Ok… I went into the army surplus store in my town to talk with the owner, really nice guy. Anyway, a guy walks in, hair a mess, tie all messed up, shirt half untucked, I’d say about 25 years old. He goes to the snap light sticks, the things that glow when you break them. He picks up about 20 of them, comes near me (I’m next to the counter), puts them down, pays for them, looks at me stares for a moment then says, “Gotta see!” before rushing past me to the door.
I’m scared.
AAACKK!!! The above post was made by me, Palve was using my computer earlier today and he did not logout. Don’t know if the mods want to do anything about it, but palve was there anyway.
Maybe he just forgot to pay the light bill? 
If he’d said, “GOTTA CATCH 'EM ALL!!!”…then there’d be something to worry about.
We have some oddball types that hang around our local surplus store, too. I guess a few hairballs are inevitable. I stop by there pretty regularly to see if they’re stocking old Army flight suits (great outfits for working on the car or in the yard…cheap, nice fit, breathable, easy to clean). Naturally, they’ve got some good camping gear, too.
Not so WAG: He was “rolling” his ass off on Ecstacy (yes this is the correct spelling of the drug MDMA).
“Ravers” use the glow sticks to accentuate visual distortions/hallucinations by dancing with them or spinning them at the end of strings. It’s actually a really cool effect in a dark room (especially if you are rolling).
Nevermind the customers, the guys that work in those places always scare me. I hate going in them.
Man oh man, do I ever LOVE the Army surplus store. Even when I was a kid (and I was a scrawny, bookish kid), I loved it. When my brother and I had done something extra deserving of reward like cleaning the gutters or stripping and painting the railings or something, Mom would ask us where we wanted her to take us. “OLD SARGE!” we’d shout. And we’d buy ninja throwing stars and one-man nylon-webbing hammocks and 200-yard coils of rope and Swiss Navy Officer’s jackets and those big buck knives that have “survival tools” in the handle and copies of Soldier of Fortune and parachutes and trenching tools and ammunition packs and YOU NAME IT, IF IT WAS ARMY SURPLUS WE WANTED TO OWN IT.
We also went camping a lot, so most of that stuff was actually useful, I should add.
What’s that, Lassie? The OP, you say? What did it say, girl? Something about cyalume light sticks? Well, I’d imagine the guy had come home from work (hence the tie) and found his power out due to mechanical failure of some sort and no one could come fix it that day, or perhaps he had neglected to pay his utility bill (it happens), and so, having no Coleman lantern, he decided light sticks were the way to go. Where to get a bunch of light sticks? Army Surplus is a great idea; wouldn’t have occurred to me.
I’d also imagine it’s danged eerie walking around a place illuminated entirely with light sticks.
Do you want us to follow you, girl?