American Science and Surplus is a classic, a decades-old tradition for denizens of the midwest and the catalog-obsessed (Toronto’s Active Surplus is a pale imitation of AS&S;’s glory). The store sells everything, so long as it’s cheap, and the product-descriptions on their website is by turns inspiring and hilarious.

Imprecision Tools�
Your writer spent over $20 a year ago for a 21 piece set of small tools: (5) end wrenches size 4mm to 6mm, (2) phillips screwdrivers #0 and #1, (6) slot screwdrivers 0.9mm to 3.5mm, (5) socket wrenches 3 mm to 5 mm, and (3) allen/hex head drivers, 1.5 mm to 2.5 mm. He was disappointed in the quality, particularly when one of the end wrenches broke on the second use. Now you can be disappointed for a fraction of the cost. We offer an “exact” Chinese copy of the set for a mere $5.00. It looks worse than it is. You can clean the burs off the socket wrenches, and although the steel is soft, it will be fine for light duty. The sample has (2) 4 mm wrenches and no 5 mm. We have no idea if similar errors occur in the other sets. So you pay your money and take your chances. We will accept returns if you don’t get (21) pieces, but not for poor quality or count problems such as those described here. 32077 MINI PRECIS. TOOL SET $2.75 / EACH (was $5.00)

Batman Filmstrip
Not the kind you watch. The kind you wear. It’s an 18″ long plastic tie made of clear camera film with the batman logo repeating. Wear it around your collar with the elastic strip. Looks good with most capes. 30734 BATMAN TIE $0.50 / EACH (was $1.00)

Link Discuss (Thanks, John!)