I’m not a big shopper. I know it goes against my chromosomal makeup however I’m just not. There are plenty of other things I can do to make myself feel feminine, such as talk about people behind their backs and scream when I see spiders. Also, I make my own potpourri.
In fact, there’s only been one time in my whole life that I’ve gone shopping with the express purpose of lifting my spirits and that was in college when I found out one of my friends had spent the night in a sleeping bag with a guy I had a crush on. “That’s great, I have to go,” I sniffled into the phone before jumping into my sensible Honda and driving to the world’s worst mall. “Who needs them!” I thought as I passed The Athlete’s Foot, which is a great name for a store that sells fungus but a terrible one for a store that doesn’t.
Doesn’t sell fungus. Incidentally, don’t ever blithely google “athlete’s foot” looking for an image of the store because you’ll get this instead. WARNING: disgusting ahead.
“Not me!” I announced as I passed a kiosks selling sunglasses, hair extensions and all manner of ergonomic miscellany. But the images of camping and betrayal hit me hard as I wended my way past Spencers For Gifts, Auntie Em’s Pretzels and Hot Topic. Was there love amongst the canteens? Furtive fleece-on-fleece frottage? Hot pine tree sex? How I loathed that tent of ill-repute!
If this tent’s a-rockin‘…Eventually I made my way to the Gap and bought, I think, a black pea coat with goldtone buttons. Did it make me feel better? Sort of, until months later a friend asked if she could borrow it for a couple minutes to go outside at a party and I begrudgingly agreed, thinking what could possibly happen to a coat in two minutes?
I’ll tell you what can happen: Barf can happen. Not a lot. Just a fist sized puddle on the lapel. Repeated attempts at spot cleaning didn’t really get out the smell so I did what anyone would do, sprayed the fuck out of that spot with gross perfume and then went to class. I’m sure I smelled like a perfumey barf factory, but, um, what was I saying?
Oh yeah, I’m not a big shopper, I’m not often given to impulse purchases and even bulk discounts leave me cold. For example, though I buy toilet paper, as a courtesy to my guests since what use would I have for such a prosaic and crude household item, I always just buy four rolls instead of the gigantic 24 pack, which is surely more economical.
Seemed like I needed another photo here and I got tired of finding ones that correlate.
Also, when I used to smoke, way back in the 1950s when everyone smoked and they didn’t know yet that it was bad for you, I never ever bought cartons. I mean, I think once I did and as punishment I made sure to spend the money I saved on hard alcohol, which I also bought in bulk. As I sat there, one foot on my pony keg, four cigarettes in my mouth, I began to feel empty. Rich, but empty. Surely there was more to life than sausage? (I also bought an economy pack of breakfast links.) I dabbed at a tear with an adult diaper, which was on sale in a jumbo sized carton and then downed a fistful of sweet relish. I glanced at my compass, it was still pointing due north, and I pulled a pen from my pack of 12 and jotted a little note to myself on one of my 35 neon colored post it notepads. Then I taped the notes to my shoe tree with scotch tape, because I was now the proud owner of 12 rolls, well, 11 if you count the one I ate earlier, dipped in seafood salad. I was lonely and lost. Not literally, since I had three Thomas Bros Guides and mapping software for a PC, plus a desk reference set with collector’s globe, but just more in a spiritual sense.
Which brings me to today and CVS and their one dollar bargains. I am powerless to resist! The other day I bought this!
And then I bought this!
And then today I bought this!
I have no intention of dusting with the duster or watching this movie, or dusting with the duckling or watching the duck watch the movie, even though I know its lush cinematography will spring to life in super high def VHS format.
Anyway, I guess what I’m trying to say is multi-colored drawer organizers in an array of party colors? YOU WILL BE MINE!
I get the swifter because everybody had to dust sometime, and I get the baby duck cause isn’t he da cutest?
But “Somewhere in Time”? The saddest focken movie in history? Seriously it sucked me in with the time travel thing, then to find out he only gets the girl when he dies?!?! Its not worth the dollar to go through that heartache again. Oh Superman, how you loved Dr. Quinn…
WOW! what can i say I’m speechless.
I will never be able to go camping again.I will never look at the atheletes foot store the same.Was never big on the whole dusting thing anyway,thats why i have a enviracare hepa 350 on 24/7.I will never let a woman or a man for that matter borrow my jacket…lets just say I will never be the same again.Oh by the way thanks for leaving out the photo of the douching part.(I think)
Alison M Rosen you have changed my life forever.
You douche after making potporri, too? I think I have a repulsive new Red Eye intro for you now.
I believe I shall impale myself.
