Black Friday .... Was That A Steely Dan Song?

well, we made it through thanksgiving; how was yours? mine was nice: rose champagne and my world famous stuffing and good company and i was thankful that i wasn't in iraq or afghanimastan even though we're winning (on odd days of the week,) the world is better off without that tyrant what's-his-name and now it's december already; i knew we were getting close when christmas ornaments appeared in my local drugstore back in july .... most americans, unlike the pentagon, the white house, the military and the neo-conservative coterie--who seem congenitally incapable of planning their way out of a cul-de-sac--seem able to plan ahead; i think starting to buy your tinsel in july gives a body ample time to get ready for the christmas season ....

i don't know about you, but i'm glad that creeping secularism hasn't destroyed the christ in christmas and that americans still have good, solid bedrock values like charity and compassion, and of course i'm referring to the the fatal shooting in a toys'r'us that resulted in two deaths and of course the trampling death of one of walmart's highly trained, highly paid customer service representatives .... boy oh boy oh boy oh boy! is there a song in here, or what? i don't know about you, but i'm thankful that the nra has protected my 2nd amendment right to carry assault weapons with me when i go shopping; safeway can get a little rough at any time of year, and you want to mark your territory when you see a choice cut of beef or a specially good price on a keg of flaccid speshul brood low-ca lo-carb sparkling glistening fortified processed official douche of the national football league and oakland roller derby team .....

hey, i just was in a toys'r'us; i wuz packin' n' yew'd be too its rill skary in thare theers lots of childrun and dolls and toyz and its rilly bright and thayrz lots of noyz sum of thoze toyz tawk to yew 'n' if'n i warn't chewin' my oxycontin tablets i'd'a just put my glock on full fukking auto i want a new barbie 'n' i wanna new peepee weepie doll 'n' i wanna get me some bratz dollz for chrissake we can't even spell any more what the fuck is with this with the proliferation of "z" to pluralize shit i don't mean maybe and that's what mayd this kuntry grayt killiin' peeple in toy storz ..... or any fukkin wherez .....

i don't know about you, but i've never been one to sleep on the sidewalk outside a walmart so i can queue up to the door at 4:30 am so's i can be first through the door to get all those really great prices on all that quality merchandise of things i need so need so much i like a six foot television screen because there's so much great stuff on tv and you want to be able to see your commercials clearly and do you think like they're going to run out of stuff or something so you have to get there early? one thing you can say about america is, there's a superabundance of shit, and i'm not just talking about the bush white house ..... and speaking of shit and the bush white house--and we were--there's a lot of silly shit being talked about "the bush legacy" these days, which is a concept that just beats the hell out of me; does anyone ever talk about adolf hitler's legacy? iosif vissarionovich stalin? nice legacy, george, a couple million dead, the world economy, shattered; every valuable life-affirming piece of legislation ever passed in this godforsaken country, rolled back, rolled up, and thrown out; turned america overnight into a third world banana republic, with institutionalized spying and torture; combat troops stationed around the country for "national security," and can you imagine the george bush library? fucking coloring books? a first edition of "my pet goat?"

still, there's one instance where he showed true grit and true leadership: when--as the dust and smoke of the twin towers was still clogging up the lungs of the first responders whose claims for medical treatments necessitated by exposure to the debris and dust and asbestos and heavy metals would later be disallowed, he told america to go shopping ....

and we did, by god; we did .....

and we've never looked back .....

speaking of assholes, i just read about students at mit who, in exchange for a free i-phone or dingleberry or whatever the fuck it is these days, will let their every move, their every word, their every purchase, their every everything, be monitored .... and once again i marvel at how fucking cheaply americans sell themselves out for .... a fucking phone for chrissakes; you can't afford a fucking phone? you have to whore yourself out for a fucking phone? oh, they say; it's innocuous, it's not like they're giving up anything, and some of them are saying how cool it'll be because the corporations'll figure out their demographics and their motivators and their triggers and they'll be able to tailor offerings and pitches to them, they'll be able to customize promotional offers, they'll be able to get more stuff that they might not know about needing if someone didn't tell them that they needed shit they didn't know about and did you hear me shrieking i just about fucking shit myself i mean i'll do the amazon.com thing every now and then but i start screaming fuck you you tasteless monkey motherfuckers when i see the "people who bought this also bought ___________" i couldn't give a flying rat's ass what some dildo out there bought your taste sucks ass you fucking bitch you don't know a fucking thing about me even though you're tapping my phone GO FUCK YOURSELF YOU CORPORATE FUCKING WHORE and HONEY? can you bring me my meds?

i'm getting overwrought again .....

do you really need a corporation to tell you what you need? oh .... ha ha .... they've been doing it for decades now? and it defines public and international policies? a nation of shoppers in an economy that's gone down the toilet .... i swear, i don't get it: people laid off, losing their houses; investments, gone, and what do i see around me? a proliferation of chi-chi superfluous stores in my downtown where you can no longer buy a fucking lightbulb, while family restaurants get shut down, refurbished and turned into upscale establishments .... the latest one in my neighborhood was the mexican restaurant that's been around for twenty-five years; twenty years ago i was dining on the waitresses; the last few years i'd take the family there because it was inexpensive and child friendly .... now it's been turned into--if you can imagine this--an upscale mexican restaurant where a chile relleno--yes, one chile relleno--costs sixteen dollars ....

i don't know; i'm not an economist but doesn't it seem like if you're a corporation and you want to "protect your bottom line" so you start to cut benefits and fuck with your unions and fire your trained workers and then outsource everything so americans no longer have jobs or if they do they're low paying ones so then they have to shop at wal-mart to get the low prices because otherwise they couldn't eat and then that means more jobs go overseas to make the shit they want to buy at low prices and you always buy stuff if you're an american because being an american means it's time to go shopping and then more americans lose jobs or become janitors or customer service representatives who use their bodies as door stops to keep back eager value hungry shoppers, well .... it's a vicous cycle and self-fulfilling prophesy of how you have to fire workers to keep up your bottom line because you fired workers to keep up your bottom line and keeping up your bottom line is the most important thing there is although wouldn't you think that if no one has any money and they stop buying your bottom line goes down the toi-toi?

the class disparities continue unchecked ... recently my n[auseatingly] p[uerile] r[abido] has been running commercials--excuse me; i meant to say that they're being "underwritten"--for dubai airlines; i'm told that it's the most firstest classest airlines in the world and you get your own private suite as you fly to dubai .... i don't know about you, but dubai isn't the first thing that comes to my mind when i think vacation mecca, and i'd've felt that way even before the advent of young children (i'd rather slash my wrists and eat my flesh than go to disneyland, by the way, but that doesn't surprise you, does it?) ..... what's in dubai? unmonitored banking for war profiteers and arms merchants like halliburton; an economy supported by oil profits and maintained by slave labor; architectural monstrosities that put las vegas to shame and, when you get tired of sightseeing on the sand dunes you can always retire to your seven star hotel and ski down the ski slope with artificial snow, right to your table in the dining room .....

mmmm mmmmm, gooooood ...... one camel steak, rare ..... please!

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