Let's Start the Bidding At . . . .

Miss B was quite a bit younger than her soldier boy.  They were an odd couple, seemingly not likely to be together.  But they were, together.

Miss B was absolutely fascinated with my pregnancy.  Absolutely.   Almost wanted to have a vicarious pregnancy through me.  It was strange.  But her infatuation with my pregnancy is, what I suspect, why she liked to be around me. She'd always ask, "Is the baby kicking?  Do you feel it moving?  What does it fee like?"  She wanted to know every detail.  I think deep down in the darkest recesses of her heart, she longed for a baby of her very own but I think she knew under the circumstances, a boyfriend married to another woman, that would not be wise and so I think she just pretended she, "never ever ever in a million years", as she used to say, wanted to have a baby.

One weekend Miss B and soldier boy invited me to auctioning with them.  I had never been and any reason to get out of my crappy apartment was a good reason --any reason.  So I drove to Miss B's and then we went auctioning.  Like out in the country --miles and miles in between each auction.  Armed with a newspaper, we drove from one auction to the next.  Some of them were just auctions just for the sake of having one and others were estate auctions.  I found those to be rather sad.  I also found that 90% of the stuff being sold was crap.  Junk!  I guess one man's trash is another man's . . . . but seriously, I was bored out of my mind.  Not to mention exhausted out of my mind.  Exhausted.  It was a lot of standing and a lot of walking.  I was walking for two, you know.  Some of the auctions you had to pay if you wanted to bid.  Others just anyone could bid and I was warned more than once, be careful of your gestures as they could easily be mistaken for a bid.

Besides being bored (mostly) and very tired, I found it to be an interesting experience.  I've never seen so much junk in my life.  Ever.  I never heard a real live auctioneer and that was interesting.  At least the first couple of times it was.  After that it was --well, like the rest of the day, boring!

But it also explained the condition of Miss B's and soldier boy's house.  They were auction junkies and junk junkies and that's why their house looked like an episode of Hoarders.  I had some mild interest in finding baby items but this was all old antique-ish stuff *cough* junk.  Miss B and soldier boy were going to renovate their old house to its glorious original old state --and that's why their house was such a mess.

Or maybe it was such a mess because they filled it with everyone else's junk and not a treasure to be found!

And the entire day Miss B was watching my stomach, asking me questions and then I thought, "Okay, this is really quite enough of this odd pair."  I was happy with auctioning came to an  end and I went back to my crappy apartment, completely exhausted.

But for odd a couple as Miss B and soldier boy were, they were very just --nice and down to earth people.  They were not judgmental of me which was a very unusual thing.  Because you see, every corner I turned was a scorn and a "look".  Everyone seemed to give me their glances of pity and disapproval of my - delicate condition.