Here's why I like Ebay: Because of Ebay, I was finally, after years of frustrated agony, able to get my parents decent gifts. The first was a couple of years ago when I found a biography of Hugh Bensen, the early 20th century Catholic writer, for my mother. She loved it. Last Christmas, I got a lot of old Latin and French missals, which she liked very much. The Christmas before, I spent a couple of months monitering auctions and picked up three postcards of landmarks for each of their youths and young adulthood - Paris, Texas, and the University of Texas for my dad, and Maine and the University of Arizona for my mother. Sure, I could have snagged any of these through online stores dealing in books or postcards, but you know - it's all on Ebay, eventually, it's simple to search and monitor, even without any effort. You tell the site what you're looking for and it tells you when something matching your needs comes up. It's ingenious.
When I was in Lakeland in my 1920's bungalow, I had a black, white and red kitchen. It was very easy to find vintage stuff to match: vintage red and black cannisters, a red and black tea kettle, and so on.
Now it's clothes I'm after. Joseph's toes recently started peeking through the feet of his sleepers, and I really didn't feel like spending much on stuff he'd only outgrow in another two months. Nor do I have time for yard sales. So it's on to Ebay, and within a couple of hours, I've got 8 good quality, very gently used sleepers (Carter's and such) for about fifteen dollars, total, including shipping. Can't beat it if you tried.