This is the lobster tank in the Wal*Mart SuperCenter in Hillsborough, NC. (The picture is several months old; the price has gone up since then.)

Am I the only one for whom live lobsters at Wal*Mart creates a sort of cognitive dissonance? I guess my mental categories of "people who shop at Wal*Mart" and "people who cook fresh lobster" don't overlap by much. But they must sell some, because the tank is still there. (Then again, maybe those are the same lobsters.)

But really, I bring up the Hillsborough Wal*Mart SuperCenter not to talk about lobsters, but to note the fact that there is a brand-new Goodwill Store right next to the Hillsborough Wal*Mart!

So brand-new, in fact, that it isn't even open yet. So brand-new, that Goodwill Industries of Eastern North Carolina hasn't even announced a grand opening date yet.

So I must be patient. And call the local Goodwill HQ to find out when they plan on opening their new digs to the public.

For more immediate gratification:

1. The Carrboro, NC Cybrary (It's a library, but it's cyber ... get it?) is hosting a used book sale tomorrow, Sunday, Sept. 24, 1-5 p.m. I have never been to a library sale at the cybrary, so I have no review to offer. Only to say that the cybrary is pretty small, so I'm not expecting something on the scale of, say, the Durham or Pittsboro library sales, which coincide next weekend. A little whetting of the appetite, perhaps.

I can predict that parking will be nightmarish. The Carrboro Century Center doesn't have adequate parking to begin with (not that I'm complaining; I actually very much appreciate the village's commitment to human-scale rather than auto-scale development, and besides, I can always drive to the Hillsborough SuperDooperWal*Mart when I need a fix of suburban sprawl), and tomorrow is also the date of the Carrboro Musicfest, so if the weather's nice (and maybe even if it's not) there'll likely be swarms of people about, and those who drove will have to park somewhere.

Be prepared to walk a few blocks. It's good for you.

2. The very nice and highly competent lady who coordinates the best thrift-store bookroom in the Triangle, that of the PTA Shop in Carrboro, is reportedly constitutionally unable to throw away books. The result is that the bookroom has become insanely overrun with worthless books, and the donations keep on pouring in. So even the big clearance sale last month barely made a dent in the stock.

So -- there's another big clearance sale, from now until Oct. 6. (And if the last big clearance can be taken as precedent, the sale may well be extended once or twice into the middle of October -- however long it takes to get the inventory back under control.) Why does it matter if the room is full of worthless books? Because only most of the books are worthless. And the non-worthless books are included in the clearance. So there are some serious deals to be had for the discerning shopper. Or the individual of rare taste who is looking for just the book that other people might deem worthless.

Alas, the Carrboro PTA is not open on Sundays. (The Chapel Hill PTA is, but they are not having a book sale.)