A long litany of small misdemeanours
September 9, 2014 3:06 AM   Subscribe

Drunk online shopping regrets. Guardian writers share their stories of accidental bulk buys and bargains that didn’t seem so wise the morning after.

One week later, readers respond with their own regrets.
posted by modernnomad (53 comments total) 23 users marked this as a favorite
 
(Before I read the article, I just want to note approvingly that this was posted at 6:06AM, which is like prime time for morning after regrets.)
posted by wenestvedt at 3:22 AM on September 9, 2014 [7 favorites]


My brother just the other day told me how he went to some party, wasted his one free weekend in months with an awful hangover, and on Monday got an email from Amazon informing him that his order of a tiny remote-control helicopter was shipping.
posted by Fig at 3:23 AM on September 9, 2014 [20 favorites]


I literally own a bus because of this.

Like, a full size city transit bus. I'm completely serious. Here's a picture of it in my friends driveway.*

Basically me, my friend, his dad, and some other friends were sitting around drinking. Since we're all total alcoholics this turned into us being drunk, which turned into us being shitfaced drunk. My friends dad used to own a really cool modded out travel trailer. It had a huge PV array and just tons of clever mods. You could even run the AC entirely off solar power. He had to sell it for some reason, and had always regretted getting rid of it. We were talking about trips we wanted to go on in some sort of camper/vehicle like that, and somehow it turned into me and him talking about how we both always wanted a bus. I had done some cursory research on which one i'd buy if i ever did and offered it up.

So he went on ebay, and there was one headed to the scrapyard with really low miles in california. Everyones hazy on this part, but the point is that he put in some huge max bid after the rest of us had passed out.

He flipped out on us for the next week about how we "made him" buy it.


He called me a few days after that and said "buy a ticket on this flight right now, it's about $120. we're going on a road trip". And fuck, was it an epic road trip. The guy who owned the scrapyard was a tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist. A skidplate fell off and i had to remove it with a socket set on a narrow shoulder with the engine running because the batteries were dead and we couldn't shut it off. We slept on the seats in sleeping bags and ate tons of junk food and saw basically the entire west coast during the totally-perfect-weather part of summer completely baked.

We never really did anything with it. I drove it about an hour out of town to play a show once with tons of my friends, and otherwise it just sat.

And then, a couple months ago he called me up and said "come over to the house and get the title, you can keep the bus, i don't want to fucking deal with it anymore".

And now i own a bus.

*this is a funny story too, honestly. my friend said i could only borrow his huge PA if i gave him a ride home after i was done with it. The PA didn't fit in any of our cars, and my friends van was broken. So i drove the 102in wide bus through his 105in wide gate and started leaning on the horn. It took about 45 minutes, at least, to get out of that little traffic circle driveway.
posted by emptythought at 3:28 AM on September 9, 2014 [139 favorites]


"... we lounged about frantically" is the perfect description of how I feel when forced to buy furniture – which possibly explains why about 85% of our furniture is some variant of the dumpster dive acquisition method.

Now I just need the sister phrase of this for clothes shopping... an activity I do attempt to subvert by buying online with a glass of wine, and which, of course, reliably results in me still wearing my comfortable but ancient raggedy rags (not even an exaggeration), while more or less expensive bought-online items that don't quite fit or feel or look right bloom in my closet.

The worst purchase I ever made online was some very expensive special batteries for my husband that were never delivered and I raised a complaint with eBay but didn't hear back, and the next time I checked, I found out that my complaint period had ended and I didn't have any further recourse: it turns out this was right after gmail started organizing mail into "primary," "social," and "promotions," and all the response email from eBay was going into "promotions," which I never checked. And I can't even blame it on the wine. *sigh*
posted by taz at 3:41 AM on September 9, 2014


(Before I read the article, I just want to note approvingly that this was posted at 6:06AM, which is like prime time for morning after regrets.)

