The large, massive, absolutely humongous Seattle goodwill store

I had the pleasure to go to the Seattle Goodwill store last week. It was quite an experience.

On a previous occasion I had made an attempt to go to the location and failed, because Google's direction didn't align with...reality. Where there was supposed to be street crossing, there was a homeless camp and a bridge. I abandoned the journey and vowed to myself I'd be back to the glorious store at some point.

So last week I took the approach from the other side. I did end up getting there, eventually, but not without some serious reconsideration. To begin with, the area is in some extremely industrial neighborhood by the howhow market, there's no storefronts, only large trucks pass by, and not a soul can be seen or heart. Except the homeless folks, they're everywhere. I was already feeling uncertain about how badly I really wanted to get to a thrift store, and then I saw a gentleman quite far ahead of me -- this is 3pm in the afternoon -- just standing by the street, facing somewhat away from me but not entirely. It turned out he was...pissing, urinating, peeing, in public view, in the middle of the day, on a major street that led to a popular thrift store, the largest of its kind in the area. I pretended to have not seen anything, hoped to the heavens I'd be hit on the head by an incoming vehicle at just the right angle to forget the last ten minutes, and moved on.

I'm not sure about the corporate structure o Goodwill but it could have been the headquarters of the organization. Massive campus, dozens of large truck, an incredibly spacious parking area were families thronged. And that was just the outside.

The inside was a massive warehouse with a section for clothes large enough to be a medium-sized store by itself. Then a separate section for kitchen wares, decorations, and the set. A furniture section which could easily pass for a decent-sized furniture store. An improbably large electronics section. A pretty decent used-books. Shelves and shelves of used boardgames, though unfortunately none of them particularly good on the occasion I was there.

75,000 new items every day, the signboard outside the store claims, and I believe that.

As with the other Goodwill store in the area, I found it to be on the tad expensive side, though I bought a couple of transparent vases for plants, and a cheapo baking tray because you don't need to buy them new -- a good wash and a bake at 500 degrees is sufficient to destroy any potentially compromising chemical or biological compounds in my opinion.

It was an interesting place, it's unclear if I want to go back, though.