I love those thrift stores. Love them. You'll never know what you'll find and sometimes, you'll find something you don't really want, but it's something you need. Of course, you could be looking for digital cameras when a friend comes into town and make a joke about how you can't understand who would need a shopping cart when going shopping at a thrift store. "My wife..." was the reply to my comment. Go figure. Ahhh, but then, I'm not a chick. I'm one of the lonely souls who ignores 90% of the store to look over the used electronics for something obsolete.

Enter the best winter jacket I've ever owned. It looks like every autoworker's plaid cheap coat. I bought it from a going out of business sale that was being held by a no-name Indian/Wolf Head/Incense/Hippie store. You know the one, in a nearby dying mall. They sell a ton of smelly knit hoodies for Grateful Dead/Phish/Umphrey's McGee consumption. I didn't like it as the pockets were on the top of the jacket rather than down at the sides. I also thought it would be a little small for me. Not true.

When winter struck, something interesting happened. It would get about 20 degrees outside, and I was WARM. All through the winter, I was WARM. No other winter coat did this. Plus, it went on easy because it was completely fiber, not a stuffed coat like I'd been wearing since I was a kid. You put this thing on, you're warm.  Zip it up and within a few minutes, toasty. Plus, I've had since 2000 or so, maybe earlier. For the $17 spent, I just can't find anything else close. Then, something happened. Something wore out.

You guessed it. The zipper. Sort of. The zipper PULL just wore out. You can see where the metal wore through. Wow. Guess it can't last. I knew I could get a replacement for it right? RIGHT? Wow. I tried. I went all over the place. I even found the Fix N Zip (TM) device but I wasn't sure if it would replace my zip properly. Then I boned up on zipper replacement and then tried to find.... OVERSIZED/ODD SIZED/NOBODY HAD IT.

I could still zip the jacket without the pull, but it was awkward. So, I looked at buying a new one. Since it's such a good jacket, I'll violate this blog's no link protocol and provide the link to what I'm talking about.  http://www.earthfashions.com/main.sc  Well, that's the main page. I just posted it because of Jerry Garcia. :) The actual coat link is here: http://www.earthfashions.com/Surfers-Jacket-BS332.htm   Yep. When I saw that this was a "surfers jacket", I realized, it made sense. It's warm, and there is no padding. So If I'm David Hasselhoff showing off my guns on the beach after an early morning surf, I just slip one of these on while still glistening from polluted surf and call KITT to take me to the drinking place where I lay down on the floor masticating a hamburger while my daughter looks on. Whew. I went really really really far for that one. 

Thar she blows! My fix. You can see the gap where the metal had thinned, allowing the zip tag to fall off. I thought I had to replace and went through all the trouble until I just put a big key ring in between and it worked. Before this however, on a trip to a thrift store, I found a flight crew jump suit with 5 zippers that were....EXACTLY WHAT I NEEDED. The jacket was pretty used, so I just cut off all the zippers and they reside in my basement as junk on deck. How could I be so mean to the HOFF? I loved his Knight Rider thingy when I was a pup. I loved Dukes Of Hazzard. I loved A-TEAM. Like Adam Carolla says, there were only 3 channels back then....

ARF! -Ric