Ahh, sorry to disappoint you but I live in a different timezone... by 12 hours.
posted by modernnomad at 3:51 AM on September 9, 2014 [3 favorites]


And fuck, was it an epic road trip.

Some of your men should still be trapped in the dim prison of the Underworld in that case
posted by thelonius at 3:58 AM on September 9, 2014 [4 favorites]


This is one of the reasons why none of my cards are saved anywhere for any kind of easy one click shopping.
posted by The Whelk at 4:49 AM on September 9, 2014 [3 favorites]


This is why I never even look at woot.com any more. (Even though I no longer drink.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 4:52 AM on September 9, 2014


Ambien shopping is much, much worse.
posted by Jacqueline at 4:53 AM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


My lone foray into this wasn't a drunk one, although I was... impaired. I whipped out my phone and used the all-too-convenient Amazon app to buy the special edition of Andy Goldsworthy's Rivers and Tides. Two disk set! Supremely worthwhile, although my wife took some convincing.
posted by staccato signals of constant information at 5:25 AM on September 9, 2014


"G, why are you wearing a custom monogrammed ball cap that says "Fuck magnets."
"What?"
"Look."
"Wow....umm...fuck magnets I guess."
posted by Fizz at 5:31 AM on September 9, 2014 [7 favorites]


> This is one of the reasons why none of my cards are saved anywhere for any kind of easy one click shopping.

I have never had One Click enabled and have never allowed the browser or the website to save my passwords on Amazon and Ebay just to ensure that any purchase impulse has to be strong enough to require me to go through the full checkout routine, including manually entering >20 character password strings.

Intoxicated shopping has never been a serious threat to me because of how little I drink, but sometimes I can find myself getting obsessed with buying a second or third copy of, say, Kind of Blue because some reviewer said that on this latest remastering you can hear Evans shifting his ass cheeks on the piano bench to stifle a fart, or something.
posted by ardgedee at 5:41 AM on September 9, 2014 [5 favorites]


A couple of years ago I was real drunk and bid on a dozen individual outdated globes on ebay - and forgot about it until, in the next few days, I started getting "you did not win this auction" emails. I got incredibly lucky here, because I only won a single one (a very nice Replogle 1965). What would I have done with a dozen outdated globes, besides post to metafilter about it?
posted by troika at 5:52 AM on September 9, 2014 [5 favorites]


modernnomad: Ahh, sorry to disappoint you but I live in a different timezone... by 12 hours.

Well then, it looks to me like regrets-making time has just gotten started where you are!
posted by wenestvedt at 5:54 AM on September 9, 2014


I may or may not have an official WETA full-scale replica of the alien assault rifle from District 9 sitting in a box in my lounge room.

It's also possible that I ordered an official WETA full-scale replica of the TST Chemrail - Dual Stage Linear Motor Rifle from Elysium.

Luckily they cancelled that order.
posted by ambivalentic at 5:54 AM on September 9, 2014 [2 favorites]


I think I have only ever drunk-ordered t-shirts, so I do not regret wearing variations of Supernatural tees. My husband probably does, though.
posted by Kitteh at 5:58 AM on September 9, 2014


My list in the last few months includes:


* toe socks
* 3 different iPhone cases
* velcro straps for wire organization
* set of knuckle rings
* iPhone charging cable(s)
* an embarassing amount of hoisery
* Badminton set (!?) with a set of LED night lit birdies
* fitbit bracelets in navy and white (was an excellent buy - my mom loves them!)
* drawer organizers (didn't really work in the end)
* 2 different pairs of sunglasses
* bathing suit (which is amazing and served me well all summer long)
* headphones
* sports bras (great purchase!)

I regret nothing. (And most of these were <$5-10 making regret factor small)
posted by olya at 6:11 AM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


These days I have a separate account I top up with ten or five dollars from time to time so I can do Drunk Kickstarter Backing, which seems like a more altruistic way to satisfy my drunk shopping habit.

On the other hand I have a lot of thank you cards and mugs from various projects that I cannot for the life of me remember why they seemed worthy of my sawbuck.

