Waiting on a Topless Lemon

We need to sell more than just our house before we move. We have three vehicles, and Hubby's work pays to ship just one. One Saturday, we dropped off the convertible at the Hickam Air Force Base lemon lot. The lemon lot is a large parking lot where anyone with base privileges resells their car, RV, motorcycle or boat. The cars aren't lemons, but "lemon lot" is the common nickname for these resale lots on military bases. The military community is trusting and respectful, so for the most part, people feel comfortable buying and selling off the lemon lots.

Hubby paid $16 for two weeks to the lot manager in the arts and crafts store (strange location, I know), and posted his sign in the car window. Our car was parked behind this row.

We live a good 15 to 20 minutes from Hickam. That may not sound like much, but once you live on the island, you have an island perspective on time. That is not close. We stalled a bit in the parking lot, just in case someone liked our car and called to drive it. Sure enough, we spotted a married couple. She kept peeking in the car window, but her husband had his eye on other cars. They moved from car to car. He looked at sedans, and she looked at every convertible on the lot. Now our car was priced aggressively, and only had 11,000 miles on it. We knew she wasn't going to find a better deal. Round and round they went, for minutes and minutes. Hubby and I played it cool, trying to be less than obvious. You know how we did that? We chased her around the parking lot in my van cruised around pretending we were looking for a car...so sly of us. Every time she headed toward our car we cheered and howled. When she walked away we booed. This went on for several minutes. We almost left twice, but twice she sauntered toward our car, out of the watchful eye of her husband. By now I knew this was going to end up a blog post, so I made Hubby take her picture. "Pose, so she thinks I am taking a picture of you," he said. I did, but I cropped myself out.
We considered staying until the couple left the lot. The kids were wailing, though, and Son1 was pleading for the park. They did not appreciate good entertainment! Just a couple of blocks from the lemon lot is a park structure shaped like a wooden castle. If she called for the car we would be close. As we exited the lot, the couple drove off, too. At least we knew she wouldn't call. Off to the park!

Guess what you can find only at parks on post? SWINGS!!! You cannot find them at public parks on our island! This one park has toddler swings, regular swings, and a tire swing!

Hubby watched Son2 while Son1 and I BOTH played on the swings! The sun was still high in the sky, but the minutes were ticking. Not one person called on the car so far. Just in case, we figured one more nearby place to stop.

Do you see me smiling on the couch back there? I know what the future holds for this stylist. Son1 detests haircuts. This little trick worked before the flowbee broke. (A flowbee attaches to a vacuum.) He can't stand the itchiness of sheared hair. Hubby helped to hold him still, he watched a TV show, and had a sucker shoved in his mouth.
Finally, the stylist finished, and nervously agreed to cut Son2's hair minutes after closing. I am sure she feared a meltdown. He's already had a handful of haircuts to date, though, and usually grabs for the scissors. This night he was so entertained by the spinning airplane wheel he was completely unimpressed with the scissors.

He looked so cute and so well behaved during his hair cut. But I couldn't imagine styling his hair like this every day. I am so Wash 'N Wear with the boys. I had her fix it.

The next day it looked like this.

We left the lemon lot vicinity with no calls. But guess what? We eventually got a buyer! One less worry before our move!