Buckle up y’all, have I got a story for you.
Most people have tinder stories where dates have gone rogue. I, however, have craigslist stories where wanted ads lead me amiss.Why every craigslist ad I answer has to be some circus act, I’m not sure. It seems I’m the Junie B. Jones of the internet. Respond to the ad, STUFF GOES A-WIRE, write about it. Repeat.
It all started with the Free section. If you’ve never taken a gander down that black hole, I highly encourage it. One mans trash is another man's treasure. Usually, I would find scrap metal, rock, or an occasional palm tree. The idea is these people just want this stuff out of their life and for the price of gas and an awkward conversation it can be all yours. Well, after drinking one too many mimosas at the pool, I went back home to my empty, newly moved into apartment and started list looking. I came across this couch that looked to be in highly decent shape. The ad specifically said the couch is yours if you can get it. Could’ve been the mimosas talking but my friend and I were one determined pair to get me that couch.
After my very well thought out “Hi, is the couch still available?” e-mail was sent I anxiously waited for a reply. And when I say anxiously wait I mean I turned on Sex in the City and took a nap. I woke up to a slew of emails which one indicated the couch was still available and I could come pick it up today. SCORE.
Not quite.
I drive a Honda Civic and my friend drove a Volkswagen Jetta. Not exactly couch transporting cars. Defeat hit us HARD. We called friend after friend with a big enough vehicle to see if they were up for letting two entirely respectable, young adults, not experiencing a mini hangover from the sugary mimosas, drive their truck across town and back until we realized Nana had a Ford Escape. We were in business.
A Ford Escape is no Escalade, but it is still a pretty sizable piece of machinery. After going back and forth about if the love seat would fit in the trunk space, we decided it's now or never and hit the highway. Literally, I tripped getting into the car.
Forty-five minutes later we pull up to an apartment complex on the outskirts of Vegas, and that was when reality decided to slap us in the face. It's 9:00 pm on a Sunday night, two girls are going to some strange man's house they met via craigslist to get a couch while wearing flip-flops. Does any of that sound like a good idea? Do you think anyone ever tried to stop us? No... no one said a single damn thing about how this might not be a good idea. At this point, it is Do or DIE. We were doing, so we pulled up and summoned the mysterious internet man.
Expecting an old-man-Jenkins look alike, we were pleasantly surprised when the gentleman was a fit older man that could have easily passed for an ex-biker squad, guitar playing dad. He seemed super excited to get his couch out of his garage, at least that is what we were telling ourselves. Surprise hit us hard when we saw how big of a love seat it was because no way was it going to fit in the back part of the car.
(We have not even gotten to the good part yet, so if you're still reading, just wait.)
WELL, not so old man Jenkins was extremely helpful. He began making all of these suggestions for us on how we could tie the couch to the roof, make two trips, or even call another friend. He was determined to make sure we took this couch.
We started apologizing for how inconvenient we were being. We legitimately thought it would be a slip and slide into the vehicle and we would be on our way. Homeboy Jenkins was not stopping and calls his neighbor out. Now were mortified because this is becoming way bigger of a deal than necessary. I am still in no position to give up a free couch, but I felt so awful at how bothersome we were being. Jenkins (i hope you know that's what we're calling him from here on out) asks his neighbor for a rope. Yep, we are now tying this free couch from the free section on craigslist to the top of Nana's Ford Escape.
Feeling useless in my flip flops, Jenkins and his neighbor strap this sucker down GOOD to the top of the car. We couldn't even believe how helpful these guys were and for nothing at all. I had no cash on me so I couldn't even pretend to give them some compensation. We thanked the gentlemen and scurried along in our family vacation style ride. I was so grateful for their help and expressed to my friend almost the whole time we were driving out of the complex how much I wanted to write them a thank you note once we got home.
It had been like 9 hours since we consumed anything besides alcohol at this point, so we were STARVING and ordered a pizza to eat on the way home.
(Yes, this is where it gets good)
We are about halfway home, no plates to eat our food, with barely any napkins, just greasy pizza and two friends driving down the freeway blasting Brittany spears when I get a text message.
Yes from Jenkins himself.
Jenkins: Hi Jordan. Hope the drive is going well. I just wanted to let you know you and your friend have the most beautiful feet and I have a huge foot fetish. I'd love to massage and worship your toes and feet if that is something either of you two would be interested in, please let me know.
Why. WHY ME?
I gotta hand it to him. I appreciate his forwardness but how does a girl reply to that? "TY but nahh. Thx for the couch."? You're hittin' me with a curve ball here Jenkins. I can't even write back because my hands are covered in pizza grease which he noticed because about 10 minutes later I got another message.
Plz, dont.
Jenkins: I take it neither of you are interested.
Not particularly.
Me: Sorry we were driving. No, unfortunately not, thank you for the couch though. Have a great evening.
HE IS WILD.
Never heard from him again but I did gain a couch, a lesson on meeting strangers and they let me keep the rope.
I do think twice about the free section. I still peruse it just in case some gold pops up. I pick my battles wisely and weigh the pros and cons of what a particular item is worth to me.
Thank you, Jenkins for providing me the ultimate craigslist experience and sorry mom.
So tell me... do you have any Craigslist circus acts you would like to put out there? I am all ears (technically eyes)...
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