Meeting-A-Thrifter

[Good Buddy]

Cookie and I just got back from thrifting with Sally and Lee, her boyfriend, that we met online.
Sally runs "ThriftList" a Yahoo group and the Seminole County Freecycle group.
We've been threatening to hang out with each other and shop for the past year and finally did thrift with them today.
We were supposed to meet them at a church rummage sale, but they arrived there before we did and scoped it out as a waste of time.
She suggested we meet at the Salvation Army about a mile down the road, we did.
They were very fun and we all warmed up quite fast.
Sally is quite crafty and Lee and I could talk about comics and sci-fi for years.
We left the SA in our car and hit 4 more shops before we went and had lunch.
They were very gracious and paid for the meal, we tipped. Mmmmm Flyers Wings oooooooh
I'm very sure we'll hang out again and in the future and we both look forward to it.

Anyone else got any successful thrift related buddy stories? Or even bad ones.
We went thrifting with a girlfriend of ours once, and it was like we were not even there (We haven't joined her since).

[ChrisMiss]

Sounds like you had a great time.  I don't have any stories to write about.  I haven't met up with any thrifters from online.  I've met other RVers in person that we've met online but no thrifters yet.

It sounds like fun though.  I'd like to meet others who are as thrilled with thrifting as I am.  Also to learn from others.  I've learned quite a bit online but to have someone with you who knows what they're looking at that would be great.

[Jay2TheRescue]

Cookie and I just got back from thrifting with Sally and Lee, her boyfriend, that we met online.
Sally runs "ThriftList" a Yahoo group and the Seminole County Freecycle group.
We've been threatening to hang out with each other and shop for the past year and finally did hang out with them today.
We were supposed to meet them at a church rummage sale, but they arrived there before we did and scoped it out as a waste of time.
She suggested we meet at the Salvation Army about a mile down the road, we did.
They were very fun and we all warmed up quite fast.
Sally is quite crafty and Lee and I could talk about comics and sci-fi for years.
We left the SA in our car and hit 4 more shops before we went and had lunch.
They were very gracious and paid for the meal, we tipped. Mmmmm Flyers Wings oooooooh
I'm very sure we'll hang out again and in the future and we both look forward to it.

Anyone else got any successful thrift related buddy stories? Or even bad ones.
We went thrifting with a girlfriend of ours once, and it was like we were not even there (We haven't joined her since).

I have an interesting story that's kinda thrift related.  Its about the friend that I sell with at the collectables shows.  I met her about 5 years ago at a local flea market run by the community center.  I was strictly an Ebay seller at that time, and was scoping out new merchandise.  I stopped by her booth because she had a lot of cool stuff there and got to talking.  Anyway, she mentioned that she lived locally in Sterling.  I said "I live in Sterling!"  She then said Yeah, on Lincoln Ave.  I said "Me too!"  It turned out that she lived 3 houses down, but I met her at the flea market.

-Jay

[SecondhandSophisticate]

Dear Cookie and Good Buddy and All:

Why I NEVER to thrifting with anyone (as a rule):

1.  I very rarely am up before 8 AM.  To paraphrase a 20th century poet (Rilke? T.S. Eliot?)  "I take my waking slow"--very slow and leisurely.  I usually don't start to thrift until around 11 AM, with afternoons being my favorite time.   

2.  I am a nonsmoker, which can limit places I visit.

3.  I am a vegetarian, which can limit where I eat.

3.5 I don't drink caffeine or alcohol.

4.  I know very little about today's cultural interests...which makes me REALLY boring! 

5.  I am a member of the AARP, which makes me crotchety.

6.  I like to thrift during the week, as the weekends are the only time I get to see my beloved, and 99.99% of people in America MUST thrift on Saturdays. (It's the LAW!!! )  though I do hit the stores on Saturdays occasionally if I get "the itch".

Thank you for this opportunity to offend everybody on this board  .

Kiss-Kiss,
 
SeSo

[Good Buddy]

Wow, you do sound boring! 

As long as people have thrifting in common, they'll have something to talk about..
We're not afraid to go thrifting with you, we're up to the SeSo challenge.

Ciao!

[Mattie]

How cool that you got to go thrifting with Sally and Lee!  I got together with some other members of the ThriftList (Frank, Hillary and Vern) a couple years ago for a full day of shopping and it was FUN.  After you've been talking with someone online for a while, it feels like you're old friends when you finally meet.

[Vintage PurseLover]

SeSo I wouldn't mind going thrifting with you either.I don't scare too easy.

[Other People s Junk]

SeSo- You don't at all sound boring and I'm all about most of your rules!  I love your quote- "I take my waking slow".

As for thrifting with other people- I love going with my MIL...We kind of split up, since we generally like the same things, but it's good to be in talking distance, so we can show each other stuff.

As for thrifting with friends, I haven't had a bad experience... I think it's a great way to get to know a person better. 

[Good Buddy]

I got it!
To most of us, thrifting is a very intimate experience, that's why SeSo, and us actually, is very picky about who she thrifts with.
Of all the folks that we have been thrifting with, we've never gone with any of them twice.
Until next Saturday.
I guess good thrifting friends are as rare as really good regular friends...

