Yesterday evening, I gave away my TV, Digital Antenna Receiver, and DVD Player. To a racist.
Since I'm heading off-continent for a few months starting in August, I've been pretty thoroughly downsizing my holdings (retiring many t-shirts, selling things like half stacks, guitar pedals, and French horn music and mutes, giving away many books, donating even more books to the library, selling and giving away much of my furniture). This is generally a fun thing to do, at least for someone like me that doesn't really care much about material possessions, so enjoys the opportunity to practice what he/she preaches. Also, a lot of what I have was given to me, so it's nice to re-gift the stuff. That's the case with the table and chairs I gave away to an incoming MFA student, and the other tables that I'm giving away to another just-moved MFA--all given to me at some point whilst moving/living here in Miami. And with the TV and receiver that I just gave away last night; the TV was given to me by a former MFA, and the receiver was purchased with a receiver-purchasing gov't card given to me by another friend. I bought the DVD player, but like eight years ago, so giving it away doesn't really feel like a loss of money.
So this is how to give away a TV, Receiver, and DVD Player:
--Have a friend come over and take a picture of them with his digital camera
--Post the picture on craigslist, saying "buy this stuff, $20 for all of it"
--Sit back as zero responses roll in for your stuff (perhaps here it deserves mention that the TV is not a flat screen, but an old-fangled CRT thing)
--Delete your "for sale" post, and switch the picture over to the free stuff category on craigslist
--Sit back as dozens of responses roll in for your now-free stuff
--Weed through the responses, many of which are spam, for the earliest, most realistic response
--Take note of the email from craigslist saying your post has been flagged and removed, presuming that this has to do with the amount of spam you generated for yourself with it
--Respond to that real-seeming response, telling them to come on by for the stuff
I'd add additional directions for how to specifically find a racist to give your stuff to, but I don't really know how it happened. Except that, once the guy showed up, on the way up the two flights of stairs to my apartment, the guy was talking like a regular Mel Gibson (I was gonna say Mark Fuhrman there, but being at a computer-on-the-internet five days a week gives me ability to update my topical references). Basically dropped an n-bomb or two every other step. Which is, to the say the least, awkward, especially when one lives in an ethnically and racially diverse neighborhood and building like I do. Luckily we didn't pass anyone.
I did have the thought, for a moment, to say something, like "You, sir, are a racist!" or "Okay, racist, no TV for you." or "I'm sure your interactions with these other humans has very little to do with their being of a non-white complexion." But I didn't. I just went ahead and gave him the things. Which seems fine, in the end, really. He seemed like a nice guy otherwise. Sounds like he was planning on giving the TV away to someone else himself, so it'll keep on giving, until the tubes finally burn out.