If you’re from Houston, you know the store I’m talking about. If you’re not, then picture a typical Wal-Mart filled with only geek toys…and okay, maybe a few appliances thrown in to act as a viable cover. It’s not that Fry’s is a bargain. In fact it’s the opposite: you can buy the same thing elsewhere for less, but they have an awful lot of stuff you can’t find anywhere else, thus the draw. At least a fourth of the store is devoted to DIY pursuits, from remote-control whatevers to networking, PC building, modding, you name it. If it’s got anything electronic inside, it’s at Fry’s (and likely the parts and pieces to fix, update, or enhance it later). I always whisper a silent admonition to myself to “look but don’t buy” when I cross the threshold into credit-card heaven, but it never fails that a trip to Fry’s results in something carried out to the car. I just always hope the damage is not too severe.

Now being the good little blogger I am, I thought it would be fun to do a little photo journal of the whole Fry’s experience. So I sauntered in (after doing my return, a common ritual of these Friday-night solo dates), and before passing the magic gates to start browsing, I stopped and started to take a photo panorama (one frame of which you see in this thumbnail, which if you click on will open to a full picture). After two frames, a less-than-patient security guard hustled over and firmly told me “you can’t take pictures in here.” I stared at her not really connecting to what she said since it took me by surprise. “Is this a store policy?” I asked, dumbly, to which she uttered a little louder (I wasn’t deaf, but apparently she made that assumption), “YOU CAN’T TAKE PICTURES.” I smiled, said “Okay” then put my digicam away in pocket. If this had been Eastern Europe a couple decades ago, no doubt she would have yanked the camera out of my hands and removed the film. Or if she was having a bad day, simply shot me instead. Thank goodness it’s America (and thank goodness Fry’s isn’t run by Homeland Security or I might have been shot on the spot).

All this was no more than a trite little story to tell someday until I read William Safire’s most-excellent “On Language” column in today’s The New York Times Magazine. Today’s topic was on the use, mis-use, and nuances of clandestine and covert among other “spookspeaks.” Now I understood a little more about the nuances of my Friday-night excursion: I thought I was being covert, whereas the security guard thought I was clandestine, no doubt thinking I was a hooligan hired to snap pictures of their lauded bargains. In reality, I was neither exactly, but that didn’t console my poor digicam whom I’m sure whined in my shirt pocket each time I stumbled across some odd (but cool) geek toy begging for me to preserve in digital heaven, or more often, capture moments of the bizarre shoppers.

I didn’t stay that long since my clandestine intentions had been effectively thwarted by an ever-policy-vigilant rent-a-cop. In my wounded-ego condition I might have been tempted to console myself with a bunch of unnecessary (but oh so cool) thingamabobs, but in the end, I left with my dignity…and a cool KVM video-audio-keyboard-mouse switcher to share two computers with one monitor/keyboard/mouse…and some unsalted cashews. But really, that’s all! Next time I may just go in with one of those necktie spy cameras and try to complete my aborted mission. Let’s see how long it takes them to spot me then! Or not.