Back in October, after so much breath-holding and finger-crossing by those in desperate need of hip-n-affordable togs, H&M finally announced it would be opening its first Texas outpost at NorthPark Center in "the second half of 2011" -- second half meaning October 2011, per NorthPark's coming-soon website. But a curious e-mail arrived in the Unfair Park in-box this afternoon: Someone claiming to work for the company says that come Wednesday, H&M is opening a temporary pop-up shop at NorthPark that "will carry men's and women's fashion concepts only at this time."

Trying to confirm this wasn't easy; I was this close to putting Julian Assange on the case, after NorthPark higher-ups kept deferring to H&M spokespeoples who were otherwise occupied. But moments ago, H&M's Nicole Christie finally responded with this hint via e-mail:

"We always love to surprise and excite our customers and we will be opening an H&M Preview at NorthPark Center in early December. We wanted to bring some of the H&M experience to our customers before we open our fantastic store in the fall of 2011."

H&M still won't confirm the exact date of its opening -- Grimes has already offered to camp out each morning and offer updates, no doubt via live blog, Twitter and Friendster. But when pressed for further details, Christie offers this:

"This will not be an official H&M store -- it will be a special shop with different interior and specially chosen portions of our fantastic fashion collections to give NorthPark Center and Dallas customers an opportunity to learn about our company and buy from the H&M collection early."

Happy Hanukkah.