Ye ole trading post and comedy column ...

I belong to one of those online buy and sell / trading networks on Facebook here in small-town Canuckistan. Although I don't buy or sell much through it, it does provide the odd educational moment, as well as plenty of laugh-out-loud moments for this cynical soul ...

Attached, just a smattering of posts from the last day.

Excuse me madam, but I think your son may have been abducted by aliens ...

In South Africa we call Jeans "a jean-pant" so this made me really homesick for a moment with its "studio pant". GUC: German University in Cairo? Nope, that can't be it... Why not just say "Good Used Condition" ... It's not like she's paying per word to advertise here. Unless she meant "Growing Up Creepy" but that would just be weird...

How cool is that - a snowflake on the arm that changes colour to tell you if it's too cold! Or you could just look at the colour of the baby in the suit. Blue-tinged baby = too cold. Red, flushed baby = too warm.

Sorry, but exactly what is that thing that you're trying to sell? Lindsay seems to know, but it's all still fuzzy to me.

Of course, sticking to accepted conventions of good grammar and spelling is completely lost on most people here. I'm still trying to figure out why she bothered with the colon.

Online marketing tip number 1: highlight the pros of what you are trying to sell, for example "double bed ... has stain." Perhaps further enhance the selling point by describing how the stain was created, like "only one owner: incontinent grandma."

I've never really understood the whole "need gone ASAP" which one sees on the site often. Surely if the owner is trying to sell it he or she wants it gone? But in this case, I have to agree. That thing is nightmare-inducing. Seriously, get it out of the house like yesterday already!

"Gently used." As opposed to what?