Slice of Life at Wal Mart

About 7p tonight tried to spend most of the afternoon kicking my current addiction to painkillers and sleeping pills does not seem to be working, with all job schedules and business outings, posing as social calls, that really are nothing else but reasons to abuse an entire array of narcotic substances way into the morning hours where a few hours later the ramblings of my ex- girlfriend making her way off to work penetrate through my somewhat conscious sleep, there goes any chance of a deep recovery, the kind where the body gets a chance to send in the clean up crew for repairs on the brain, heart, and central nervous system, therefore at the time being I have been caught up in a battle of keeping a strong mind that wants to call it a day while setting off a chain reaction of physical events that shall either end in a stroke of a heart attack, possibly a seizure of some sort.

These are the slow hours like the ones I experienced in some back room hostel in the old part of Bangkok watching British news television after after hour until I could find some way to fall asleep, I slowly started to run out of the prescribe sleeping pills recieved in a euro medical style clinic when the week and a half of no sleep, partying, and trekking three weeks earlier in Vietnam began to overwhelm my entire system. This seemed like a point where the end was near, at least I had bothered to buy global health insurance, otherwise it could have cost me hundreds of dollars, had a bit of a chat with the doctor who offered me nothing more than a script for sleeping pills and a some advice on taking it easy with the nightlife style, so much for heeding advice, after a couple pills and a few hours of sleep it was right back out to the crazy streets of Hanoi, zipping around on mopeds stoned on grass, pills, and a fair amount of booze following banshee like Viet teenagers who dared me and some fellow travelers to chase them around the city streets of downtown Hanoi, like a video game, a true sense of crashing, injury, and danger did not register with the likes of these youth with faces covered in bandanas, helmets, if they wore any at all, covered in american and british rock band sticks, along with various stickers of profane discription, so by now all I could do was just hold on, get into the entire process of weaving inbetween moving cars at 45mph along tiny darkened streets which bled from one into the next, not giving me much choice but to slide in front of all sorts of cars, clipping chrome bumpers, while manuevering through pedistrian traffic at almost every intersection, all the kinds of things people watch in the movie theaters with all the high speed action and editing cuts, at this point nothing more than a matter of survival for the next fifteen minutes as these rebellious teenagers took us through one of their many curcuit tracks, eventually ending right back where we started to some applause and disbelief on their part that a friend and myself actually could keep up with them, which was more out of fear of being lost in the middle of Hanoi, without much Viet language skills, a true challenge to get back home, more so than the death race we had just completed, so we had the approval of the cool kids of how me and this other mid thirty something showed them how the old school started this shit and they were nothing but artifacts of many generations who turned their back on everything, everyone, and every normal idea, in order to find what the hell that was actually drilling away on their brain in an attempt to make some sense of it, all those blank spaces in the puzzle called life. This is what drives me now and hopefully drives the heart of this blog.



Wal Mart have to go in to get some vitamins and all that other type of shit some doctor told me I needed, of course outside the list of various, cholestrol lowering medicines, don't want those doc, just the strong stuff, vicadins, codines, oxys, xanax, colatypins, real dope, none of this lipitor shit, not much action in those types of medicine, except for people with bad luck in the gene department and more than likely some poor eating habits topped off with a no exercise regime.



Walking into Wal Mart I notice a young slender twenty year old woman probably fresh from the gym wearing a sports bra top and tight lycra pants, a looker and at that age why not take advantage of it to the fullest extend, even though she seemed to be hanging out with one of her old high school guy friends, unyet realizing at the virtual goldmine down the block when she figured out her appearance could take her more places than just the local Wal Mart, but everything has its price, doesn't it?

A couple of guys passing by me give the woman the once over, I would have too yet am still brain dead from a sleeping pill and a couple xanax, ready to focus on getting everything right now before I ship off to the Sahara for a couple of weeks until my condo is ready to move into, just living in this limbo land of the Las Vegas lost, a true orphan of the city which is ironic considering the first week I moved into Vegas I stayed at the Sands right before they destroyed it, even comping another week of rooms.



