How sad! Just another case of internet replacing anything in book form! Moonshadow, you are right, lots of folks (elderly, rural areas, etc) still rely on catalog/phone orders for their shopping. When one of my BFF's was dying with breast cancer, she had two copies of the LAST full size Sears catalog that was published; she gave me one of her copies. I will treasure it forever. Tuesday

I have always had good luck finding larger size clothing that fits good and looks nice at JC Penneys. Years ago, I used to shop at the one in Omaha, NE, then in Rochester, MN (still go to that one when I visit my son) and now in Houghton, MI. The Houghton one is much smaller and I don't find nearly the selection of cloths in my size, but still buy socks, gifts, and other items there.

Intimidation works better than money around here, lol! My goal was to get it almost emptied to see what we actually need to store. I have a lot over oversized bowls and platters now consolidated on the bottom shelf that were formerly all over the pantry and kitchen. This is also our only food storage area. It's a weird triangular room resulting from the addition of a new wing at an angle in between 180 degrees (straight continuous line with existing structure) and 90 degrees (right angle to attachment wall). It's almost 80 square feet. I would like to have a proper pantry built in with a place for the soda stream machine, a convection oven, and the exact type of storage I need. I needed the room clear so I can think about what to do in there, and also for it to be more liveable while I am waiting. We are about to start a major project downstairs so I am saving the pantry for later.

I used to buy a lot of clothes at Penney's. This shows the sad part of stores these days. Sears Roebuck, JC Penney, Powers, Montgomery Ward and some others in their day filled a niche for the somewhat "upscale" desires, where people could get a taste of the higher class stores at a cheaper price and still get a higher quality item than the bargain basement stores and someone to wait on you. But... Then people decided to be super cheap. The Malwarts, KMarts (aka Came-aparts), etc sprung up promising lowest prices and didn't mention lack of quality or service. It was the introduction of do-it-yourself customer service. You find a clerk, they don't find you. They have no idea what the product is. Shoes are there lady, find a pair that fit. I don't know where it is guy, I don't work in that department. And people settled for it. And it destroyed main street retail for the most part. People gave a slight uprising for a while. So they did improve some quality and started carrying some name brands. Also brought in celebrities to try to give them credibility. When the smaller stores and the internet starting giving them a real boot they had to put in some name brands but what's happened? Prices have gone back up. You pay as much at these places a you did at a JC Penney, Montgomery Ward, Powers, Sears Roebuck (bye-bye Roebuck!), etc. I give Sam Walton credit for being a marketing genius. His philosophy of give people the impression of saving money and they'll pay any price is so spot on as they say it's truly magnificent. He even convinced people to pay $50 a year just to be let in the door to buy overpriced stuff, haul it yourself, bag it yourself, require ID from people who stamp their feet at ID for any other purpose and then stand in line for the "privilege"! It's brilliantly executed. Some grocery stores around here tried a membership thing 40+ years ago and it flopped miserably. Timing and execution are key. Black Friday should be a memorial day to mourn the loss of decent retail. We should place flowers at the sites of the dearly departed stores. But then again, I wouldn't want to buy something with the 4time Felon's name on it as a memorial!