<p>Nada on the ride board. There are plenty of resources to have shared rides to Midway/Ohare, but I’m unaware of anyone carpooling back home for breaks.</p>
<p>As far as books go, Amazon and half.com seem to be almost always much cheaper than Norris. The only time I ever buy books at Norris is if they are extremely hard to find online/IE professor-written books or course packets that are specific to the class. You’ll also get more money back if you sell your books via these resources as well. </p>
<p>There are sometimes dorm or greek group emails about books, but fairly rare. </p>
<p>One secret tip, that I’m really hesitant to share because if I tell it then it makes it harder for me to use :P. is to check the libraries - both Northwestern and Evanston Public. You can check out a lot of the literature books here (I got my ($100) Shakespeare collection tome, for example) and even some actual textbooks. The only caveat: one time a person placed a recall on a book I had checked out for a class, which meant that I could not renew it long enough to keep it for the quarter – and while there are basically 0 fines for late books normally, they are hefty when you dont turn in a recalled book. </p>
<p>Otherwise, the college textbook industry is just one of the most awful in the country, and it’s just one of those costs you have to deal with.</p>