Maybe I should move on to drunk Kiva microloans.
posted by The Whelk at 6:14 AM on September 9, 2014 [13 favorites]


Before the bottle is opened, Kickstarter is closed.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 6:28 AM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


I bought a douchey leather fringed Owen Wilsonesque jacket from J. Peterman's clearance section when I was on a nigh-psychosis-inducing dose of prednisone once. I told myself I had "always wanted one, here was my chance" but it makes me look like a cross between a skeksis and the dog on the cover of Beck's Odelay.

Drunk shopping was more things like Christian Audigier sneakers and eBay midcentury velvet paint by numbers. Much more practical.

Nowadays I try to keep the genie that is my id IN the bottle.
posted by Lardmitten at 6:28 AM on September 9, 2014 [6 favorites]


thankfully nothing in any of the designer pawn shop websites (Oh I'm sorry "consignment" ) are ever in my size to begin with and the shoes get snatched up before I get there so I never caused any REAL damage.
posted by The Whelk at 6:30 AM on September 9, 2014


I've got an ashtray made from a taxidermy caiman and a crate full of VCDs of the Sifl and Olly Show, since they never released them on DVD.
posted by Ham Snadwich at 6:31 AM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


(Before I read the article, I just want to note approvingly that this was posted at 6:06AM, which is like prime time for morning after regrets.)

Ahh, sorry to disappoint you but I live in a different timezone... by 12 hours.
posted by modernnomad at 6:51 AM on September 9 [+] [!]


Six pm is a totally legit time for regrets; you take an afternoon nap and then it's the point where your hangover has cooled off enough that you can fully absorb how terrible you actually feel in a spiritual as well as a physical sense.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:05 AM on September 9, 2014 [2 favorites]


I own a dozen (many fewer now...I've given them as gifts to a large number of people who are not Lebowski fans) Walter Sobchak Urban Achiever action figures...the one where Walter's wearing khaki shorts and vest, with the Folger's coffee can and Cynthia's pomeranian, not the one with the bowling ball and the suitcase with the whites. I pre-ordered what I thought was one at a ridiculously high price but I NEEDED that figure. A few months later I received an enormous box full of Walters. I never exactly regretted this purchase because, really, how can one "regret" a Walter action figure...but I did have a moment where I thought..." Am I wrong? Am I wrong? No, I'm an asshole".
posted by tzuzie at 7:14 AM on September 9, 2014 [3 favorites]


Either the "accidentally buy a doll table on Ebay" thing has happened to multiple people (which is kind of hilarious), or the Guardian writer cribbed it from this This American Life episode. (Link is to the transcript- it's the first story; audio here.)
posted by damayanti at 7:18 AM on September 9, 2014


15 years ago via The Onion: http://www.theonion.com/articles/man-with-complete-mamas-family-video-library-never,1592/
posted by TDavis at 7:25 AM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


tzuzie, PM me: a Walter would look good in my office alongside my Bob & Doug McKenzie figures!
posted by wenestvedt at 7:51 AM on September 9, 2014


I once paid $5 to sign up for a website. AND I WASN'T EVEN DRUNK!
posted by blue_beetle at 7:54 AM on September 9, 2014 [11 favorites]


Wait, there are Bob and Doug McKenzie action figures? That qualifies as a sober purchase!
posted by Ber at 8:18 AM on September 9, 2014 [2 favorites]


Thank goodness iTunes exists as an outlet for my late-night booze-induced spendlust, which is why I am the proud owner of both Popeye and Pee Wee's Big Adventure.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:26 AM on September 9, 2014


I bought one of these coyote fur mountain man hats. I regret nothing.
posted by Demogorgon at 8:53 AM on September 9, 2014 [4 favorites]


I had a fairly recent ambien shopping spree that I mentioned in the ambien thread: "I went on a $200 amazon spree on ambien and had no idea until stuff started showing up at my house. I bought 8 books, 6 e-books, and a Bruce Springsteen album."

