Wrey's Wrandom Thoughts

First topic message reminder :

After having posted some pictures of Fiestaware in the Mine! thread, I had cause to think back on my time working the antiques and auctions circuit. It was a very interesting life making a living that way. I wouldn't recommend it to everyone, but as a hobby it can be really fun. Here are some things I learned during that part of my life that might prove useful to anyone who wants to collect.


1) Learn everything you can about what you collect.

For every kind of item that is being collected, there are all kinds of fakes out there, of varying qualities, from laughable to nearly undetectable. Read everything you can so you don't get taken. Very few auction houses will expressly guarantee that the items up of bid are beyond all shadow of a doubt genuine. Almost always you will be told to look the items over carefully. Once bought, yours to keep.

2) Book price is for suckers.

There are only three things in the world that have undeniable, inarguable value: food, water, shelter. Everything else is arbitrary. That is what the auctioneer for whom I worked explained to me. I cannot tell you the number of times I had to tell sweet little old ladies that they would not be living in the lap of luxury after the sale of their Hummel collection. They would hold up their well worn Hummel books and say things like, "But here in the book it says that Little Girl with Two Ducks is worth $500! What do you mean it sold for $25!" :rant:

Here's how book price works:

Every collectible item goes through periods of vogue. Last year it was worth nothing, this week it is the hottest thing, next month you can't give it away. That's just the way it goes. Books on these items rarely get published until the item is showing some movement in the antiques and collectibles community, and almost always just after the item has hit its peek price. The book price represents the highest price the item has ever sold for, and represents the item in its most pristine and perfect state. The problem is that the peek price of an item is often its own death knell. The item's price pushes it out of the average Joe or Jane's capacity to purchase and the item starts to get passed over both at auction and in the antique store. The market for the item falls out and = No can sell. It also often means no can buy as well. This happend to me with the fountain pens I collect. When I first started looking for them, any make, any model could be had for $25, $30. Fountain pens, along with a number of other men's collectibles started to take off and the prices went through the roof. Books got published. The prices got stuck at an exagerated mark, and stopped moving. I would visit antique stores time and again and see the same fountain pens gathering dust months, even years later. Which leads me to the next tip...

3) Collect things you like. You may be stuck with them.

This is not too big of a deal for the hobbiest because it is normally in the nature of the hobbiest to collect things they like. But if you collect with the intent to sell some day... well, just don't put all your eggs in one basket.

4) Watch e-bay!

One of the best places to get real (or at least more realistic) market values for antiques and collectibles is via online auctions. Still not perfect because there will always be that person who is willing to pay a rediculous price for an item for personal reasons.


So, um, yeah! That's me for today. More Wrandom thoughts to come.

Hey everyone. Haven't had a random thought post in a while.

Yesterday I was looking through a box of memories. You know the kind. A shoebox filled with little odds and ends that you just can't throw throw because they have memories attached to them. I found the St Ends side of one of these:



The girls on the forum will know only too well what these are. Rarely do fellahs' buy, get, or give these charms. But, as you all know, I'm not your regular kinda' fellah.

I gave the Be Fri side of one of these charms to my best friend when I was in high school, Scott. We were in JROTC together and both of us were on the guys' exhibition drill team. I had the biggest, most angsty, unrequited crush on him that ever graced the halls of any high school. So complicated, the whole thing. He was, of course, as str8 as a laser beam. Anyway... I gave him the other side of that charm during military ball (like prom, but just for JROTC.) When I think back on it, the whole thing embarrasses the living daylights out of me, but at the same time the memory is kinda' sweet. He took the charm from me with grace, now that I think back on who we all were during those years.

I made Thai red curried chicken and veggies over the weekend. Yum^10

Stir fry the fresh veggies!



Serve the yummy red curry!

One man's treasure is another man's...well, you know the expression. Being an avid meat-eater and equally avid veggie-hater, I must admit, I see no saving grace in that photo. As a child, that's the kind of stuff I was punished for refusing to eat...made me hate it all the more.

The good news is YOU can have my share! LOL

If you make an internet or phone purchase for goods or services that may recur, your bank will not have the capacity to stop further charges from coming from said provider of goods or services unless you cancel out the card you used and have the bank issue you a new card with new number.

They will not do a stop payment on these kinds of electronic transactions via debit card the way they can with a transaction by check.