Finally, got inside the place where the greeter Chris waited for me, not really too profesional about his job while sitting there anonymous in a silent presence pretending to be official in regards to his job, therefore I said hello initiating an automated response from him in the form of hello, a bit of rapid small talk followed, his job would be secure for another few hours. Grabbed some fruits from the produce section which has always seemed too weird after shopping in Sprawl Mart for so many years they have branched out to become that sort of retro general store where anything can be purchased, which is not a bad idea.

Are the prices competitive, not too sure, but if you are already there to buy some other goods, why not get the grocery shopping out of the way as well, just one more parking lot, jam packed store, and battle at the check out counter that can give the DMV a run for its money in the testing of one's patiences department.



Right off the bat Miley Cyrus clothing monopoly guess there is a small portion of the country that has not figured out her whole entire saintly, virgin like routine is nothing but a sales gimmick forced upon her with suits wearing mouse ears needing that massive bottom line revenue she has been able to produce over the last six or seven years, she is a gold mine, the goose, and motherlode all wrapped into one skinny little older teen who just smiles, shakes her somewhat tempting young lust in front of other female teens her age who are looking to figure out their own budding feminine state, the only problem is the army of perverts, conservatives, and sociopaths who take these ideas and girls, twisting them into something coveted, abducted, and unfortunately occassionally murdered as was the case of some 17 year old girl recently who went to a Metallica concert, who from all reports just got seperated from her friends and did not appear to be on drugs, possibly getting a ride home from some freak who had every intention not letting her see the light of day, real fringes lay in our mist, the most stealth, covert, and indectable, real scary stuff.



Regardless, Miley has her own clothing brand cartering to the philosophy of blossoming self expression and sexuality with clothes that are not exactly local Vegas stripper material, but come one, tight booty jeans and undersizr tube tops, granted I don't think Wal Mart would sell too much of her clothing if the brand looked like the kind of homely shit that was around in the late 70's when I was a kid, today anyone wearing any sort of home spun, low rent, second, third generation handme downs would be nothing but the center of ridicule and those dreams of being around the cool kids and dating either the cool girl or guy would be nothing but a crushed afterfact. The picture of Miley in a belly shirt with plenty of skin revealed around her waist, feels a bit risque for a company based in the south who are surrounded by plenty of bible thumpers who might not necessary approve of this kind of nature, yet with the advent of the internet, social networks, and entertainment that promote a certain sexual appearance, what is left for the kids to do, but follow suit or get left behind to be with the social outcasts, misfits, and lost souls whose future revolves around redemption through hard work and innovation or becoming a trail blazing radical who sees through all this insane posturing behavior, making something out of their observations in an artistical way, there you go, not much else, military, dead end jobs and drugs, there it is.

Enough of Miley, she will soon fade, up on the cross at the end she when wants to become a woman and molt out of her childhood celebrity skin that will signal the end for her career and having any creditiblity as a musician and artist resulting in transforming herself into nothing more than a punchline for late night talk show hosts and rich frat boys who look to put the angle on her when she attempts to head back into some high end college she can afford but does not necessarily have the social background to assimilate within, once from the trailer always from the trailer, ask any of these other female pop miracles, look at Brittney, Mandy Moore, and Hillary Duff, all got spit out then left for dead, come back when you have real talent like Taylor Swift and Christina Aguliara, these two can bring the goods, get the grammys and write their own music, no pop brand underwear or perfume to legitmize them, but the label of artist or ho by the commerical powers that be, is quite a fine line no matter what industry.

Spot, the infamous I Love Beer t-shirt right next to the I love Me t-shirts, not much else around here except tons of Chinese produced goods without any sort of value made in deals with sports figures who Wal Mart can take the chance on backing promotionally, Tony Romo, pretty boy, some guys might like him, but more than not, maybe the ladies too, either way, seeing all this clothing that ten years ago you might find a end high surf shop or sporting goods store shows me just how far we have sold this country down the river in order to get a few things at a discounted rate so a generation of teens shall not feel left out or marginalized socially.

At the checkout counter what the fuck is it about Octomom losing 50 pounds that is suppose to be intriguing but nonetheless there she is with her new tits and curvy ass sporting them for the tabloids, all too happy to be back on top in the spotlight where greasy men in business suits will come along making all sorts of promises for tv shows, commercials, and god forbid an offer to pose naked in Playboy, the thought makes me cringe, the fact this person is a celebrity only goes to show the base nature of society in its own personal quest of garnishing their own little fame at whatever the cost, be it a porno flix, a reality tv series, or mass shooting spree at some local church, the desire to be noticed in this 21st century culture as been blown so out of proportion there does not seem to be much of a way to stop it, with 24 hour news coverage, instant messaging, and personal websites, people have become nothing more than advertisements for mouthwash attempting to sell the global public on cons that would have made P.T Barnum take note.

