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Humor June 2013

Nonstop Shoppers are Unstoppable

By John C. Liburdi

Deliveries are always exciting times for us. We painted reserved parking spots in front of our house to make things easier for UPS and FedEx drivers. We used to have a friendly gal as our postman, but our deliveries have become so heavy that they assigned the mail route to a grouchy muscleman.

Like most other newly hitched couples in the 1970s, my wife and I started out with quite a lot in terms of love but very little in terms of material goods. As time went on, we were able to buy a house and furnish it. In fact, we both became aggressive shopaholics; we pretty much pushed everything else aside in our lives so we’d have more time to accumulate stuff.

When we began searching for a house in the ‘80s, the realtor asked us about location. We explained about our need to be near a major mall and surrounded by lots of big box stores. We then began frequenting them so much that we had the barcodes from their store membership cards tattooed under our forearms—makes for quicker checkouts at the cash register.

At home, we revert to the “distance-shopping” mode. First come the catalogues — and I must say, we don’t mind paying shipping charges for the two pounds of catalogs that come inside each package we receive. We’re also big on TV shopping. Other people watch “Dallas” and the Super Bowl, but we enjoy the shopping channels and long infomercials. Later in the evening, we shift to the point-and-click mode for some Internet shopping. Our credit card is preloaded on 36 shopping websites.

Deliveries are always exciting times for us. We painted reserved parking spots in front of our house to make things easier for UPS and FedEx drivers. We used to have a friendly gal as our postman, but our deliveries have become so heavy that they assigned the mail route to a grouchy muscleman. Naturally, I rent a truck every Saturday morning to collect the store-delivered items I ordered during the week.

As you can imagine, our house is at saturation now. The ceiling is sagging and has big cracks because of the heavy load up in the attic. We did put some of the overflow in our six storage sheds out back. Then we took drastic measures, trading in our big Detroit cars for small Italian Fiat 500s in order to gain more garage storage space.

Yes, we’ve accumulated quite a bit of stuff, and some of it is problematic. For example, the magazine and book collections have turned into silverfish farms. The various generations of Tupperware and glassware are so hopelessly mixed up that none of it matches anymore. And my six thousand dollars worth of woodworking equipment sits rusting because I never got around to building that birdhouse my wife always wanted.

We’ve tried selling some of the stuff, but those idiots who come to our yard sales just don’t understand the value of all these things. Truth is, we don’t put much out because of the sentimental value some pieces have — my wife and I still have our highchairs from when we were babies. However, I did try to give a church charity some of our old clothing; unfortunately, the grumpy old deacon told me to go to hell when he saw what I brought.

I even tried to push some of this stuff onto my son; he rejected it, giving the flimsy excuse that his one-bedroom condo can’t accommodate much. In fact, my son became so disgusted with our situation that he sent us on a mini-vacation to Vegas, which we viewed as yet another shopping excursion. Once he saw us off at the airport, he started phoning for dumpster deliveries and pickups. He purged our house to a minimalist state, leaving only the bare essentials.

When we got back, he proudly announced that he loaded eight huge dumpsters and had them hauled away. He said that just the old magazines and records took up one entire dumpster. I told him I was OK with that, except that there were first edition comic books and some old Caruso 78 rpm records mixed in. Then I stood up on a chair, opened up the ceiling air return register, and reached inside to get my five pounds of antique baseball cards that he hadn’t noticed — worth nearly two million dollars!

In the end, we were pretty happy with what he’d done with the house; it was like getting one of those home makeover experiences they show on TV. More importantly, the house was largely empty, presenting us with an exciting new shopping challenge — how to fill it back up with stuff!

My son’s eyes rolled as I grabbed my car keys and said to my wife, “Let’s get out there honey; lots of really great sales going on this time of year!”

 

Liburdi's recent book "Italian American Fusion: Italy's Influence on the Evolution of America" is available at on-line bookstores and the Kindle Reader.

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