This is a rather cruel thread for me. I gasp to remember what I've left behind.
All my life I have had the knack of being at the right place, at the right time (natural born scrounge)
but with no money.
I have seen so much stuff, from Oklahoma to California.
Yard sales, swap meets, junk shops and antique shops. I have had regular reserved spaces at swap meets where I shopped yard sales and sold at the meet. I was first customer at innumerable yard sales (when the best deals of all happen) and I was at the swap meet, in the dark, for dealer setup time.
I had a junk shop of my own. I have put unmentionable miles on old wreck cars and trucks traveling and looking. I go to swap meets and junk shops on vacation! My truck engine fails to run in the presence of a yard sale sign. It simply won't move!~
I was wanting/trying to collect tools before hardy anyone collected tools, and prices were for dirt.
But never cheap enough for me.
Oh I always came home with something. There was always some little goodie I could afford. I have hundreds, maybe thousands of cool little things to show for my life.
But the auction catalog cover tools, or anything I could sell for more than a few hundred each?
I saw them alright. All for sale, and for a fraction of their true value.
But bring them home and call them my own?
Slim to none, is my lifetime record.
Now you know why I began to make tools from scratch. It was the only way I could have anything great.
yours Scott