Missing my sweetheart, septic tanks and used cars

I must confess that I am really missing Mrs ERJ.

I woke up about two in the morning and could not get back to sleep. I went out to the living room and could only find Herc (the senior partner). Zeus was nowhere to be found.

Five minutes later, I heard a yip. He had gotten himself trapped in the kid bathroom. Kubota had left the dog-gate down and Zeus took advantage.

After paroling Zeus, I laid down on the couch in the living room and fell asleep to the sounds of two, large dogs breathing.

Yep, I am missing her.

Septic tanks

The septic tank guy was scheduled to come mid-day today.

Of course he called at 8:05AM "I am three minutes away."

Keystone cops action. Find shovel. Start clearing clay from the top of the septic tank. Where is the opening.....

I got charged an extra $50 to get it pumped. It was him having to wait for me to get the top of the tank cleared and the fact that the 'solids' were resistant to pumping. Truth be told, if he had charged $200 extra it would have been worth it.

Used cars and inefficient markets

I had a conversation with a younger person (30ish) regarding the "problem" of finding reliable used vehicles at a reasonable price.

He was lamenting the fact that the kind of vehicle he was looking for only lasted ten minutes or so an Facebook Marketplace or Craigslist.

He had never heard the concept "efficient markets" nor had he been introduced to the advantages of shopping in "inefficient markets".

An efficient market is one where every bit of information is instantly available to all buyers and sellers. There are no bargains to be found in efficient markets.

He was shopping for vehicles using Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist because it was efficient. The same reason ten-thousand other shoppers used those venues every day.

"But how do you find and shop in an 'inefficient market'?" he wailed.

"You talk to friends" I said. "Do you have any friends that drive a school bus or deliver mail?"

Then Belladonna piped up, "Or deliver for Amazon or Fed Ex? Or somebody who mows lawns?"

The point is that those people drive tens-to-hundreds of miles every day and see lots of used vehicles inefficiently parked beneath shade trees with "FOR SALE" signs stuck on them. Most people drive past them at 55mph and never see them.

Further conversation moved us in the direction of motivated sellers. An older person who no longer drives or a concerned son-or-daughter trying to remove that temptation is a motivated seller.

The young person had no issues with a +fifteen year-old vehicle if it had low miles and had been maintained. It sounded just like Granny's Buick to me.

The 30ish person's problem was they had no concept of how to tap-into that group of people.

"Well, they go to church and ice cream socials and play bingo. They have Visiting Nurses and Meals-on-Wheels visit them" I offered.

YOU might not know many older people but you know people who might. Or even if they don't know older people they drive past their houses every day.

Just put out the word of your general price-range, age-of-vehicle and miles.

People LOVE to do favors for their friends, especially if it does not cost them any money.