Shoddy's Sporting Goods Store

"Come to Shoddy's to buy junk that will break the first time you use it."

Yesterday I was in a tree stand in the woods and when it came time to leave I lowered my unloaded gun, barrel pointing down, like you're supposed to, with the typical string arrangement. I had a new string for just such a purpose that I had just purchased at Shoddy's. It had a plastic clip on both ends for easy attachment to the gun at one end and the tree stand at the other. This allows you to climb up or down the tree without having to hold your weapon.

I was holding onto the plastic clip at one end and as I lowered it the plastic clip broke off of the string causing my 12 gauge shotgun to stick about five inches into the soft dirt at the base of the oak tree I was in. Nice, now I have to clean five inches of dirt out of the barrel or have the barrel blow up in my face next time I use it.

I had nearly given up buying anything at Shoddy's, otherwise known as D___k's because everything I buy there is junk and breaks the first time I use it. In recent memory there was the deer dragging harness. This harness consists of straps you put on your shoulders like a back pack and there is a rope with an attachment at the other end that you hook onto the deer so you can drag the deer out of the woods. Mine broke the instant I began to pull. It's like the manufacturer didn't really expect you to drag a deer with it, only store it in your back pack.

The other piece of junk was a scent dragging apparatus where you apply scent to a pad. This pad is then attached to a rope which you attach to your ankle. This allows you to apply doe scent to the trail where you hope the buck will come. The first step I took, the scent pad caught on a weed, of which there are many in the outdoors, and it broke.

So beware of Shoddy's, otherwise known as D___k's, or other stores such as K___t, or W_____t who carry products they sell for profit but which don't really work.

Wasn't it Plato who believed that everything on this earth was just a representation of the perfect item in heaven? So your table is a representation of a perfect table in heaven, etc. If I'm understanding that right, Shoddy's is a great example Platonic thought. Whatever you see at Shoddy's is just a representation of real sporting goods that actually work in some other store.