These damn tabloids in every register, Jen, Brad, Angelina, Oprah, Kristy Alley, Gary Busey, and Mariah Carey all in rehab, with marriages on the rocks, either gay, binge drinking, eating, or drug abusing, all the trimmings of stardom have come alive in these pages that would make Dickens laugh and even William Randolph Hearst fall on the ground and piss his pants at the level of yellow celebrity journalism that now exists, hell I even have to give the papers the once over, there they are right in your space between all the packages for beef jerky, various rows of candies and gums to drive parents crazy when the kids start demanding those goods, then get denied and start throwing a fit till they get what they want, instead of a quick smack across the face, still there goes some boxes of candy into the cart, anything for a brief bit of relief, shut those damn brats up, why the hell did you have them in the first place, so in my estimation all the suffering these parents must endure is a just reward for sticking it in for too long, feels good for about five minutes but it's the other 19 years after that making those five minutes fade away rather quickly.

Not sure who else is in the tabloid section, Oprah with her own magazine, sort of a black woman's Martha Stewart lifestyle guide, but look where Martha Stewart's lifestyle got her, yet who does not want to live their life like those two, from house design, what books to read, health tips, cooking, while making some sort of life plan for the future with the hubby and the kids, for the real meaty stuff just go a rack over the Madamosille, Vanity Fair, and a various other boat load of mags with women who starve themselves, painted in highend makeup by artists who make thousands a day in their trade, formulating a lie, an imposter, a diety who has no human qualities what so ever that at least to me seem to relate with the average customer who reads such kind of stuff, really, this 100 pound little freak who shows off her little breasts on some television show has something really profound things to talk about inside the cover of this magazine, please let's read on, get the real inside intel on the metaphysical existence of the human race, world peace, and the dymanic theories of affordable clean power.

But let this not only extend to the women, because I have caught a few male co workers buying into all these men's health magazines, like these guys are in shape in the first place, I am at least 10 years older than all these fucks and can run circles around them, nothing but an opportunity to get sucked into more shit clothing, colonge, shoes, and somewhat semi romantical ideas to spring on your woman or other such insightful issues on topics regarding the true location of the woman's g spot or how to be right by being wrong in a relationship with your g/f, wife, who ever, combined with plenty of dating, do's and don't, as well as how to get rock solid abs while taking HGH and or steriods, finished off with little consumer knick knack sections on all the cool hip tech gear to own.

Use to read Wired magazine for the most part, it had some pretty heady stuff in articles regarding to technology, arts, music, and futuristic type shit, then boom, here come the ads for the gadgets the joneses should own, the multi page sections of models in the lastest cool hip gear to wear for the middle and upper middle class tech heads when heading out on the weekend via tweeter and a few other portable I phone like apps that smooth out the process of calling someone to either have to talk to them or ignore the phone by letting it go voicemail, easier with this distance technology to blow people off, without having to do it face to face, very convenient but not doing much for those who are slowing eroding any sort of person to person conversation, just gets weird, why not just text them from across the room to see if they want a drink with the ol ;)

Think I am over the cashier aisle rack of goods that have no real value but somehow find their way into the baskets of customers all over the US and if there was no market, these tabloids, candy makers, and jerky sellers would have moved onto something else so readily needed. People need to be told how, what, and by the means of acceptablity and norms that will be dictated by these lifestyle magazines, totally forgetting that at the beginning of it all those who set the trends everyone else seems so ready to follow that the trendsetters did not really have this endgame in mind acceptablity, except maybe Andy Warhol, this wholesale liquidation of personal freedom, expression, and design repackaged into a mass consumable idea only to be thrown away in the trash a few years later, has become the next wave of living on the forefront of personal identity as it crashes on the shores of every major continent in the world, a global contest with no soul, no creativity, and certainly no ability to recognize that these followers are being sold down the river with little more than an MP3 player, a packet of pop rocks, and a coke, Enjoy the ride.