OK, I'll admit it. I turned 40 last year and it's turned me into a crank. Not that I didn't have all the makings of one when I was in my 30's, but flipping over another digit on life's little odometer has brought out all my potential as a irascible, middle-aged guy. Things that I used laugh off, now irritate me like canvas underwear.
As a seller I try to take a grin-and-bear-it attitude. After all, the customer is always right...right? But between you and me, there are some incredibly annoying parts to this online auction thing and here's just ten of them:
10) People who use wallpaper backgrounds in their auctions. They're slow-loading, and most would give Ken Kesey flashbacks.
9) Buyers who include nothing but a check or money order in an envelope. No auction number, no item name, no user name. You must think you're sending payment to Karnak! [Ina just asked me who Karnak is. An old Johnny Carson joke. If you have to expain,...]
8) Fuzzy photographs. Look, I said I had just turned 40, and my eyes are already on the way out...I DON'T NEED YOUR HELP!
7) The credit card spam I now receive since I started using online auctions. If I accepted all the offers, I'd have enough credit to purchase a small island in the Florida Keys.
6) Telling a buyer how much it's going to cost to ship an item, then going to the P.O. and discovering that you can't send it that way.
5) 300 kilobyte item images. We don't all have T1 lines in our homes!
4) People who email me to ask what my reserve is. Here's a suggestion: Bid and find out!
3) Broken picture links. I'm bidding HOW much for that little box with the red X in it?
2) People who use music in their auctions. Have you ever heard a MIDI version of "Funkytown"? It's like being trapped in a Muzak-filled elevator.
1) Buyers who "round off" the amount of payment. No kidding, I've had an item that sold for $102 and had someone send me a check for $1000. No explanation...nothing. Well guess what...you know the 12-piece set of stemware you won? I just rounded it down to 10!
Nit-picking? Maybe. Aggravating? Definitely!
Now stop bothering me, I have to go find where Ina hid my reading glasses.
