The High Wood

Sometimes I just don’t understand the way people run their businesses. Let me explain.

Usually I catch the train into work but, just occasionally, I need to drive in. Parking is hard to find but I discovered an abandoned building site – at least, it has been advertising new office space for years and nothing has happened – where you could just drive in and park. The ground was rough but it was free.

A couple of months ago, someone erected a small shed and started to charge people to get in. Either the owners had finally caught on or else it was a brilliant piece of private enterprise. Regardless, it was fair enough. At eight dollars it was still cheaper than the council-provided spaces.

In fact, the money was pretty irrelevant. What mattered was that, although the place was always nearly full there was nevertheless always room for one more. This was immensely valuable to someone who tends to get in a little late when all the public spots are full.

So. Last week, I was driving in and pulled up at the little shed with eight dollars in my hand. Sorry, says the man on the gate, we’re not allowing casual parking anymore. You have to pay for an entire month.

I will confess to having boggled. The huge area that was normally covered in cars was nearly empty as the following photo shows. Obviously they had been turning us away in droves at vast expense to themselves.

I think it was the stupidity of the whole thing that really got to me. If they had come up with some scathingly brilliant idea which involved my being turned away I would have been forced to admire it.

As it was, they are costing themselves well over one thousand dollars a day and absolutely everyone is worse off. Even the council didn’t make any more out of it because all their spots were already full. I ended up parking miles away.

I have been caught by this sort of thing before. I try and plan my life around everyone acting in their own best interests and sometimes people just insist on shooting themselves in the foot. Sigh.

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There is a place fairly near us that does "Reverse Garbage" which is a place where you get rid of old bits of things without paying a dumping fee and where you can go and cheaply buy things that people have dumped.

Robert has been having fun building marble rolls and Rube Goldberg machines recently so we took him along to buy some cheap bits of tubing and anything else that might be of use. While we were there, we spotted a rather dusty-looking pedal organ.

Click on the image for a high res version

A brief examination showed that it was still more or less working. The keyboard was intact and the various stops went in and out smoothly and it made a melodious noise when you pumped the pedals and pressed some keys. In fact, apart from a few dents it looked pretty good.

The price tag said $180. This seemed to us to be a ludicrously low amount of money so we bought it before anyone else found it. For another $20 we had it delivered and, two days later, it has arrived.

It was made by the Estey Organ Company in Vermont and imported by Naylor and Co. Estey (est. 1846) are apparently a well-respected brand and their better pieces can end up in museums.

This is not one of their major works of art but it looks pretty nice and, as far as we can guess, dates to somewhere around 1920 +/- 10 years. Our piano tuner also mends organs and will be coming around to check it out in a few weeks. He may be able to tell us more.

At the moment we are basking in the warm glow of what we believe to be a great bargain. And, even if it isn’t, we’re only down $200 and have a nice looking bit of furniture. Hard to go wrong really.

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