#13 -- Wait to shop

Been trying to get people to play softball on Saturdays for the last few weeks, but just haven't been having a lot of luck at getting anyone out to play. Sat at the field this morning for about a half-an-hour before giving up and heading over to the local supermarket to pick up a few groceries. When I got out, I noticed that it was about five minutes to ten and there was a store right across the road that I wanted to visit. They happened to open at ten o'clock and so I made my way across the street and parked my car.

The store is called Deseret Industries, and I love to visit it. It's a store that is pretty much (I think) only here in Utah. Not sure if the LDS church owns the store, or just sponsors it but it's pretty big here. Really, it's just a second-hand/thrift store. People can drop off stuff whenever they want, and it's not very often that I drive by and don't see a car or two dropping off some stuff. I love going there because they have a pretty big book section where I can buy hardbacks for $3-$4 and paperbacks for less than a buck. Just makes my day to be able to walk into the place and find a great buy. Of course, I'm quickly running out of room at home to store any more books and my wife keeps "softly suggesting" that I not buy any more books. It's just so dang hard not to. Yup. I have a habit. At least I'll admit to it. :)

Anyhow, as I drove into the parking lot of DI, I noticed that a large number of people were milling about on the sidewalk near the front doors of the store. Now, I've seen the commercials about Mervyn's that has the lady sitting in front of the glass window repeating, "Open. Open. Open," as she blinks her hands open and shut, and I've even arrived at a Border's bookstore a few minutes before opening a time or two and waited with the other one or two people for the store proprietors to unlock the doors before we could go in. But seriously, there were probably thirty or forty people standing at the doors, waiting for the starting bell.

I sat in my car for those few minutes, listening to some great music (Load, by Metallica), and at the top of the hour got out of my car and headed towards the waiting mob of people. I was about halfway there, when the glass doors slid open, and said mob started funneling through the opening. As I walked, I looked around and noticed that there were probably about a dozen more people weaving their way through the parking lot, along with me, towards the storefront.

I came up to the doors and noticed that there was a semi-offical looking guy standing behind them finishing his job of flipping all the locks. He glanced over at me with a somewhat flustered look and I asked him if he had that many people standing outside the doors everyday. He responded that he did, but that usually they ran into the store after he unlocked the first door. I chuckled a bit at that, but he said that he was quite serious. They actually ran into the store. I'm guessing this is so they can find the best deals first and get out before someone else snags 'em from them. Eh. People.

I wandered through the outdoors section, looking for a used bike seat for my youngest kid. No luck. Then I mosied on over to the furniture section, hoping to find a decent chair for my kitchen table. Again, for the youngest. Decided that the high-chair just wasn't good enough. Actually had some luck there. One of the employees asked me if I wanted to buy one particular chair that I was looking at. He said that he only had two of them. I told him that I only wanted one. So, he slapped a pricetag on it that said $5, and I threw it over my shoulder. Hoping that this great find would soothe any possible confrontations after I got home, I headed towards the back of the store to find some books.

Truthfully, I was pleasantly surprised to find what I did: a hardback copy of Stephen King's Duma Key for $4; The fourth Temeraire book by Naomi Novik (also hardback) for $4; a christmas CD of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Orchestra at Temple Square, $4; and the biggest surprise: all ten books in L. Ron Hubbard's Mission Earth Series in paperback. All ten.

Despite the fact that I found the kitchen chair AND the Christmas CD (which my wife was really quite happy about), I still got blistered when I got home for all the books I had bought. Luckily, I had stacked one of my shelves with paperbacks in a very uneconomical way, and so after a little reorganization was able to find places for all the new books. Phew!

And at the end of the trip, I couldn't help but be pleased with the things that I had found by heading into DI at opening time. Usually, I only make it in some time after work, after everything has been picked over by everyone's greedly little fingers for the entire day. So, maybe it'd be worth it to make a weekly stop at DI on Saturday mornings. Maybe I should show up those ten minutes before opening time each week, and wait with bated breath for the click of the doors, and the whoosh of others feet as we all scramble in to find the great deals. Maybe it'd all be worth it?

Nah. Waiting to shop just isn't for me.