OpShopping

Jenny and I are both dedicated opshoppers. I believe OpShops are called "Thrifts" in the USA while in Britain they are simply called charity shops.

Anyway, Brisbane has lots of them and Jenny knows most of them. I know only the ones local to me. Neither Jenny nor I go there to make important purchases. We just like seeing odd and unusual things and may buy something we really like it. The beauty of such shops is that their stock is always changing so they are forever new. It's a great mistake to see something there and think you will pick it up tomorrow. By tomorrow it may well be gone.

Anyway, Jenny took me out to see some of her favourite destinations recently and I made some local forays by myself. And we did pick up a few small items.

The most surprising was a miniature pocket knife that I thought would make a good keyring. The most surprising thing about it was the price. It was one of their "free" items. I looked for trademarks etc on it but could find none. I did however find some very tiny writing on the knife blade. I had to get a 10x lens to read it but it simply said "China. stainless". I liked the fact that it included a small Philips head screwdriver.

A strangely satisfying buy was two teacups. For years I was a bit bothered that I had a set of saucers and side plates but no cups to go with them. The cups were presumably broken long ago. So I was surprised and pleased to find in one shop two cups of the same pattern. So I suddenly had a new teaset. I have lots of teasets but I do like this one

And I also had one quality buy: A set of heavy crystal wine glasses from France. I have very little crystal so I was pleased to catch up a little.



Voila!