It’s about time – if you haven’t already gotten the urge – to start rummaging through your basement or double-car garage or storage unit for all the junk you don’t need anymore because the king of all garage sales is upon us once again.

Thousands upon thousands of items needed to feed the beast known this year as the 49th annual Rotary Auction and Rummage Sale (June 26-27 at Woodward Middle School) are now being identified in households all over the island.

This undeniable, addictive penchant for Americans to buy, buy and buy some more material goods seems to have reached a prodigious level on Bainbridge Island. Out with the old and in with the new is a phrase many an islander must love to utter. It’s certainly not by happenstance that the annual event is what many non-islanders think of when Bainbridge is mentioned.

Why us? Money, of course, but also a bunker mentality might have something to do with it. You know, let’s take a stand here and fill our castle with all of our worldly goods. And keep an eye out for things that we may need just in case the ferry sinks, the bridge collapses and we’re stuck here forever.

Considering the amazing longevity of this chimerical event, once could hypothesize that the buying appetites of some residents have increased because of a proclivity for producing a supply of neglected goods so some 500 to 600 Rotarian volunteers will have something to do during much of May and all of June.

Of course, that would belittle the lofty goal of the service club, which is to sell all that stuff in order to donate thousands of greenbacks (about $400,000 last year) to help people in need. No, that is not the purpose of this gibberish.

Craig Jarvis, the event’s assistant chair (and chair for No. 50), says there are indications that donations may be down a bit this year while, simultaneously, more people will be looking for bargains because their consumer habits have been curtailed by the downturn. Perhaps, but he hopes not, and offers a plea that the good residents of the island who love to procure will certainly heed: Please, dig just a little deeper this year to find the locale of that long-forgotten Aurumania bicycle or gold necklace you’ve misplaced. Whatever it takes, good neighbor, to help out.