The Art of Yard-saleing

I'm convinced that Peter and I would make a good Road Rally Team. We have perfected the art of city yardsaleing. On Saturday morning the alarm is set for 7:30am. This is not for Peter, as he gets up with the sun around six, but for me who could happily sleep until well after the radio shuts off.
One of us gets the paper at Coleman's, the local grocer's and perambulates the pooch at the same time. I say one of us, because it is not always him, but well yes, it usually is him.
I call out the names of streets from the list of yard sales in the classified section while Peter hunts for them on the large map of St. John's. When he finds the street, he writes the house number on the street and the time the sale starts. It is an interesting local fact the some don't start until 10am. Anyone who knows the art of yardsaleing knows that most everything worth getting is got by 10am, so the late starters can allow for more location hits if you can navigate them correctly.
We don't mark down all the sales. We weed out the ones too far away to be practical; Paradise and Conception Bay South for example. We also weed out the ones that are only Sunday (another St. John's oddity) and we discount those that are advertising kid's toys as we know from experience that kids stuff and clothes is all they are really likely to have. We're not in that market.
Once we go through the list, we survey the map to decide which areas of the city are most likely to have the best cast offs. The cardinal rule is; Always yard sale in a better neighbourhood than you live. Rich people get rid of better stuff than poor people. In St. John's we live in Rabbittown, (inner city) but we yard sale in Mount Pearl and the west side (middle class suburbia) Of course there are swanky neighbourhoods right in the city of St. John's itself, but the concentration of yard sale per neighbourhood is much lower than out in the burbs. I'm convinced that the urban elite just give their stuff to black tie charity auctions, or maybe they just pawn it off on their less fortunate relatives. ("We were going to take the Spode to the cottage the next time we went but if you like it...")
Once we have a plan, off we go, usually by 8:30am. Today we had a late start due to the fact that I didn't hear the alarm until the dog jumped on my head. We always use the truck. It holds way more than the car and you never know what you will find. I drive, Peter navigates while keeping an eye out for bristle board signs advertising yet more sales along the way. St. John's is an old city, and the streets are every which way, making route planning and navigation a challenge to the newbie. Once we meander into the suburbs though, the one way streets and cul-de-sacs designed to calm traffic are a different navigation nightmare.
I have an idea that "The Yard Sale Challenge" is the next Reality TV hit. Take teams of 2 people, not necessarily couples, but the bickering that ensues is bound to be funnier. Send them to a city in which they don't live, give them a list of items to buy and a set amount of cash in small bills and change. The fastest team to get the most on the list, with the least amount of money wins. Everything must be in working order to count, extra points awarded for bargaining down. Shooting it would be tricky, but a camcorder on a headset might work.
Today, we hit about 15 sales. Our haul included: a filing cabinet, a CD rack, a desk chair, a floor lamp, a microwave, two book cases, a boot tray, and a cookie tin. Total cost $32.50. Our last purchase was about 10:38am, meaning the whole spree last about 1 hour 45 minutes. I bargained down on the book cases, but the floor lamp doesn't work. We bought it at a church sale. Go figure, we were burned by the Jehovah Witness and we weren't even driving the car with the Darwin Fish on the back. Peter wants to buy a $20 multi-meter to figure out why it doesn't work, but I figure we can buy 4 more lamps for that and one if them is bound to work.