The best junk sales are full of the unexpected — weird stuff that goes beyond spatulas with broken handles and toys with missing parts.

“You mean something like this?” says Patti Milos. She’s holding up a pair of — what the heck? — sheep shears. They’re big scissor-like things, tarnished except where the blades are sharpened. I’m guessing this baby has nipped its share of sheep bellies.

“Or maybe this?” says Jason Davis. Let’s see … is that a towel? No, it’s some kind of banner emblazoned with a cartoon horse and one word: “Howdy.” The horse looks mean, though, with close-set eyes and a heavy brow. It makes the howdy seem a bit sinister.

Patti has volunteered for a few days to help Wenatchee’s YWCA organize and display thousands  — maybe tens of thousands — of items for the organization’s twice-yearly outdoor mega-sale. Jason, a YWCA maintenance guy, is on hand to do the heavy lifting.

These Spring Flings and Fall Flings are opportunities for the YWCA to get rid of leftover items from their weekly estate sales, says Thelma Erskine, head organizer for the events. The oodles of items are carefully spread out on rows of tables that fill the group’s parking lot, with overflow of pricier stuff inside the building.

The sale was held Thursday (Oct. 2) and was expected to continue Friday if the weather cooperated. So, before it rains, take a quick look:

Right here on this table are two used light bulbs (20 cents each), a Princess phone from about 1979 ($1), an unopened pack of thumb tacks (10 cents), a shoe horn (50 cents), a bath mat (50 cents), and one of those old aluminum ice cube trays that’s almost impossible to extract the cubes from (not priced, but you could probably get it for 20 cents or less). Customers pay half the marked price, because the YWCA wants this stuff to move.

“And what about this?”  asks Patti. It’s a measuring spoon used as a promotional item by the Tedjo Oil Company. Two interesting things about it: 1) it’s old enough that the telephone number is just four digits — 1044 — and 2) it costs only 10 cents, no, make that 5 cents.

“That’s one of the wonderful aspects of this sale,” says Patti. “You work on this thing for days, and hundreds of items pass through your hands. Then someone comes up with a weird, quirky item you’ve never seen before” — she nods towards a table holding a trombone — “and you think: ‘whoa, where’d this come from?’ “

Details: The YWCA’s Fall Fling was held Thursday and Friday, Oct. 2-3, in the organization’s parking lot at 212 1st Street in Wenatchee. The first day’s proceeds benefited the YWCA. The second day’s proceeds went to the Jill Wood-Spanjer scholarship fund at Wenatchee Valley College.