Nana Scores a Bag of Crap!

My husband has a hard time buying me gifts. He says it’s because I “don’t do anything.” To him “doing something” means fishing, hunting, or trap shooting. By his way of thinking, it doesn’t qualify unless it happens outside, preferably in extreme weather conditions.

When I was working and raising children there really wasn’t time to develop hobbies. For years I was going to graduate school nights and weekends. In my spare time I did the laundry and occasionally ran a vacuum cleaner over the big chunks on the carpet.

The children grew up and went off to college, and then I retired. I have no interest in outdoor activities, guns or ammo, bowling or fishing. I like cozy indoor activities. I read. I write.  So in retirement I expanded my interests. I started to blog, and I discovered Woot!

Woot is an online deal-a-day site. They sell one item a day. When it’s sold out, they don’t post another item until the next day. The exception to this is a Woot-Off where items are put up for sale one after another. Some items sell out in seconds, others (known as woot-killers) linger for hours. During a Woot-Off the Woot forum is a lively gathering place for Wooters. Woot is a quirky culture with its own specialized vocabulary and strange customs.

During a Woot-Off thousands of people sit on-line waiting for the opportunity to buy a “Bag of Crap.” Known as a BOC, it is what its name implies, a mystery purchase with no guarantee of quality. Waiting for the BOC to show up is half the fun. Wooters post strange pictures of cats, Star Trek characters and monkeys and keep up a constant banter about how it is the “worse Woot-Off ever.” Last month, after a year of trying, I finally scored my first “boggy old creature.” I was one of 3,000 people who made a successful purchase. The item sold out in seconds. A Bag of Crap costs $3.00 plus $5.00 shipping.

There are tales of BOCs shared in the Woot forums, videos on YouTube, and websites dedicated to reporting on Woot Bags of Crap. The fun doesn’t end with securing a BOC. The forum discussion continues through the delivery of the BOCs. Wooters anxiously check FedEx shipping to find out the weight and dimensions of their boxes. Many times the first deliveries are video taped and posted for all to enjoy. Woot legend includes BOCs with high-end electronics. Sometimes wooters receive hard drives and computers…some work and some don’t.

I received:

•  1 wine bag
• 6 copies of Disney princess software for a camera I don’t have
• 1 Marvel comics tin toy
• 1 Star Trek action figure-Nero
• 1 Snowman speaker with lights that flash to music that hooks up to an i-pod

Pretty much crap!

On the forum I anxiously read about the three people who received letters in their boxes which apologized because part of the order was too large to fit in the box and was being shipped separately. These Wooters were the lucky recipients of Pallets of Crap. The POCs are legendary. Some people get big screen tv’s (2 people did this time). Once a Wooter got an entire pallet of car wax. Another time a Wooter received cases of “Band of Brothers” action figures…cases and cases of the same figurine.

In the last Woot-Off the forum crowd waited on-line with the POC recipients for the FedEx trucks to arrive. Video and pictures of the prizes were posted.

It’s fun. It’s like being a kid and waiting for Santa to come. You never know what you’re going to get. You just hope it’s not underwear.

There was another Woot-Off this week and I scored my second Bag of Crap!!!! Now I’ve got a week of anxious anticipation of the delivery, checking FedEx for updates, reading the forums to see what other Wooters received in their packages of similar weight and dimension…and maybe, just maybe, I’ll hit the jackpot and get a letter. There could be a Pallet of Crap in my future!

All this fun for only $8.00. And my husband says I don’t have hobbies.