Tricks and Treats

One of my coworkers lives pretty close to me; sometimes we carpool. Today she locked herself out, and her roommate won't be home until late. I told her to make herself at home, and then realized I'd left all my tabs open in Firefox this morning. If you think six completely random LJ-related tabs are work safe, you'd be right five-sixths of the time; #5, second from the top, was my incomplete rant on recent poor reading experiences. Yes, norabombay, that one.

Moving right along!

I had an idea for a Halloween costume that's completely useless anywhere but work, where it will be awesome; unfortunately, I need new pants to make it work. So I've been consignment shopping this week with erratic success.

My guide to consignment shopping:

1.) Zen.
You will walk in looking for shirts and walk out with a skirt. Your shopping list will be a lamp and a coat and you'll find a Foreman grill. You will never find the right handbag, unless you're trying to find a hat.
2.) Know your jeans: walk in knowing what fits and doesn't, or plan to try on 20 pairs of jeans and strike out on every count. There's always #21, right? This is not in disharmony with #1, unless you actually had plans for those three hours you spent trying on jeans.
3.) If you think your local Goodwill is fairly useless, you may be on to something.
4.) The difference between vintage and consignment is the rack time you put in to find it.

So I don't have the pants, but I do own a soup cup, a new handbag and a Foreman grill. I think grilling is on the menu for some point this week.

The Civil Liberties and Checkbook Edition

First, WMATA: Metro Transit Police to begin bag inspection program. This may not be a technical infringement of my civil liberties, but I nevertheless am adding the ACLU to my contacts list. Also, it doesn't sound like it's actually going to work, and the Post's statement that "Police will not be viewing the content of papers or other reading material. But if illegal items such as drugs are found, they will be confiscated as evidence, and police will cite or arrest the individual" makes me question how often these new search procedures will be used as drug searches, rather than explosives checks. (Quote from "Metro to Randomly Search Riders' Bags", The Washington Post, 28 Oct 2008.) This is apparently my breaking point: rank stupidity in the "war" against terror is finally coming home to me, and I will not stand for it.

The other thing I'm contemplating tonight is my electricity/heating bill. Roommate M. and I are cheap, but we both stop functioning when the thermostat is down at 65 degrees. Tonight we upped it to 68 and had a little utilities discussion, and I'm thinking about springing for blackout curtains. Neither of us wants to be the one to say, "hey, we need to spend more money", but at the point where we're too cold to do our homework, it's time to up the utilities budget.