Acquisitions, Sailboats and The Clampetts go to New York

The stories in this column are true. Averett lives a dull life in rural Southside Virginia with his wife Management, two children and a rotating assortment of goats, dogs, cats, snakes and other local fauna.

As you know, one of my sideline businesses/hobby is buying and selling stuff. As long as I sell more than I buy or as long as I sell for more than I spend my bride Management is happy. She really prefers one in and one out with a profit but sometimes the profit justifies rebuying more than one.

That issue she has with my collection of stuff cluttering the landscape is unreasonable. In fact, all of my collection is on the east side of the estate leaving her with three sides uncluttered.  Do you suppose I should negotiate for another side to balance the décor?

A few months ago I added another boat to what Management kindly calls my Armada. The number of boats sitting in the yard and in various spots is not really my fault. I intend to blame the chickens. When you get into the habit of thinking of eggs in dozens it is an easy slip into thinking of other things in dozens.

Another flaw in my mental processes is looking at a map and deciding that a trip looks reasonable. Last week we had to pick up a boat in New York. According to the map, New York City is just (Averett holds his thumb and finger five inches apart) a little ways. Before Christmas I bid on a little boat in New York on an online auction and won. Now, winter is a good time to buy a boat before the masses are thinking about spring or boats. The prices are cheap. This little boat had a requirement that it be moved within seven days, which made it even cheaper.

So it happened that I bought a boat that had to be moved within seven days, was 500 miles away and I didn’t even have a trailer it would fit. This is what makes the acquisition and transportation of stuff fun. I called around until I met a nice guy who agreed to move and store the boat until I could pick her up.

As an interesting side note, it happens that New York has a ridiculous tax on cigarettes. Just the tax on cigarettes is more than the total cost in Virginia.  Cigarettes in New York sell for three times what they do here. This means that a guy going to New York to pick up a boat could pay for the trip with five cartons. He could pay the marina fees with eight cartons and could pay…. Not that any of that matters since only criminals would bootleg cigarettes. Besides, I discovered long ago that I am allergic to jails.

On the other hand, it would be foolish to make a trip to a place that charges $15.00 a pack for cigarettes without an adequate supply on hand.

The only issue was that Clampetts in New York thingy. The Godfather (of my brats not the New York one) drove and he has one of those nice girls who hide somewhere in the dash and give him directions.  I don’t know what he did to annoy her but she apparently was mad at him. Just as we hit downtown New York she advised a right turn. Then for the next hour or two (it seemed like four) we toured places tourists don’t go.

We drove through the Bronx, Queens, Staten Island and past some monuments and a statue of a lady. We drove through some neighborhoods where our kind obviously didn’t fit in.  By our kind I mean country boys pulling a boat. We did get some strange looks though.

Then we stopped for gas and met a lady who was apparently from the welcome committee. She was very friendly, but I don’t know why her office was beside a lamppost.

After we finally escaped and returned to the interstate about a mile before THAT ugly right turn, the girl in the dash tried to get us to do it again. We declined.

In any case, we had a nice trip, picked up the boat, returned home safely and with cigarettes to spare.