Shopping

I do NOT love to shop. I do love finding something nice, and getting it cheap, but I usually hate what you have to go through to do it.
I've already posted about my TJ Maxx gift cards and how I don't like TJ Maxx. Like Marshall's, it's one of those stores where you can sometimes come across a gem, but I don't usually have the patience to do it. Even in "nicer" stores like Lord & Taylor, I sometimes feel so dragged down by the experience of wading through people and carrying stuff around, especially in the winter when I'm also lugging a coat and feeling overheated indoors. But at least at the "nice" stores you can usually check your coat. The last time I decided to really get serious about buying some new work clothes on sale at L&T, I took the elevator straight up to the coat check place and left everything there except my wallet, so I could be a lean, mean, stripped-down shopping machine. Of course, despite my best efforts, I don't think I found much on that trip!
Lately, I have been trying to stay away from buying much of anything, but I've been starting to feel like I am wearing the same things all the time and could use some new clothes for work. A couple of weeks ago, I tried to clean out my closet a bit, thinking I could imitate Caitlin's PantRy Challenge and do a Closet Challenge. Yeah, there were a few things in there I'd forgotten about but it wasn't the windfall of nice-fitting designer fabulosity I was hoping for. There wasn't even any ill-fitting designer fabulosity, as I had already given up on ever again being able to squeeze into the 2 pairs of Nicole Farhi pants I once bought on sale, which are now being enjoyed by a size-smaller friend.
So, deciding I needed to put my money where my mouth is (and keep most of it there) by being a smart bargain hunter, I resolved to look for some cheap new duds at Century 21.
Century 21 is a discount department store. It's become a big destination here, both for native New Yorkers and for tourists, particularly the Europeans who come here in droves to shop, especially now that the exchange rates are so favorable. I hadn't been to the Manhattan store in years, probably due to some kind of post-traumatic reaction to the crowds I remembered from the last time, magnified in memory by all the legends of people fighting over skirts and trying things on in the aisles because the fitting rooms are such a zoo. So last weekend, I decided to ease back into the experience by going to the store in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. It's a bit smaller, maybe not quite as crowded. But I didn't find anything-- I tried on a few tops, but all I ended up buying was a baby gift. So this weekend, I got serious and went to the store in Manhattan. On a Saturday afternoon. While there was a sale going on. On a tax-free weekend!
Sure enough, it was kind of chaotic, but not as bad as I expected. And the selection was much better than in Brooklyn. In the shoe department, I was only a size away from getting some lovely suede boots by JP Tod. But then, when I hit the upstairs, I had some luck. Some unmentionables of my preferred brand were half price, and I found a few pairs of pants worth trying on. The line for the fitting room was about 20 people long, but it ended up being worth it. I bought one pair of very nice, perfect-fitting John Varvatos pants: original price $400, my cost $49.99.
That was enough to make me feel like I'd won the game and didn't want to play anymore, so I got the hell out of there. Some people would argue that I could have gotten a perfectly good $50 pair of pants somewhere else, and that is true. I'm not into buying a lot of designer clothes just for the sake of the label (and I never buy anything with visible logos, except maybe jeans where it is pretty much unavoidable). But sometimes-- not always, but sometimes-- you get what you pay for with expensive clothes, in terms of fit and materials and looks, and I'd rather have a few things I really love than a lot of things that are just okay. That doesn't mean I would ever pay $400 for a pair of pants. But it does mean I'd sometimes rather go through a hassle to pay $50 for those pants, instead of effortlessly buying a lesser pair of $50 pants at the Gap, or two pairs of $25 pants at K-Mart. (Remember Rain Man? God help me if I ever start quoting Tom Cruise lines to explain my outlook on life, but "K-Mart sucks" definitely resonated with my shopping philosophy!) And the fringe benefit is that I'll have had as much retail guerilla warfare as I can stand for a good long time, so I won't want to go anywhere near a store for the next few months! Just a little aversion therapy to keep me in line!