxes, and two wooden end tables without their glass tops.

There was no “wow factor” that I could see.

However, I surprised Ella, and myself, actually, by bidding and winning at $80.  The fact that it started to rain just as the auctioneer said sold should have been my first clue that it was a waste of money.  After paying our bill, we braved the sprinkles to check out the contents.  Much to my display, it seemed to be mostly Christmas decorations.  By then, the sky had opened up, so we decided to clean it out on Sunday.

Late Sunday afternoon, I decided that we had procrastinated long enough, so we made the short drive to the storage unit and got to work.    We performed triage on the unit, with one pile for stuff to keep, one pile for stuff to trash, and one pile for stuff to donate.  Thankfully, the trash pile stayed relatively small, but the donate pile kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger.  The keep pile wasn’t as big as I would have wanted, but it made for easy storage, and we just walked the stuff around the corner to our actual storage unit for which we pay monthly.

Beside the two display cases, we kept some camping gear (lanterns, flashlights, cook stove, etc.); some vintage Christmas crap for our antique booth; and assorted odds and ends that Ella deemed worthy. 

We then loaded the rest of the stuff in the truck; donation crap went in first, followed by the real crap. I then found a dumpster to offload the real crap, then dropped the donation crap at Goodwill.  Since it was after 6 p.m., I just put it out beside their donation door.

The two tables without their glass went to the curb in front of our house.  Even though the tables were rained on for two days, some kind crafty type person finally picked them up.

The whole process, from digging through the small unit, to disposing of the trash and donations, took approximately three hours in the late afternoon sun.  Thankfully, there were no surprises, other than the leather satchel that contained medical items, including a broken stethoscope, and assorted blood collection vials.  I was glad that I had put on my gloves before pawing through that bag.

Was it worth the effort?  Probably not, although the two display cases are nice.  The vintage Christmas ornaments might bring a little in our antique booth, and the camping items probably will just sit until I find a way use them (I’ve only been camping once in my life).  

While loading and unloading the truck in the heat, I remembered why I don’t buy storage units very often.  It ain’t like they show it on TV.

Elsewhere in the land of Barry’s Books, I’ve made a concerted effort to declutter the house.  I started by sending six boxes of toys to Amazon (FBA) this week.  I am also donating five totes of religious books to the hospice thrift store today.  The books were part of the pastor’s library that I purchased, and, while truly nice, aren’t worth much more than a penny each on the Amazon marketplace.  I kept trying to figure out some return on investment for them, but decided that I was tired of bumping into the totes.  So, off they go.

I also made good on my promise last week of not thrifting on Saturday, and have been determined to follow suit this weekend.  Unfortunately, a plethora of sales, including several church and estate sales, are tempting me to fall off the proverbial wagon.

It's hard to be strong when there are bargains to be had.

Have a great and productive weekend everyone.