Free chairs!

Do you need chairs? We have 2 really, really comfy black chairs and we don't need them anymore. They are in perfect condition. You can come and get them now!!!!!

My mom always says we should give to the needy. So if you need chairs you can have ours for free. You can have our soap too.

We live in the house with the big u driveway.

My mom plays tennis at 11 o'clock so that would be a good time to stop by.

ok. See you later.

PS. If you see my mom's station wagon in the driveway don't stop!

PSS. Or my dad's car.

-Kris, age 9

The seats on our chairs are black.

This is the ad I would have written if they had Craig's List back in 1973.

Yeah, right.

I was way too chicken for that. But the thought would have crossed my mind as I sat in one of the chairs. I would daydream about selling those chairs for sure. That, I know.

I hated those chairs when I was a kid. Mainly because I spent hours sitting in them. They were the original "time-out" spot designated by my mom. In fact I think she invented it. It wasn't called time-out back then. It was just called go-sit-on-the-black-chair-NOW.

Did you ever talk back to your mom and stomp around so hard the walls shook? Well if you did that in our house you would be headed for the black chair. Yell at your sister for touching your stuff? You're headed for the chair again. Knocked down your little brother's beer can collection? Yep. Go sit down.

I vividly remember the chairs in our living room. They were placed right in the middle of the room on top of the freshly raked, celery green shag carpet. Yes, we vacuumed and raked that carpet with a metal rake each week.

Who rakes carpet anyway? Well, back in the 70's we did. (And yes, it's the same rake you use to smooth out the sand trap on a golf course.) It made the room look perfect, I guess. Like a freshly mowed lawn. You could see the teeniest little footprint on that raked carpet. So as you can imagine, the living room was pretty much off limits. Unless you were being punished for a time out in the black chair.

You couldn't see outside when you sat in the chair. Because seeing outside might be interesting. And that was not the point of sitting in the black chair. The point was to be miserable and uncomfortable. You faced the piano, the empty front hall and the front door. You longed to escape off the chair and out the door. But you didn't dare.

The leather seat got hot and sticky on your skin as the tears roll down your cheeks onto your legs. The cane backing gave you something to poke at as you "thought about what you've done." Why did she think I could only think about what I've done sitting there in that chair? Did she have any idea how uncomfortable it was? I'm pretty sure she did.

When you have four kids you need a black chair. Or two. And a living room that is off-limits to everyone but adults. These chairs saved my mom's sanity. (Along with the big jug of Tyrolia wine.) I get that now.

Today's The Red Dress Club Topic: imagine you've just had a fight with a friend, a co-worker, husband, significant other, child - you get the picture. You're mad. It's time for revenge.What would you sell? write a humorous listing for eBay or Craig's list. Talk about the items and why they must go.