The Suckiness of Capitalism

Okay, I've now been offered two jobs. Two $9 an hour jobs that I will hate with an undying passion, but I have to take one of them, I guess, and so I am waiting for them to call me back. I am not ebullient; I am not enthused; I am not looking forward to some miserable scut secretarial job that will net me less than unemployment paid me to do nothing, but there you have it. Money is money, and I need it. So, whine. Whine whine whine whine, and hopefully tomorrow I will be heading off to the accounting office of an electronics factory somewhere in Woodfin or Weaverville. Yay me. I can always quit, right? Right? I hate having to earn an honest living. I suck at it so badly.

To visit the other side of capitalism's tawdry, tarnished, leering and lipstick smudged face, I went to the mall on Monday. It was just as awful as I thought it might be, and the soundtrack, of relentlessly horrific Christmas music, was even worse. I stopped by Victoria's Secret (just for the hell of it, not to purchase any gifts, I swear, and you shouldn't be reading my blog anyway) and ended up in line behind a woman who apparently thinks of Victoria's Secret as her home away from home. It was a little eerie. She had her husband and her mother (or his mother) in tow, and frankly none of them looked like Victoria's Secret types, but she knew all the salesgirls by name, talked about what she had just bought and soon would be buying, and apologized for not making it to the last fashion show (VS has fashion shows at the Asheville Mall? Jesus, civilization as we knew it is indeed over.) and promised to make it to the next one. It was a strange moment in the age old art of in line eavesdropping. Then I went to Spencer Gifts, oh god help me. I can't understand why Spencer Gifts is allowed to stay in business. It's one of those conundrums in an apparently increasingly theocratic society: sex and drugs and rock and roll are bad, bad, but we must have an outlet for them, and so, Spencer Gifts, beloved home of the marijuana leaf bead curtain, the attractive "You're 50 Now And Can't Get It Up!" joke T-shirt, giant card and shot glass, the black light AC/DC poster and so on. Also the home of the strobe light, which M wanted (no doubt for some nefarious reason) for his birthday tomorrow, and which he will duly receive, if UPS does their job right.

Actually, the other mysterious thing about Spencer Gifts is the large area devoted to "old fart" jokes and birthday cards, for 40 and 50 year olds. Does anyone over the age of 15 actually shop at Spencer Gifts? Do they actually find that stuff funny? Are there really people like that, and, if so, how can I make sure I continue to successfully avoid them?

In other news, my friend D made a flying visit up here from Savannah & it was good to see him. Also, it is Jay "Bird on the Moon" Joslin's birthday today and not only that, but he came over & tweaked my blog template the other night, which explains why it is now wider, ha ha, and you, gentle reader, have been fooled into actually reading more words than you were before while the posts still look as if they are the same length! He is a genius and a good friend and I'm glad he got around to being born 33 years ago.