Featured Letter: Nothing more terrifying than a tag sale

To the editor:

Last week, I went through one of the most terrifying experiences known to man: a tag sale.

With the aid of a local company specializing in these things, I watched helplessly as literally hundreds of people descended on my house and garage, leaving what resembled the remains of a locust plague straight out of the Old Testament. 

Now, it’s my opinion that at least 9 out of every 10 people are decent, pleasant and polite. It’s the remaining 10 percent that are unbearable and give the rest of humanity a bad name. Proof of this theory can easily be witnessed at events like a tag sale.

Let’s start with people following instructions.

Despite the newspaper ad saying the sale would start at 10 a.m., with a “sale closed” sign planted in the front lawn, people were already milling around at 8 a.m., openly objecting to not being let in until the appointed hour. Next comes common courtesy, not so much toward me but to my neighbors whose driveways were being continually blocked by cars whose owners obviously believed they were somehow exempt from having to walk like everybody else. Once inside, the fun continued as, here and

there, sour-pusses could not refrain from criticizing every thing they saw.

“This is all crap.”

“None of this is worth anything.”

“Are they crazy with these prices?”

“I have one of those already.”

And, finally, to their hapless spouses: “Aren’t you done yet?”

Then there were the people who attempted to switch tags, others who tried walking off without paying, still more who left major parts of their purchases behind like lids and handles, and finally those who would lay personal items down, forget where they left them and begin yelling that someone had stolen their cell phone, purse or the heirloom they had purchased earlier, at another sale.

But the grand prize of the entire affair goes to the person who stole a banana from my kitchen counter.

Thanks to you, I finally had a legitimate reason to heed the immortal words of Rodney Dangerfield: “Hoo boy, you’re gonna be drinking early today.”.

Patrick Lohn, Southold