The Tarp Conundrum has been scrutinized in the Lost community:

http://mswendy.wordpress.com/2008/10/14/lost-parody-tarps/

Another big quandary amongst the many LOST podcasts, blogs and message boards: [i]“Where did all the tarps come from?”. Not just a handful from possible plane cargo wreckage… but scads and scads of them![/i]

Lost is auctioning off most of its props. I haven't looked through the catalogue, wouldn't be surprised to find a couple for sale.

http://www.profilesinhistory.com/lost-auction-preview/lost-auction-preview

Dagny, I appreciate that I wasnt the only one who considered that-I find it amusing that a whole community has observed this .
I am all set with the props-not surprised that they are being auctioned off, but I am not a collector of anything (on purpose). Although, It would be kinda cool to label all my emergency stuff with those....

I watched a few episodes the first season than as it got wierder and hard to discern any plotline, I just gave up on it.

I've watched all of the episodes and it almost jumped the shark for me in seasons 2 or 3 but I had to gut through it. It's total escape-ism for me. DW and I get to turn off reality for an hour and click on a different mind wave to try to figure out what's going on. Two things that were not noticable to me: roving guards (maybe on a couple of episodes) and I always wondered where would be a good place to put the sanitation pits, just from a community planner perspective.

The island is a relatively easy place to survive. There are pigs inland, and fish in the sea (and Jin gets on with catching them early - he turns out to be a fisherman, which is handy), and plants. They get water too.

One thing that struck me, and not really wanting to get into the big Jack versus Sawyer issue, is that where Jack went through the plane wreckage looking for meds and alcohol that he knew he could use, Sawyer went through it looking for just about anything. After a while they set fire to the plane because it was becoming a health hazard, and then when they needed something Sawyer was the guy they had to go to. Eg I don't think he had any idea they'd need batteries from laptops, he just saved everything of value. Smart guy, who really helped the community.

I've not really looked at the tarps, but maybe some of them were material from the plane? Eg seat covers. (By series 2 they find other sources.)

I'm currently part way through series 5. Although there are good things about it, I'm not sure they are worth the bad. I'd say that 90% of the questions raised in the first series haven't been answered yet, after over 100 hours of TV. What's especially annoying is the characters lack of curiosity. They don't talk to each other, or share information, or even ask questions half the time. They'd been there a week before anyone even thinks to circumnavigate the island, and that's Syed who's actually just trying to kill himself, and he doesn't far. Had he continued, he'd have found the pier and other installations we see in the second series. For all they knew, there could have been a hotel on the other side of the island. They just didn't explore.

I've stuck with it since the first episode. very enjoyable. what I love is their ability to navigate the jungles without compass!