Ciao!

[SecondhandSophisticate]

Good Buddy and Diane and Other People's Junk: Someday we will meet at the "Thriftshoppers.com" convention (Good Buddy, catch my drift? ) and "do" whatever town we are in! I am honored to be among such interesting and open-minded folk!

Mattie, I am happy for your positive online translates to real-life experience

Good Buddy, you have called it so perfectly!  Thrifting is very personal and intimate for me. I have done it alone for many years, or ONLY with someone very close to me (my mother, my husband) because it's a side of my life that was looked down upon by the people whom I knew, some who actually looked down on me for going to killer garage sales and church sales and thrift stores and my actually being proud of my finds and loving , those finds,  nuruting them back to life and respecting my found articles for their past history and service to their previous caretakers. So I learned to keep that side of my life quiet after being broad-sided by 80s YUPPIES, for example.

In the long run, however, the stigma has served me well. Thrifting became my personal downtime, a time of focusing and concentrating on the immediate, to hone in on what was in front of me, to weed out the assault on my senses by modern-day living, to live simply and well, to use my imagination.

OTJ:  I cannot claim authorship of the line "I take my waking slow"  It is from the 20th century poet, Theodore Roethke.   Here is the poem in its entirety:

THE WAKING
   
   I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
   I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
   I learn by going where I cannot go.
   
   We think by feeling. What is there to know?
   I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
   I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
   
   Of those so close beside me, which are you?
   God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
   And learn by going where I have to go.
   
   Light takes the Tree, but who can tell us how?
   The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
   I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
   
   Great Nature has another thing to do
   To you and me; so take the lively air,
   And, lovely, learn by going where to go.
   
   This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
   What falls away is always. And is near.
   I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
   I learn by going where I have to go.
                                -- Theodore Roethke

It is so beautiful to me.  Enjoy, Bellas!

 
SeSo

[Big Daddy Audio]

I would go thrifting with others, but I don't think there are any others on the list in Phoenix.  I'm also a guerilla thrifter which means I have something in mind, and will blow into a store and out of a store in 5 minutes or less, simply checking for what I seek.  I don't browse - I enter, look at the areas in which my goals would be located, and leave.  Not much fun in that for someone else.  There are things that take a "gut feeling" to cause me to look at time consuming things (eg - records can take a long time to look through, as not only do you have to find something you want, but they have to be in really mint condition - a rarity).  I seem to have a knack for looking through records.   

I do like contemporary culture, and can converse on it, but when I go into a store, I switch "it" on, and don't want to be distracted by anything.  It would cause me to cease free-flowing, and would cloud my RAS (see separate post).

If anyone ever comes out to Phoenix for a visit, I'd surely go with you to show you the good spots, but I'd probably just help you, as I wouldn't be very good company if I was also thrifting.  I guess it's just the "hunter-killer" aspect of my DNA.

That is all. 

[Scott]

I used to go thrifting with a friend of mine on a regular basis a while back. He and I collected the exact same kind of things, so we had to lay some ground rules before we went out but it worked out well. There was quite a bit of give and take involved -- even if one of us found something first in the store, if the other person "needed" it "worse" we would give it up to our thrifting partner. This again all comes down to maintaining good thrift Karma.

I've also met a few people online who I would up thrifting with at least once. One instance didn't work out as well, but wasn't terrible by any means. Another instance the person I met and thrifted with turned into a good friend, who I still keep in occasional touch with even though we live a few states apart now.

I think thrift buddies are good: they are the people who can talk you out of passing up one of those borderline can't decide to buy it kind of items, and comparing notes on thrift scores can be a very inspiring way to keep up thrift morale when in a slump.

[tiamatgreen]

The only time I have been thrifting with someone else was quite a while back with a then-boyfriend for Halloween costume ideas. We ended up getting a purple ladies suit and a bright yellow shirt. A little white makeup and some green hairspray and he was the Joker from Batman for Halloween that year. Alexandra is the only other thrifter on here near me, and we briefly discussed making the rounds together, although we both collect some of the exact same things, so much like you and your friend, Scott, we would have to lay out a few rules first I think.

[Thrift Shop Romantic]

I never thought of it as "guerilla thrifting" but that's pretty close to what I do, too. I thrift largely at lunchtime, I have almost NO time to spare, and I sort of sweep in, see what's in housewares and furniture, and zip off again.

I don't think I'd be a lot of fun for anyone else. I have a friend who goes with me sometimes on weekends, but she goes her way (usually the books) while I sweep the store. She's aware of my technique. :-)

[SecondhandSophisticate]

Big Daddy, I would Love to see you in action...sweeping into the store, striding into the store, heads above the rest, using your focused, eagle-eye gaze to hone in on exactly what you're looking for, your gut instinct directing you, your adrenilin flowing...
 I bet aisles part for you like the red sea,  , you have so much energy!

Love your focus and determination!

Ciao,
SeSo