Tag Archives: pawn shop

Consignment

Consignment: (n) agreement to pay a supplier of goods after the goods are sold.

There are three of them.

Yes, three different interactions with human beings that are disconcerting because they require a certain amount of trust in a stranger, which seems completely irrational.

May I start with a car mechanic? I don’t care who he knows, who knows you or who knows him.funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

When you are bringing your vehicle in to be checked over, you are walking in the assumption that this attendant standing before you, glibly relating what has befallen your transportation, is speaking the truth.

Now why would he do that?

We don’t trust anybody else that much.

If you live in a household with children, you don’t bake three dozen chocolate chip cookies without finding a really good hiding place. Even though they’re your children and you’re supposed to trust them, you don’t.

But we take our cars–and put them in consignment–to a complete stranger under the assumption that he is going to love that four wheels as much as we do, and for some reason, give us a good, jim-dandy deal.

Secondly, a pawn shop. I suppose if you get desperate enough to go and pawn something, it may not really matter if it works out well in the end. Survival may be so important in the moment that considering future moments might be irrelevant.

But what’s to keep a pawn shop guy from tearing up your ticket, selling your thing, making some profit and then pretending he never even saw you before?

So to a certain degree, we consign to this broker virtue that just may not exist–because we are desperate to receive a financial fraction of what our item is worth.

And of course, finally and obviously, there is the actual consignment store. You bring in your clothes or your used appliances, and they agree to set them out for people to buy–and later they present you with a check. And you have no idea if it represents any fair portion of the amount for which they sold your treasure.

So please don’t come to me and say that you have difficulty putting your faith in your loved ones or your trust in God.

For any person who will believe a mechanic, a pawn shop broker or a consignment store owner, should believe everybody

 

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Checkmate

Checkmate: (n) in chess, a check from which a king cannot escape.

Rudy was not rude–but he was very stubborn, especially when it came to chess.

He loved the game and had practiced it since he was a boy of five, and now, at sixteen years of age, he was anxious to take on all comers. He loved to obliterate the competition, bragging about how few moves it took him to conquer.

He was certainly obnoxious.

He was so bratty that everybody wanted to play chess with him just to pull him down a peg or two from his glory perch in the sky.

Everybody but me.

I had learned to play chess when I was very young, but never liked the game that much. Even though I realized stating that aloud made the smug and the pseudo-intellectuals believe that I was stupid, I still found chess to be slow and over-rated.

So I had no intention of playing the game with Rudy the Rude. (I changed my mind. He was rude.)

This frustrated him and caused him to put out vendetta after vendetta, and eventually he told me that if I could beat him, he would give me five dollars and if he won, I would owe him nothing.

I thought it was time to risk my ego for the possibility of remuneration.

Call it what you will–an alignment of the stars, a lucky few moves, Rudy losing concentration, or maybe me just being better at the game than I thought I was–well, I beat him.

Checkmate.

He went ballistic. He was so angry that he nearly accused me of cheating–except that our little match had gained an audience of about twelve people, so there were witnesses.

He reached into his wallet, handed me five dollars, and screamed, “Double or nothing!”

Now, let me tell you that I possess many vices. For instance, I’m obese. I’m kind of lazy. I need to work on my consideration, like every son of Adam. But I am not bone-dead stupid.

Possessing the Golden Ring, it is not a good idea to go to a pawn shop and hock it. I wasn’t about to give Rudy another opportunity.

I think it nearly drove him crazy–because every time he began to discuss his God-given ability with knights, kings and rooks–there was always somebody who had been at the great match, and was prepared to remind him of his Waterloo.

Thank you for enjoying Words from Dic(tionary) —  J.R. Practix 

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Brain

j-r-practix-with-border-2

Brain: (n) intellectual capacity

A friend of mine bought a German shepherd. He did so as a means of protecting his house.

He named the dog Rugby.Dictionary B

Rugby was probably one of the sweetest animals I’ve ever encountered in my life. I was absolutely enthralled with the kindness of this creature, but certainly convinced that Rugby was incapable of guarding anything. He was even patient with the four-year-old child who lived in the house, who was enamored with the animal’s nose, and continually tried to pluck it from his face.

I laughed at my friend when he insisted that Rugby was a replacement for a burglar alarm.

Then one day we went off on a brief shopping trip. As we returned, pulling into the driveway, we heard barking and growling. It sounded very aggressive–frightening to the ears.

Stepping into the house, we discovered a terrified gentleman penned in the corner, held prisoner by a very intimidating Rugby.

Apparently the man had decided to come into the house to steal some items to sell at the pawn shop–only to discover that the house was well protected by a deceptively dutiful German shepherd.

The man begged to have the dog called off.

As soon as my friend called the police, he motioned to Rugby to come to his side, and the family pet returned–with a wagging tail and a panting tongue.

You may ask me what this story has to do with the brain. Here it is:

The brain is like Rugby.

It doesn’t have any natural inclinations of its own, but only brings forth its training when the situation arises.

  • If you think being smart makes you generous, you are sadly mistaken.
  • If you believe that a formal education causes you to be ingenious, you will be disappointed.

A brain is merely a “thing” until something breaks in, and it does what it was trained to do.

 

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