rummaging...

eBay Haiku Competition: THE WINNER

All the votes are in, all the bribes have been counted and the delegates wives are admiring their new fur coats and porsches. Yes, it's finally time to announce the winner of the 2012 Olympic venue.

Coincidentally, it's also time to announce the winner of the eBay Haiku Competition.

Thanks to everyone who entered - there were some great entries. It was hard to pick a winner and it was a close run thing.

Three honourable mentions. First to Krill54 who clearly knew that any James Bond haiku had to be a contender:

Trapped on a rocket
with women of loose virtue?
Clearly Bond. James Bond.

And second to Circals, who was one of the most lyrical of the entrants. His 'highly commended' haiku:

This book by Dennis
Is full of thrills and menace
Completely Wheatley.

And third to ridetheoverdraft, with this great entry in his feedback:

Thank you for the cash,
I spent it on loose women,
drugs and alcohol

But for sheer enthusiasm, volume of entries and entering into the spirit of the thing, there can only be one winner. majikthijs.

He entered dozens of haiku, in both his auctions and his feedback and the quality was consistently excellent. His winning entry:

you sent me a disc,
ingeniously packed,
like the spring blossom

Just perfect.

Congratulations to all. An iPod shuffle is on it's way to Majik as soon as he emails me an address to send it to.

Finally, it's time to announce that Rummaging is going to take an indefinite break. Other projects are taking up too much time, so the blogging has been neglected. Rather than walk around all the time with a nagging suspicion that I need to write a new entry, I'm going to call time on it for a while and come back, if at all, with a new approach and a new enthusiasm.

In the meantime, if you want other stuff to read then check out:
For ebay related stuff: Bayraider
For funny/weird stuff: Boing Boing
For environmental stuff: Small Environmentalist

It's been lovely. See you again soon.

Once you pop...

Another flurry of entries from krill54. All for vintage and first edition books, proving that eBay haiku are as hard to stop as a packet of Pringles.

Trapped on a rocket
with women of loose virtue?
Clearly Bond. James Bond. 

I cannot rival
the tension inside this book
with merely three lines

Disappointment lies
in rare offers like this one
for those who seek flaws

Poetry and plays?
How could you ask me for more?!
(ok - free shipping)

If I could prove that
the handwriting was Herbert's,
it'd be gone by now.

George Best haiku?

ridetheoverdraft leaves a feedback haiku clearly inspired by George Best:

Thank you for the cash,
I spent it on loose women,
drugs and alcohol

And I would be failing in my duty if I didn't recommend that you read some of his other feedback too, which includes "The cocaine/CD/virgin* arrived safely and well packaged. Can't wait to snort/play/sacrifice* it (*delete as applicable)."

Haiku: the final stretch

Very light (OK, non-existent) blogging recently. I could make excuses, but you don't care.

I'm sorry.

Anyway, a stack more entries in the eBay haiku competition. The quality is getting better and better. Click here to see all the entries so far.

Krill54 has joined the party with a whole raft of entries. There are some real gems in here.

Selling this quickly
so I can buy more garlic
in case this comes true

Faint stains on cover
But illustrations are clear
Less dust than Trigger

Time's proven Shaw's worth
at far more than a tenner.
He wouldn't approve.

Just 99 p
with extremely cheap shipping
who cares the book sucks?

Useful for pricing,
but it won't help you answer
if Shane could whoop pa.

and my favourite - and possibly the only haiku ever written about John Fowles, The Magus

This massive volume,
less than $.01 a page*,
a job lot of plot.

and a few more from the indefatigable Majik. Thesse were left as feedback. His feedback 'left for others'  page is becoming the standard by which others are judged:

This includes the first one in Dutch:

Snelle levering,
verrassend leuke feedback:
een tevreden man

which translates in English to:
Fast delivery,
surprisingly good feedback:
a satisfied man

and another;

super-duper pda,
and telephone all in one:
christmas came early

Also, someone has left majik feedback in a haiku, without seeming to know about this competition:

Super ebayer.
Smooth as clockwork transaction.
Bring on the summer!

The competition closes soon! Get your final entries in. There may be a one week extension because my own blogging has been so miserable recently, but whether it's in an auction or in your feedback, I need to know about it for it to count as an entry. Email me at rummaging@gmail.com!

A sublet cleavage?

So who is the 'mystery celebrity' who sold space on her cleavage in an auction last week?

Although the auction has closed, the 'celebrity' still hasn't revealed themselves.

Could this be because the winning bidder has just found out what they've bought and is refusing to pay?

According to snopes.com, the celebrity is in fact Teresa Ilagen, who recently changed her name to goldenpalace.com. So her fame is based purely on her previous auction. This would explain why the celebrity was described as someone who would be known 'to everyone on ebay'.

But not really a celebrity, under any definition of the word.....

There's always a catch. And more publicity for that bloody casino.

New haiku

Lloyd sends in the first haiku in the description of the auction:

Blue Wrangler jacket
70s original
Now too small for me

and a fantastic feedback haiku:

Fantastic surfboard
Sold by a true gentleman
Waiting for summer

Whilst Bernard is aiming for the most entries, this time with a tent haiku:

open up the zip
when everything is wet
a tent keeps you dry   

this one feels authentically japanese and also has a reference to the seasons, which is a bonus.

Create your own media frenzy

There's an auction online at the moment selling tips and tricks for creating your own media feeding frenzy through eBay auctions.

However, as one of their techniques seems to be comment spam, which I've just filleted from the site, then they don't know how to create the media frenzy they promise. they only know how to annoy.

And look at that, I've deleted all the comment spam and I won't link to the auction. That's the sort great publicity they could create for you, too.

MiG 23

There's a MiG 23 fighter for sale at the moment.

It's in Poland and the seller says: "Will post to United Kingdom, United States, Australia, Ireland, Canada, Asia, France."

But for some reason, he won't post it to Africa, Russia, South America or China.

Who does he think is going to buy it? All those countries already have airforces. Robert Mugabe isn't going to bid if he has to pay for the stamps.

Cervical Rings

Now these are genuinely odd.

One for the medical historians, this set of cervical rings is like a set of Allen keys. You just have to find the right size.

Shudder.

Other people's typos

Use this - fatfingers.com - to look for spelling errors on eBay. It's a bit hit and miss. (thanks to Kimbal - who has a great site...on an interesting topic)