One of the books was about how to teach your toddler to procure food and water, should they find themselves alone outdoors in a survival situation. Apparently I thought this was some kind of "outdoor activities with your kids!" book. No. It is "SURVIVALISM FOR THREE YEAR OLDS -- APOCALYPSE-PROOFING YOUR CHILD." I kept it, though, because it is fun to show people.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:55 AM on September 9, 2014 [5 favorites]


Mine was a guitar. Fortunately not one of the nice ones mentioned in the article, but still.

See, I'd always wanted to play electric guitar. When I was a teenager, though, my band needed a bass player, so I switched to bass fairly early on and played that for years and years (and honestly finding a band as a bass player rather than the 10,000th guitar player is pretty easy).

So I'd never actually gotten a shot with a really cool electric guitar.

Apparently, on Thanksgiving, I'd gotten really tanked on port while making dinner (this part I sort of remember) and eventually passed out and at some point awoke to throw up, but in between sessions of leaving all my Thanksgiving regrets in the toilet, I apparently staggered onto Musician's Friend or one of those sites and ordered one of those "Babby's first guitar" kits with the guitar and amp and bag and tuner and everything. And then I threw up a few more times and passed out in the bathtub, as is my wont (never go running and then drink wine to rehydrate, that is my advice to you).

The first I learned of this was when the UPS guy staggered up to my third floor apartment with about 50 pounds of kit because they shipped it all in one enormous box.

When I opened the box, it was all gift-wrapped in an enormous box.

The incoherently-typed note attached to the gift box was apparently intended to say something along the lines of "You always wanted a guitar, well now you've got one, motherfucker.--Drunk Ghostride."

So now I have a guitar.
posted by Ghostride The Whip at 8:59 AM on September 9, 2014 [21 favorites]


Come to think of it, this is a reality show waiting to be green-lit.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:02 AM on September 9, 2014 [3 favorites]


When you scroll down the OP article, you come to a color photo of one brave Guardian writer wearing a comic jesus-was-I-smashed-or-what! expression and a pair of fabulously regrettable trousers.

I had to re-read the picture caption.

"‘I could probably have tried to send them back’: Sophie Heawood and her excess flatpack furniture."

(Yes, she is sitting beside some furniture flatpacks!)
posted by Jody Tresidder at 9:03 AM on September 9, 2014


It's a long-running joke at work that whenever I get a package from Amazon I exclaim, "Aw, crap, what did I order THIS time?!"
posted by wallabear at 9:06 AM on September 9, 2014


The incoherently-typed note attached to the gift box was apparently intended to say something along the lines of "You always wanted a guitar, well now you've got one, motherfucker.--Drunk Ghostride."

So now I have a guitar.


I don't do much drunk purchasing, but now that I've thought to gift wrap it and leave a note to my future self, I'm sorely tempted to start.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 10:04 AM on September 9, 2014 [8 favorites]


I don't do much drunk purchasing, but now that I've thought to gift wrap it and leave a note to my future self, I'm sorely tempted to start.

This will be just like that time I accidentally bought you fifteen pounds of gummy bears!
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 10:24 AM on September 9, 2014 [4 favorites]


damayanti, people mis-order doll-sized stuff a lot! In fact, there's a whole Amazon and eBay sub-economy which is built on mis-representing the size of merchandise in order to get people buy tiny things at full-sized prices. The sellers are usually juuuust on the edge of properly disclaiming and informing, but you've seen eBay. How much of that boilerplate hyper-fonted spaghetti design mess can you actually read? Doll clothes, doll-house furniture, and baby clothes (I was told) are mis-sold this way. They look just like the full-sized adult stuff in the pictures!