I have a Visa Card with a $300 limit. Every year they bump it up to a couple thousand and I call them to decline the increase. They're always surprised when I tell them I like the low limit. I use this card for internet purchases so that my total risk in case of fraud or disagreement is not more than $300.

NaClmine wrote:I have a Visa Card with a $300 limit. Every year they bump it up to a couple thousand and I call them to decline the increase. They're always surprised when I tell them I like the low limit. I use this card for internet purchases so that my total risk in case of fraud or disagreement is not more than $300.

Extremely good planning on your part. Total open credit is, of course, one of the major factors taken into account when making the really big purchases in life. The fact they they have offered these increases to you means you will get a yes in the future should you need to ask for an increase without leaving your total open credit too high.

NaClmine wrote:One man's treasure is another man's...well, you know the expression. Being an avid meat-eater and equally avid veggie-hater, I must admit, I see no saving grace in that photo. As a child, that's the kind of stuff I was punished for refusing to eat...made me hate it all the more.

The good news is YOU can have my share! LOL

So strange how perspective can alter perception. Lemme' 'splain.

It's 1970-something. My family is stationed at Offutt AFB in Omaha, Nebraska. We're living off-base. I'm the only Puerto Rican boy for ba-jillions and ba-jillions of miles. There are some Mexican kids, but they have quickly deduced that I am not the same kind of Latino that they are, so I find no purchase with their group. Ergo, I'm feeling very much a fish out of water. Nothing but cows and corn for an eternity and the only kids able to pronounce my name correctly will have nothing to do with me.*

My best friend is probably the nerdiest kid in school named Richard. He lives one street over from me, so well within my allowable roaming range at that age. I am a very polite little boy, so I am welcome at Richard's house for dinner on the regular. They have veggies all the time! No veggies at my house. So to me, the veggies were what they ate. And by they, I mean everyone with simple easy names like Richard and Tammy, Mike and Greg. Pretty blond hair and blue eyes.

Veggies = The seemingly blissful life of the other kids.


* In either second or third grade, my teacher messed up my name so badly at the beginning of the year that I ended up as Ravioli for the whole year. Yeah.... Ravioli.

My name is actually Reinaldo.

Wreybies wrote: Extremely good planning on your part. Total open credit is, of course, one of the major factors taken into account when making the really big purchases in life. The fact they they have offered these increases to you means you will get a yes in the future should you need to ask for an increase without leaving your total open credit too high.

Already have the "yes" on big credit . . . my other credit cards have $20,000+ limits, so it's always amusing to me when I "demand" a $300 limit on one card.

Regarding "veggies", my mom was one of those common folks who invoked the starving millions in Ethiopia. And, I was that smartass kid who offered to ship his veggies to the poor, starving children. Fortunately, my wife is an avid veggie eater so our children got at least one decent role model and most of them like veggies.

Reinaldo huh? Not an uncommon hispanic name. Hard to believe a school teacher would struggle with that one. Non-hispanics might have trouble trilling the "r" but the rest is pretty simple.

LOL!!! Your funny.

Okay, I had a migraine earlier when I read today's responses in this thread and just went and lay down. Now my head doesn't hurt so much and I get it. I think...

You're not to blame, Gary. That convo was going in a couple of different directions at the same time.

Wrey's fiesta ware
Hey, did you know the red-orange fiesta ware glaze is radioactive ? Fact. I used a broken saucer for a demo source when training Fire fighters for years because I didn't have to futz with licenses, placards and approved locks and so on to own it or have it in my van. The glaze contains uranium oxide. Makes a Geiger counter talk like crazy within a foot or so.
Not to panic-I know of a ninety year old woman who has a collection big enough to create a radiation area about six feet from her china closet. The last I knew she thought the whole concept was funny as heck-she got the collection from her mother who lived into her eighties, though the daughter has added to it.

If you ever see one of the big serving platters, even if chipped or cracked, for a halfway reasonable price, let me know. I’ve been looking for one for years.

CS

Yup, sure do. My vintage Fiesta was collected while l was attending U.F. in Gainesville, FL. During my college years, one of the many jobs I had was working at an antiques auction house just south of G-ville and just north of Micanopy on the 441. Learned all kinds of stuff concerning the antiques and collectables trade.

chuckS wrote: Hey, did you know the red-orange fiesta ware glaze is radioactive ? Fact.
CS

Cool concept . . . serve your guests raw food and let them watch it cook! LOL