Bryan C. Fleming

A middle aged woman has a heart attack and is taken to the hospital. While on the operating table she has a near-death experience. During that experience she sees her guardian angel and asks if this is her time. The angel says no and explains that she has another 30-40 years to live.

Upon her recovery she decides to just stay in the hospital for a few more days and have a facelift, liposuction and a tummy tuck. She even has someone come in and change her hair color. She figures since she’s got another 30 or 40 years she might as well make the most of it.

She walks out the hospital after the last operation and is killed by an ambulance speeding up to the hospital.

She arrives in heaven again, sees her guardian angel and says, “I thought you said I had another 30-40 years!!”

The angel replies, “Sorry. I didn’t recognize you.”

Last Thursday I stopped to get a pizza for Sherry and I (we didn’t feel like cooking OK). The place we go has great pizza for only $5. They usually have them ready, but today they said there would be a 15-minute wait.

No problem I said. I’ll just kill some time browsing at Target next door.

While I was at Target, I found myself once again in the video game section. To my astonishment they actually had 3 Xbox 360’s. Could this be real I thought? Perhaps the supply shortage of these consoles is over.

The kid working there asked if I wanted one. “No”, I said, “But how long do you think they’ll last?”

“Probably about a day”, he said, “the delivery truck just dropped them off about an hour ago.”

I left the store to get my Pizza.

Then I had a thought. If these things are going to be gone tomorrow why not sell it on Ebay?

5 minutes later I was back in the store scoring my Xbox 360 premium edition ($425). I actually cut off some kids to buy it right out from under them. I think they were a little pissed off about that. Oh well, my win.

Saturday night I listed the amazing $1 Xbox 360 with no reseve. Sherry suggested I do this to encourage more bidding.

Sunday morning I awoke to find my Xbox had only bid up to $105. I was nervous. Would I be paying someone to take this off my hands?

The auction ended at 7:01 PM EST time last night. As our little Xbox hit the first page of Ebay (15 minutes until the end of the auction), the page views went through the roof. Sherry was hit with emails/IM’s asking a bunch of questions about shipping and what not.

By this time our Xbox exploded to $425. This wouldn’t be enough to cover Ebay’s Fees and shipping. I needed $475. So I bid on it for $479 and became the highest bidder.

With minutes left I was outbid at a grand total of $540. It was to a guy in NJ and I’m sure he’s fired up to get one of these.

The Ebaying was a lot of fun. Making $50 off the transaction felt good too. Yes, I’ll get an Xbox 360, but probably down the road when the supply is more in check and they have Battlefield 2 out for it;)

I guess the moral of the story is don’t be afraid to set a low price on a hot Ebay Item. The true economics will take over and you’ll get exactly what’s its worth in the free market.