The restaurant auction was as I feared. A bunch of newbies looking for collectibles and souvenirs. There were a lot of tin signs on the walls for decoration but the majority of these were reproductions right down to the manufacturer's mark in a corner. These people had watched too much American Pickers and were bidding in the $500 to $800 range for stuff that had been made in China five years ago.
I did score some 6" deep hotel pans for $5 each - these will be perfect for pickling, anodizing and etching metals for knife blades and other ornamental iron. Retail on these is about $30 each.
The Western Washington Chemistry equipment turned out to be an entire lab! The old professor retired and the new one wanted all new stuff. The back of my pickup truck is full and my 10X6 foot box trailer is loaded up to about 5 feet tall. I bought not just some chemistry equipment, I bought the whole damn lab!
Back to business as usual tomorrow so I will post photos of both events then.