Wow. How much of this is true? I find it hard to distinguish fact from fiction when you do posts like this. Ok, when I started reading the first paragraph, nothing unusual, then I saw that potpourri image and the caption that followed it, and I’m like, ok, here we go…
But then after that, starting with the sleeping bag, I couldn’t tell when you were kidding or when you were just recalling facts (on some). That’s some memory you have (like me) if all those little details were in fact true. You smoked?
I always see the Montclair Plaza every time I’m on the I-210 E heading to Las Vegas. Never visited it, but I did stop by Victoria Gardens in Rancho Cucamonga once.
Talking about Shopping, I had enough of listening to another commercial that begins with the lines “In these tough economic times, blah, blah, blah, blah,blah, blah, blah we are here to help…”
Awww man I like that movie it is actually pretty good.
But anyways, people like you are good they stimulate are economy. More so than the stimulus bill will ever do.
Bring the ducky on red eye!!!!! And give it to Bill as a gift that would be awesome.
Sometimes, when Alison writes a blog such as this, I feel like she’s bearing her soul to a degree. She’s saying something significant, and sometimes there is a sense of sadness mixed with the humor. The humor is a camouflage pattern to the textile of melancholy underneath. I sometimes have these feelings of loneliness when I shop. As a single man who’s never been married. I remember a time when going to the mall meant only buying some shoes, and making googly eyes at the pretty girls. However, now, I find that I dread trips to the mall or most other stores. I do feel that sense of loneliness as I stride the teen filled walkways. I have little to nothing in common with most people here. It’s what it must be like to be a foreigner in a land where nobody speaks my language. I can feel the isolation.
Toddrod
As a supporter of your blog I have to angrily say Why the effing sh%t is your STARMETER at 47% in IMDB.COm ? It’s a travesty i tell you !
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2853396/
Perhaps. Comedy and tragedy are two sides of the same coin, as they say. It’s certainly not unusual for artists to go through these highs and lows. Of course, that can be further complicated by simultaneously not wanting to do anything about it. Valentines Day coming up wouldn’t help.
By the way, she’s right about those commercials being made by space aliens. The pajama ones are downright bizarre. They have a surreal quality to them, and the way they run two of them back to back like that, definitely makes it like Valentines Day in the Twilight Zone.
I believe the best thing that we can do for Alison, is several days of psychoanalysis, followed by a slew of mushy valentine blogs on Valentines Day.
I still think that impalement is the best way, but I’m game if everyone else is.
A very intellectual approach to Miss Rosen's mental state Todd! I just think she's wacky! Kinda like Howard Hughes before he went senile…the long hair & finger nails stage!
If you were running for office..I would put my ballot in your box.
that is all.
That’s one of your funniest posts ever, Miss R.
I like when you talk about your “chromosomal makeup” because I always assumed you used Elizabeth Arden.
And I really love how you recycled the duckling picture, because in my book there’s nothing better than a green blogger!
On the topic of strong perfumes used to mask other more horrible smells.
I’m a guy who drives a truck, not some wimpy little import truck, but a genuine GMC 1/2 ton crew cab 4×4 truck. I’m also a Volunteer Fire Fighter. I know, I know. I is possible for me to be any manlier? Without the benefit of some penile enhancement pills or lengthening surgery, I don’t think so.
NOTE: The previous paragraph has little bearing on my tail, mostly I just wanted to reinforce my manhood.
Anyway I was traveling to the gas station with a couple of gas cans in the back of my truck, when they fell over and spilled some gas onto the bag my turnout gear was in. This was a problem for two reasons. The first being that it’s generally frowned upon to enter a burning building with gear that’s soaked in gasoline. Something about bursting into flames. The second reason I forget.
So I dropped the gear off at the laundry mat on my way home. When I picked up the gear I noticed a very strong and un-fireman like pretty potpourri smell wafting up from my gear. It seems they washed it two times but it still smelled of fuel, so the third time they washed it with the chemical equivalent of dead flowers and fruit.
The smell is so powerful that in one day it’s filled my shop (another manly place filled with manly tools and equipment) with the condensed smells of an English garden.
I’m now praying for a nice house or apartment fire so I can return my gear to it’s proper smell of charred wood and burn chemicals.
My god this is a long reply.
Brett, I’m still trying to figure out why you put little ball bearings in your tail, and how that reinforces your manhood! Hey, man, I’m not being judgmental, cuz everyone has those crazy things that turn us on. Have you considered looking into anal beads? (I have a feeling that Alison won’t post this comment now)
Toddrod
I decided months ago that if I were to find a magic lamp, one of my wishes would be an edit function for blogger comments. The second, is to pass by AMR on the street so I could make a scene, and the third is whirled peas, because I care.
Also, I use the bearings in my manhood. They provide a pleasing texture and do in fact reinforce it.