This picture seems to indicate "African American Slave Revolt Reenactment" Day.
Black Friday is passe and just a little bit racist sounding these days. Now there's something on Small-Business Saturday and internet days and even Black Friday Preview Night on Thursday for people who can stay up late but like sleeping in.
Screw that. You know what the only other important sales day is this week?
It's Wicked Wednesday.
That's the day 200 million assholes come into stores, ask 1800 questions about a product, fiddle with and break the demos, steal all the fliers and pamphlets, and then walk out without buying a damned thing because they've decided to "come back tomorrow."
Where they will fight tooth and nail, miss out on what they really wanted, and pay more online to get it in a week when they could have had it yesterday for less after shipping.
Papa's buying a book when he gets off work and is hiding in a cave.
I went out to get some very specific items. I got none of them. I went out to price a few larger-ticket items. I managed that, somewhat. On a whim, I also stopped into the bookstore to burn through one of the gift cards I got for Christmas. Bad idea.
Even though it was a tentative tick on my official BUY list, I very quickly made the following purchase:
God-fucking-damnit.
Like the 3x3x3 Classic wasn't hard enough? No, obviously not. I've warn through at least one of them in just a few years. I can run through solutions starting from all six colors with scramble time in between two or three times just over the course of a regular television program. The little reflective lamination has come off most of the stickers by now.
Shit, I just fixed the 2x2x2 with the internet after something like 8 years and this 4-cube monstrosity starts learning at me from the puzzle shelf at the local book store. And I, in my vainglorious stupidity, believed I could solve the contraption in much the same way as it's smaller counterpart, simply "chunking" multiple rows here or their to suit my need like some kind of deranged Good Will Hunting utilizing The New Math.
Hours later and I'm failing to even grasp the instructions to get it back to normal assigned me by an online cube solver. I know I said it would be a bus, but this–this may actually be the thing that kills my brain, you guys.
Also, Carolyn said I should blog about butts tonight. ))<<>>((
As I was grocery shopping today, a man walked up to me. "You don't remember me," he said.
No. No, I don't remember you, random six-foot-four Mexican with bad teeth and and handshake reminiscent of grasping a cracked, dried out baseball glove.
"Think hard," he said so softly I could barely hear.
"Are you … are you [redacted]'s father?"
"No…" he said. "Where did you used to work?"
"The Gap?"
"Yeah…"
"Did you used to be one of the delivery guys?"
"Yeah, man, you still working there?"
"Oh, how've you been? No, I haven't worked there in … oh, two years, now? How's it going?"
"My son died today."
WHAT THE FUCK.
Apparently, he just came into A&P to see his cousin, but the cousin wasn't working today. Also, he'd been laid off from IBM last week. Then he asked me if he could ask two questions. The first? He asked for bus fare to get to the hospital today.
Yeah, in hindsight, I volunteered every piece of personal information this guy seemed to know. When it comes to charlatan psychics, this is what is known as a "cold read." By supplying just enough generic detail in the right setting, working from resulting clues a fraud can appear to know a great deal about a person.
How did I get out of this incredibly awkward conversation and whatever smaller favor he was going to ask of me after I said, "No, scumbag, you can't have me lucky charms my money"?
I told him that someone had just stolen my credit card number and I'd been dealing with the bank all day, leaving me only about $20 to my name until a get a new card next week."
Which is true, by the way. Fuckin' sucks. However the universe rewarded me for how well I handed many terrible situation all on the same day. When I went to check out, an adorable, punky/scenester-ish type of cashier girl with a blond bob started chatting me up. Seems she really liked that I bought my Red Bull in bulk. In hindsight, she talked about having one on her break enough that I probably should have asked when she got off, but 20/20 and all.
Last week I saw a man, mid-forties, talking to his woman-person as they exited the local supermarket. Pushing their cart, he hopped onto the back and rode downhill the dozen or so feet to their car.
In one sense, it gives me hope for my future as the type of man who will still enjoy riding downhill on the back of a shopping cart when I'm pushing fifty.
In another sense, it irks me that when I'm pushing fifty, I'm still likely to be doing stupid shit like that in an effort to artificially inject some livelihood in to asexual relationships that will never be as intimate as I'd like.
I went grocery shopping the other day, pretty much entirely for sandwich finxin's, whole wheat and white bread, tomatoes, cheeses, roasted beasts and the like.
There are really only three guys who work the deli counter at our local A&P: Old Italian Guy, who always gives me a few slices of everything to snack on as long as it's not very busy; Young Latino Guy, who actually speaks perfect English and can handle orders in both metric and Imperial measurements and is always happy and talkative; and of course 14 Year Old Pudgy White Boy Who Never Remembers An Order, Can't Seal A Deli Ziplock Bag For Shit and Has Cost Me Many Dollars In Cheese Going Moldy Too Fast Who Always Calls Me "Sir."
If you don't already hate this kid as much as I do, he's basically one more testicle descending away from being this wonderful fellow:
However, this last trip was a bit more fun for me.
It was relatively busy and everyone was working at once. Obviously, I got stuck with Chubs and so made my order one piece at a time and slowly. Twice each. I began with 3/4 lb. of roast beef.
"Regular or salt-free?" he asked. (Not an unreasonable question.)
"Regular," I said.
"…Salt-free is on sale, though." Really? Have I already begun the physical metamorphosis fated me by my Yiddish grandpaternity? Have I taken on the appearance of a wrinkled, old diabetic who splurges at every opportunity to consume the same delicious sodium chloride which will one day raise my blood's pressure high enough to burst forth from its arterial prison and pool inside my brain cavity? Have I?
"No. Regular is fine," I assured Whitey.
As "The Beaver" sliced my beef (not a metaphor), something which he had to pause in to check if I had wanted a half-pound (wrong), I muttered under my breath:
"I LIKE salt."
This was apparently and I swear completely unintentionally hilarious, at least to the woman in line next to me. In her late twenties and shopping with someone who seemed to be her affable mother-in-law, she was young enough still remember how delicious bad food is but still old enough to appreciate the willfulness to relinquish adult responsibilities and malign annoying people in public.
"Zucker’s observations hit the mark precisely.…Girlpants and Gasoline sheds light on our collective (self-)consciousness." - Lily Ackerman, Phi Beta Kappa Key Reporter
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