hope that i get old before i die…

so i took a trip up to san francisco the weekend before last for the green festival because a friend was one of the organizers and also because i had never seen “the city by the bay” before. just to give a little background into the theme of this post, i drove up to san fran on I-5, and came back on US 101. even though taking the 101 back was a good 70-ish miles longer, i really wanted to see a different part of the state than the same one i took to get there. also, it was a sunday night, and i had a feeling (more like a fervent wish) that there would be very little traffic once i got back to LA. of course, as any one who lives in LA can tell you, there is almost never a good time to drive through the valley on the 101 no matter what day it is.

my biggest observation, and something that i’ve been thinking about ever since i went up there, is how much everything in this country is set up to be exactly the same no matter where you go. drive on the highway and you get the same green signs with the same font no matter if you’re in california, texas, wisconsin, new york, etc. even within the sub culture put forward by the green festival, there’s a certain same-ness there as well. not only with the presentation of the products, but the presentation of the attendees as well. all over you hear the same conversations going on but with different people having them. the same language to describe the same conditions and settings, and the same side conversations when one of them goes off on a tangent.

i worked for a non-chain pizza restaurant for many years and one of the owners would always complain when customers would call up and say that something they ordered one night was terrible because it wasn’t exactly like the last one they ordered. he would smooth things over with the customer, but off the phone he would always bitch about how “people expect mcdonald’s” when they order food. meaning that everyone thinks that when they don’t make it themselves it should be exactly the same every time they order it. i first heard him talking about this several years ago but it never sank in how far flung the phenomenon is until that weekend in san francisco.

i’ve only ever been to two other countries, not counting the couple hours in toronto’s aiport which doesn’t really qualify. but in mexico, even in a border town, the only things that looked cookie-cutter made were the american businesses that came over the border to give the americans a taste of home in a foreign land. i found a similar thing in israel, but there’s was slightly different but yet still the same unless you were visiting the ancient areas of the country. but when you go near a financial area (aka - mall, strip mall, shopping area, etc) you find the same types of western societal sameness, only most of the writing is in hebrew instead of english. in some cases, it was the phonetic hebrew version of the english name.

i have always known that america has been about assimilation and common experience, but when it is forced on us this way, it seems so artificial. actually, no, it IS artificial! there should be no reason for our cities to be the same but with differently shaped buildings. except for the famous bridges and the giant hills, i really could not tell the difference between san francisco and a place like madison, wisconsin, as long as i wasn’t standing where i could see downtown.

even going into the local organic food-type market, it was set up just like any other organic food store no matter what brand of store you were shopping in. whole foods looks like trader joes looks like rainbow foods looks like outpost looks like any other damn store that caters to that type of clientele.

“i hate walmart”
words and music by dave lippman

I’ve always hated Blockbuster
Starbucks, not quite so much
If I’m not boycotting at least three oil companies
I start to feel out of touch
I wouldn’t be seen near Nordstorm or any such
and I hate Walmart

I don’t like whips, I don’t like chains
I don’t go chopping up my neighbor’s brains
Don’t really even like shopping
Except at the flea mart
and I hate Walmart

Now you may wonder, what’s all the fuss?
If you don’t like the train — take the bus!
Well I’ve found religion
and just between us
I hate Walmart

If you didn’t hear the story, well here’s how it is
Big company sells below cost
Drive mom and pop out of biz
Pretty soon all over the land
One big square store, identical brand
And that’s why I hate Walmart

Used to be you could drive around
Stop in at three or four towns
and count up different sites and sounds
Different if not unique
Different accents
Different smells
Different things to buy and sell
Now it’s all Taco Bell
I hate Walmart

Roads used to dip and wind
You drive slow, relax your mind
Never knew what you’d find around the next bend
But now the freeway goes so straight
It’d go right past the pearly gates
I don’t feel human
I feel like freight!
I hate Walmart

I like to roam, I like to greet
Individuals on the street
You always know the one you meet is one of a kind
But more and more it seems to me
Reflections of something on TV
When we’re all alike nobody’s free
I hate Walmart

I boycott Burger King
I boycott Newt Gingrich
I boycott everything which I’ve seen advertised
Used to go out to dinner in a diner
Now they say fast food is finer
But it tastes like it fell out of an airliner
It’s enough to make you weep

I don’t like board games
I don’t like brand names
They make inflated claims
They’re full of bleep
Everyone I know is a high tech dealer
Wants to sell me a digital potato peeler
And I don’t like Garrison Keeler cause he’s so white

Turn on my radio dial, like to hear something new once in awhile
But it’s the same old crap in a brand new style
It’s audio rape
But still I try to pick and choose
I turn the dial but I always lose
They only play the worst rock and roll
and maybe if you’re lucky maybe one little rhythm and blues
And that’s why God made tape

Used to be we wore beads and bells
Made our own clothes in our own way
Now we all wear uniforms that say
Hard Rock Cafe
We’re in a state of sartorial decay and that’s why
I hate Walmart

If there’s a pretty spot they pave it over
Put a cloverleaf over a four leaf clover
Black paint on the White Cliffs of Dover
It never fails
Hope you like this song, thanks a bunch
Could go on but I gotta go eat lunch
If you didn’t like it I’ve got a hunch
You work in sales

So grow your own
Make your own
Be careful what you own
Develop non-shopping to an art
And whatever you do
Don’t shop at Walmart!

…literally!

i bought the first book on a whim about six weeks ago because there was so much fuss about the latest edition. *** and for the record, i have only just started the 7th book and i have no idea what happens, so please don’t spoil it for me. no comments on this post will be read until i have finished the book *** i just finished the seventh book, and wow!

anyway, back to the story… i got the first book and decided to skim through it since i had already seen the movie. the movie pretty faithfully follows the book on the major plot points from what i remember, and it took me about two days to read it, so i got the second one having also seen the second movie. well, i thought i’d give myself a slight break between books so that they would line up as individual volumes in my mind. i read the robert jordan “wheel of time” series literally from start to finish through 10 books and they all jumble up in my head for the most part. trying to avoid this with harry potter, i decided to read something else in between potter books.

well, this was working well until i got to book five, “harry potter and the order of the phoenix”. once i started reading that book, i could not put it down for two days straight. i stayed up reading until 2am (or later), had to be up for work around 6:30-7am, and ended up reading myself right into a cold that kept me out of work for two days, and made me miss a co-workers wedding reception. was it worth it? even though i missed work and may not get paid for those two days, and i still feel like shit, and felt like i was going to die of a heart attack during those days, i would say that there is no other way to read these books except obsessively. and i just finished “harry potter and the half blood prince” after three days of reading that one. and now i’m starting on the last book “the deathly hallows” without even waiting for book six to cool off first.

i have been told by friends and friends of friends that these books were very well written, but they were people whose book opinions i didn’t value very highly (no offense to anyone who recommended me these books if you are reading — which you probably aren’t anyway but still). either i didn’t have the same taste in books as they did, or they were more casual readers than i am, and the fact that a bunch of kids also love these books made me think it was written for a lower age group than the one i occupied. and i have to say that the first three books definitely come out as “young adult” material, but after that the series goes very dark and very sinister. they almost read like a murder mystery, except the murders come near the end and you pretty much know who did it because you can “see” it happening! i have spent the last six weeks saying to myself, “wow it’s getting late, one more chapter and then i’ll go to bed” at roughly 1am most nights. “just one more chapter and then i really need to go to sleep”. it sounds very much like i’m a crack addict when i write it out like that. i guess we can all be thankful that there are no “harry potter whores” trying to sleep with their dealers so that they can get the next chapter in the saga….