My Daring Passage to Goodwill

No I’m not too snobby for ‘o-K’ and ‘Wally-Mart’ but sadly even THEY are too sophisticated for my slow brow quirky tastes in quality and craft. Yes I’m that rare geek breed that heeds the need to feed his penchant for culling through the splits n’ stains at thrift stores. Though the better than new prices are nice, the real attraction for me to these dens of discounts is the ‘love of the hunt’ for the unique rather than just saving money. I know that sounds misguided and frivolous in these tight times, but ‘un-holey’ fashion undies tend to be expensive and I’m always in need of something other than pancakes to press through the ‘ol laundry mangle. 

Though I’m not really a board-game player by nature, I do easily get bored and GAMEY playing them. Despite this fact, I’m always drawn to search the thrift store toy aisle for tot treasures especially since my sister-in-law is coming to visit and she loves to try new games. On a recent rainy-day excursion I was not disappointed as I found an interestingly packaged board game of famous quotes called ‘Daring Passages’ crammed into its own Magnum-sized plastic wine bottle. 

I enthusiastically groped the bottled-up game with fondness and intent to purchase but soon realized that my frumpy presence in a Goodwill, while gripping a big bottle of wine by the neck, did not ‘look’ as anonymous as I typically prefer. Other than by the case, there is no truly elegant way to carry a wine bottle around in a store and I had neglected to get a basket when arriving earlier. Despite my best efforts, no matter how I hugged or lugged that jug, I admit it - I fit the perfect profile of a wandering wino wagging his vessel of  vino for all to see.

Sure enough it was not but five minutes before a jerk of a clerk came to check up on me. I think he came to kick me out of the shop if required, but maybe that was only because I was wearing an over-sized khaki raincoat with no pants underneath? I proved to him that the big black wine bottle was just a board game and he chuckled reassuringly, yet still distrustful of my slurred speech and incessant foot dragging. Hmmm, the next time I visit that place, I had better wear longer shorts, use a shopping cart … and think twice before downing a double dose of NyQuil for breakfast!