Nate's Swap Shop 8200 E. 63rd St. (at U.S. 350 and I-435) Saturday and Sunday only, 816-353-1627
While drive-in theaters may be a relic of the Eisenhower administration, drive-in Swap Shops are doing boffo business, though, sadly, with not so much frisky sex. Of Kansas City's two outdoor flea markets at drive-ins, Nate's has the more eclectic collection of vendors, peddling everything, literally, from canned soup to lug nuts (although the Boulevard Drive-In in KCK has fleas by day and flicks by night). Dealers, who typically arrive at dawn, pay Nate a flat fee to sell anything they want (except beverages, candy, gum and snacks). Customers pay $1 to drive in, park the car and wander about, poking through boxes of used videos, CDs, cassettes and LPs, tools galore, brand new hip-hop clothing and running shoes, mufflers, auto wax, disheveled Barbie dolls and cartons of Quaker Oats cereals. Want to find "The Last Supper" painted on a TV tray? It's there, between the racks of Army fatigues and the guy selling sticks of pungently sweet incense. On a recent market day, as a man looked over a table of rifles, his little son asked, "Are you gonna shoot somebody, Daddy?" As they moved on to the Disney videos in the next stall, Daddy replied, "Not here, boy."
