Forty-four dollars and thirty-five cents ... $53.81 ... I watch the numbers climb in their typically erratic fashion. My teeth are clenched and sweat drips from my brow. When it's all over, I am the winner at $67.01, plus shipping and handling.
The prize this time is Green Lama #6, a rare issue of a comic featuring a 1940s superhero who, unlike Batman and Superman, never made it out of the decade. But he still lives on eBay, just like all the other superheroes, pop stars and cultural icons of our past.
eBay is a great place to buy things you need, especially when you know exactly how much they cost in a retail store and can bid accordingly.
But it is a terrible place to buy things that you don't need. There are so many interesting listings that it is easy to get caught up in the dreaded "auction fever." I know, since it has happened to me.
Pierre Omidyar, eBay's founder, once remarked that eBay would never have gotten off the ground if not for the hardcore collectors who popularized the site in its infancy.
Indeed, the various communities of collectors are still important to eBay, judging by the volume of listings. The things people buy and sell range from the well-known, like stamps, baseball cards and comic books, to the obscure, like Masonic badges and bus tokens.
I, for one, came to eBay in order to relive my childhood.
It started off simply enough, with the purchase of a He-Man and the Masters of the Universe metal lunchbox to add to my collection of lunchboxes, which had been dutifully assembled with frequent trips to garage sales and antiques stores.
After that, I was hooked - no more driving up and down the state of New Jersey, no more haggling, no more disappointments. Well, except for getting outbid, of course. But then you just have to raise your bid.
After lunchboxes, it was everything else great about the '80s: Gremlins trading cards, Thundercats action figures, promotional Star Wars drinking glasses. Then I moved on to NES carts and Powell Peralta skateboards.
After a while, sucked into the vortex that is eBay, I ventured into the '70s - and even further into the past, into a strange and mysterious world of tobacco cards and luridly illustrated paperbacks.
I was no longer reliving my own childhood, but that of my parents, and that of their parents. It was great.
Each day, my room looked less like a room and more like a time warp, some sort of interstitial space between eras where all the detritus ended up.
But the good times could not last. The invoices, which had been pouring in steadily, suddenly turned into a grand deluge.
I had to step back and wonder whether each new box of G.I. Joe colorforms or Wuzzles trick-or-treat bags was really worth it. Sure, they were great, but what was I to do with all this stuff? I could barely walk through my room without discovering that I'd bent my Wookiee. So I gave it up.
However, I don't hold any grudges. It was great while it lasted. Despite the danger, I would encourage other people to try eBay, as long as they don't get carried away. There are some things you just can't find anywhere else but eBay, which make it a difficult site to avoid once you start.
Writer Adam Cohen, in his superlative book about eBay titled The Perfect Store, says it best: "No one can truly experience eBay, of course, without acquiring at least one 'only on eBay' item. I now own a small Turkish carpet, handwoven in Iran in the 1960s, featuring a likeness of President John F. Kennedy with slightly Middle Eastern features."
Fortunately there is hope for the hopelessly addicted. Anyone who has browsed the listings for long enough inevitably notices items that have sold for record-high prices - the same kinds of items that have been sitting for years in their closets, attics or basements, or waiting to be found at yard sales and flea markets.
And so begins the transition from buyer to seller. While selling is still an addiction, it is decidedly easier on the wallet and helps keeps the house clean, too.
