08/13/2026
A few more stories from the store...
CAN WE BUY IT BACK?
Angela said a little boy, maybe 9 or 10, came in with his mom. He saw a rocket ship we have up on the top shelf in the Children's Space (aka, the Toy Room).
“Oh, Mom, can we get it?”
“No, we can’t get it. We donated it!”
“Well, can we buy it back?”
INTERSTELLAR MOVIE VS REAL-LIFE HABOOB
It was a SUPER hot day when Carl came in, and we talked about heat here vs the heat in Arizona vs the heat in the Middle East. I told him I have done ZERO research on this, but I lived in Arizona for 37 of my 59 years, and it’s only been in the last 15 years or so that I even remember haboobs becoming a thing.
A haboob is a giant wall of dust that moves quickly across a huge swath of land. I’m not sure if it’s a new weather phenomenon or I just somehow never knew about them. But they’re terrifying to drive in. Visibility is zero as your car seems to be swallowed whole inside a giant cloud of dust. The first time I drove in one, I had no idea what I was actually up against until I got home and saw it on the news. The pictures looked like a scene out of a horror movie. I told all of this to Carl – who then showed me a scene from the movie Interstellar. They could have been using footage from an Arizona haboob for that scene! It was just an interesting conversation – nothing to do with thrifting.
MARCO POLO!
A woman and her mom came in – they were traveling from South Carolina to Raleigh, saw our sign, turned around, and came in! Because our store is separated into various rooms, it’s easy to lose track of the person you’re with. So one called out, using the old saying from our days as kids in the pool, “Marco?” And the other answered, “Polo!” These were the first folks I saw do this – but I highly recommend it!
TWO DADS SHOPPING ON THE SAME DAY
Two men came in today – dads who were shopping, in whole or in part, for their kids. Not one, but two on the same day. This was an unusual phenomenon.
Marty came near closing time, and he and I got to talking. He grew up in Colerain and told me how different things are now. He said he was basically a well-behaved kid, but sometime before fifth grade, he and his pals decided they were going to try out using some curse words like “hell,” “sh*t,” and “damn.” Thing was, they did it in the lunch line, and a teacher overheard them. They got marched straight to the principal’s office. Discipline back then was no joke: he had a paddle – with holes in it. And… he was a tennis player. Marty begged the principal not to paddle him. He s***ked Marty’s two friends but did not s***k Marty. Instead, he drove Marty home where his mom was already waiting for him at the front door with a belt. Marty wished he’d let the principal s***k him.
Yes, he says, it’s different now. He didn’t even seem sure that corporal punishment was a good thing. What he misses is the fact that people cared more. Bad behavior wasn’t tolerated. Parents cared what each others’ children were up to. And ... he met his wife at the diner that used to be where the Duck-Thru now sits on the SW corner of Sterlingworth and the US 13 Bypass.
