Now I've gone and done it.

I don't have what I'd consider a particularly addictive personality, which is to say I can walk away from stuff if need be. And sometimes, the need be. Ho boy.

Now, I do a fair amount of shopping online; Amazon is my best friend. And someone in my position doesn't have a lot of time to do leisurely shopping trips, so if I can hunt & gather online then so much the better.

I try to limit my forays into cyberspace because I see real potential for me to abuse the system. I'm trying to get out of debt, not further in. And so, thus far I have been successfully able to avoid one of the biggest selling sites on the Internet.

eBay.

Oh, I hear you. How could I be willfully ignorant of one of the top sites out there? Obviously there is something wrong with me because everyone who is anyone is buying and selling on eBay.

Or so I've been told.

I've been a little afraid of eBay, to tell the truth. There seems to be a real science to the buying and selling that happens there, a system that looks to be quite complicated to the average liberal arts major with no head for business (me). So I've done what I always do when it comes to stuff I'm a little afraid of: I ignored it.

But here's the thing. I am a consignment shopping fool. I buy a lot of Spawn's clothes at consignment shops because a) it's cheaper and b) the clothes have already been washed, so whatever they are is whatever they are. No guessing about shrinking/stretching/fading. I don't feel too anxious about turning the kid loose in a consignment outfit, since whatever damage that can be done is, to my thinking, negligible. I don't feel nearly as blase about full price brand new clothes. And I take a lot of stuff to consign, too, because I don't have a lot of smaller kids in my acquaintance to pass things on to and really, I'd rather have a few shekels in my pocket.

I had three outfits of Spawn's that the kid has outgrown, top-label designer stuff that was barely worn (thanks, mom, for clothing my child), and I knew I wouldn't get too much out of them in consignment. So what to do.... what to do... ?

You guessed it.

I closed my eyes and jumped into eBay. I listed the three outfits and am waiting, on pins and needles, to see if anything happens.

And you know what happened next? I started shopping. And I started bidding. And I won an auction. It should be delivered this week. I'm also watching a handful of items.

My road to hell is paved with eBay links, folks.





-- Mox