A search on eBay for glassware will net shitloads of results. Even items on the public DEA special surveillance list--like heating mantles, Parr hydrogenators, and even fucking tablet presses (as in high-throughput electric ones)--can all be had from eBay with great selection.
 
eBay has to be the biggest online retailer. Good, you say, because it's more easy to blend in. But this is not some shop where you can pay with cash and get out. Every transaction is recorded, passed around various national agencies and their analysis programs, and stored on multiple hard drives for eternity. If your shipping info or account is/can be linked to your identity, every purchase can be considered as transparent as a Sudafed purchase. Every government agent and their dog could find out the brand name of your round bottom flasks.

Let's say you think you're pretty smart and buy a pre-paid debit card (with cash) to do all your purchases. You still have to get the stuff shipped someplace. And I'm sure "paid with pre-paid card" is a criterion for a red flag by whatever programs they use. I don't think anyone will notice if you buy a little glassware, but anything more useful than that or any patterns seems like a trap.

Not your address, not your name, not your pre-paid debit card.  Wonder how one would get around those if they had the budget.

Name is not an issue with pre-paid debit cards. Last time I used one online, I just put a Joe Blow name and it went right through.

Not-your-real-address is a seemingly easy obstacle, but of course your weakest link. There are plenty of stuff on there a bee could use to turn nectar into honey, enough to justify the risk.

I was going to order glassware from ebay, i thought it should be ok, but yeah its a bad idea.

I found a great glassware store in the USA, great prices, especially for heating/stirring mantles.

Might just order small boiling flasks, i heard 500ml and over will raise someones attention...?

full set of glassware, a stirrer/hotplate, several gallons of various solvents/acids, a bunch of hydroquinone, and sassafrass oil.

Those all are pretty innocuous (as in "illegal chemistry" doesn't immediately come to mind) except the sassafras oil. Lots of people buy "chemistry sets," so I don't see buying glassware as suspicious--even if Big Brother is watching. Correct me if I'm wrong. I agree that it can be good for innocuous purchases, based on the assumption that said purchases are safe to do even when you know the government knows about them. Buying shitloads of glassware (or any lab equipment) is indicative of manufacture. A hobbyist will rarely spend over $500 per year on his or her hobby.

Buying chemicals at all on the snitchbay is a bad idea. Like someone on WD once said, it's like drinking water from the toilet.

I have recently found a lab supply shop, and i thought to myself, why not just walk in there and buy what you need?

Not everything in one hit of course, i want to buy my mantle before anything, then slowly obtain my vacuum and glassware.

If i'm asked what i'm using it for, i either have a great excuse which i already have, or i just say its a present for a family friend, etc.

Then when i go in again, they will know who i am and what i'm after. Anyone else do this? I dont see a problem with it..?

Just walk in and walk out.

I have recently found a lab supply shop, and i thought to myself, why not just walk in there and buy what you need?

Not everything in one hit of course, i want to buy my mantle before anything, then slowly obtain my vacuum and glassware.

If i'm asked what i'm using it for, i either have a great excuse which i already have, or i just say its a present for a family friend, etc.

Then when i go in again, they will know who i am and what i'm after. Anyone else do this? I dont see a problem with it..?

Just walk in and walk out.

Oh I wish I had one of those in my shitty city. It would be so convenient. Good excuses would be that you're homebrewing beer (most plausible), that you're making biodiesel because you're a treehugger, that you're working on the next great American invention, that your son/nephew/niece has taken an interest in chemistry, that you're a student researcher at [local university] who broke one too many 5L heating mantles and have to replace it yourself, that you want these flasks because they look so pretty (might only work if you're a girl).

Funny y'all brought this up.  I just realized that there is a laboratory equipment and chemical supplier right down the street.  They carry everything one would ever need from glass to reagent grade chemicals.  So I gave them a call to set up an account.  Turns out that one doesn't need an account to purchase from them, and they accept cash.  I was as happy as a puppy with two peters.

If you are nervous about buying from eBay, just have a look at who is running their online store, many of them have their own websites independent of eBay. Just think of eBay as the catalogue and referral service ...

Great advice zgoat! The subforum is called "Reagents and Apparatus Acquisition"

You have to use all three options to be secure which is not a problem for one or two things but  most people don't have 5+ different addresses at their disposal (using friends is a bad idea).

That being said it all depends on what you are buying and how motivated police is to get you.