Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Woodbridge High & Woodbridge Middle up for auction

So it turned out that Woodbridge High School was being put up for auction, and I went there (around dusk) with Greg and Grandma M. Almost as soon as we arrived, though, we learned that Woodbridge Middle School was also being put up for auction this same night. We went over to watch the auction at WMS. WMS didn't look at all like it really looks — for one, it had a church built into the middle of the front side of the building, with a largely black congregation. Many members of the congregation were standing outside watching. The building was fairly modern, maybe 80's-90's red brick architecture; the church portion wasn't distinct from the building, except there was an embedded tower with stained glass going all the way up it, which stuck out above the roof line a little ways.


(This is what Woodbridge Middle School totally didn't look like in the dream.)

The area where we were standing was kind of a long, raised concrete patio/walkway, and in front of us was a short wrought-iron fence (acting mostly as a railing) separating the raised patio from a lower patio that led up to the school building. From our perspective, facing towards WMS, there was another small two- or three-story brick building with a walk-around veranda on the second floor.

There was the crowd up where we were, mostly people watching the auction, and then the crowd on the lower patio in front of us, mostly participating in the auction. As the bidding started, the first person to bid was Oprah, who was facing the audience as she registered her bid. Soon after, a Muslim man in middle-eastern(-ish) garb, who was perched on the outside corner of the second story veranda of the building to our left, raised his hand slightly, registering a bid. Then two other men, standing on the patio below, continued the bidding.

For whatever reason, there wasn't anything indicating how much each person was bidding, only that each bid registered in turn was higher than the previous bid. (Seems like a bad way to run an auction, unless there's rules stating how much the price increases with each bid.)

No comments:

Post a Comment