On Amazon, they do it too, but it tends to be things like not being clear that something is a junior size or girl's size and selling it at a woman's or lady's price. Purposely, it seems, but difficult to prove. And you'll likely keep it because it's a couple of ounces of fabric that they want to charge you $12 to return.
posted by Mo Nickels at 11:34 AM on September 9, 2014 [2 favorites]


I own a dozen (many fewer now...I've given them as gifts to a large number of people who are not Lebowski fans) Walter Sobchak Urban Achiever action figures...the one where Walter's wearing khaki shorts and vest, with the Folger's coffee can and Cynthia's pomeranian, not the one with the bowling ball and the suitcase with the whites. I pre-ordered what I thought was one at a ridiculously high price but I NEEDED that figure. A few months later I received an enormous box full of Walters. I never exactly regretted this purchase because, really, how can one "regret" a Walter action figure...but I did have a moment where I thought..." Am I wrong? Am I wrong? No, I'm an asshole".

BRB, I'm going to go get outrageously drunk and offer to buy a dozen Walter Sobchak Urban Achiever action figures from somebody.
posted by Mayor West at 11:37 AM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


I bought one of these coyote fur mountain man hats. I regret nothing

Favorited for future Ambien use.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 1:48 PM on September 9, 2014 [2 favorites]


I am the proud owner of both Popeye and Pee Wee's Big Adventure.

I can't speak for Popeye, But Pee Wee's Big Adventure is actually excellent and this should not be a regret. Like, 92% on RT excellent. Yes, I too bought it while drunk but I'll admit to enjoying it sober.
posted by Hoopo at 2:19 PM on September 9, 2014 [2 favorites]


This topic came up on reddit once. I don't remember the context, but I just remember that there was one comment by a guy who had drunkenly bought a Fleshlight in every combination of outer shell and inner rubber shape. It was apparently at least a thousand dollars worth of masturbatory tooling.
posted by Rhomboid at 2:52 PM on September 9, 2014


This is why I keep all my drunk online stuff to the confines of Metafilter. At the worst, it's only gonna cost me five bucks!
posted by turbid dahlia at 2:57 PM on September 9, 2014


I regret my drunk IRL trip to Men's Wearhouse to buy a sports-coat. Never tell an elderly salesman you want a "classic" look. You'll end up looking like an elderly salesman. Trust me on this. My wife still teases me about my old man jacket...
posted by MikeMc at 3:30 PM on September 9, 2014 [3 favorites]


I have a semi-regular personal tradition dubbed 'red wine and videogames Friday night.' And by videogames I mean computer games, by which I mean Steam. I tend to log onto Steam and think 'oh, I'll just have a look at what's on sale.'

Frankly, I'll probably need to buy another game. However I don't regret my purchase of Euro Truck Simulator one bit - I've logged many hours moving yoghurt between Warsaw and Vienna.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 3:43 PM on September 9, 2014 [4 favorites]


You'll end up looking like an elderly salesman

Bone on your 40s slang and sell a quack anti-aging cream!
posted by The Whelk at 3:49 PM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


I think of drinking as an essential part of online shopping.

These people are in a whole other league.
posted by univac at 4:56 PM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


You'll end up looking like an elderly salesman

Honestly, going to Men's Wearhouse drunk is probably the best way to deal with their salesfolks. Wish I'd thought of that before.
posted by Existential Dread at 9:09 PM on September 9, 2014 [2 favorites]


"I could see myself getting drunk and buying stamps. 'Oh, the state birds! Purchase!'"
--Patton Oswalt, No Reason to Complain
posted by Monochrome at 11:19 AM on September 10, 2014 [1 favorite]


I had too much wine one night and inexplicably bought 3 different translations of the Iliad on Amazon. Wine-dark sea, indeed.
posted by The Elusive Architeuthis at 8:01 PM on September 10, 2014 [1 favorite]


In the joyous flush of a new job offer and a half bottle of white wine, I bought a corset.

This seems to be a thing with me: I own three corsets and never wear any of them.
posted by subbes at 9:21 PM on September 11, 2014


Oooohhh, tzuzie, you are The Best!
posted by wenestvedt at 6:39 AM on September 17, 2014


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