A Tom B. Taker Christmas
There it was. In the mailbox. A legitimate Christmas miracle. It was as if a veil had been lifted from my eyes. Instead of darkness I beheld a world of twinkly light.
It was beautiful! I felt alive. I loved everything I could see. I sprinted out into the street and hugged the garbage man. He was beautiful. He looked really surprised. Maybe I should have worn pants but there was no time for that.
In my hands I held a Christmas card. It was even addressed to me. To me! Someone had sent me a Christmas card. A bona fide recipient of the Ribbon of Participation. I was finally somebody.
“God bless us, every one!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. I’d never felt a stronger sense of belonging.
Yes, it was time for a let down.
Profits of Doom
Oh the humanity! and the savings!
If you thought “Black Friday” was as grisly as our post-industrial modern retail consumerism could get – you thought wrong. Dead wrong.
I often lament what I call the death of empathy in our society. I see it as a contributing factor to all sorts of various ills that plague us.
“So a bunch of people died? Why shouldn’t I use it to make a quick buck?”
Thanks for playing, but if you have to ask, it’s already too late for you. KERCHUNK! Here ya go. I just punched your one-way ticket to Hell. Have a nice trip.
If there’s one clear and present danger to the world of retail it’s this: There aren’t enough days in the year for sales. Am I right? We need more sales! 365 days just isn’t enough. For too long we have been limited by the rules of decorum and shit that makes sense, like crafting “sales” around events like holidays, birthdays and fun stuff.
No longer will we be limited so harshly. There are savings to be had. Swing open the gates of Hell. It’s time to cash in on human suffering. These savings are gonna be good.
My Two Tuppence
This and a bucket of spit will buy you a pile of dead hair.
If you invest your suckance
Slyly with a skank
Like a ship run aground
More rewarding than invested in a bank
It will fail to astound
A wallet violently oppressed
And you’ll feel it each time they molest
As your effluence stickily expands
Deftly in the hands
Of the directors
Who invest your liquidity per their horny little glans
So yeah, there was that time I put thousands of dollars in a savings account with that “American” multinational bank. You know the one. Their logo is a red, white and blue flag credit card. Because nothing is more quintessentially American than, “I want it now. I’ll pay for it with credit.” Hey, let’s make our logo a credit card. That’ll show ’em what we’re really about.
And we fall for it.
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LivingSocial Disease
Somehow I got signed up to LivingSocial. How? I don’t know. Maybe I pissed off one of my neighbors and they did it as passive-aggressive revenge. Well played.
Meanwhile, I happen to love me a good Mongolian BBQ. I have many happy memories of loading up bowls and topping them off with bean sprouts piled so high they resembled Marge Simpson’s hair. And onions. Lots and lots of onions.
One time my bowl came up and the lady in front of me grabbed it by mistake. Moments later she returned and said, in disgust, “This isn’t mine! It’s full of … onions!” I said good day, you onion hater. Those are my onions you’re talking about!
Another time I was in a Mongolian BBQ stuffing my face minding my own business and I watched two snot-nosed bubble-launchers kids load up giant bowls with nothing but meat. That’s bad form. Mom and dad watched approvingly. I can only assume they were also redshirting the bastards. Yeah, they were clearly on the right path. Anyway, these kids brought their steaming bowls of meat back to the table, picked at them momentarily, then pushed them away. It was none of my concern but it still pissed me off. Man, what a waste of good meat. And the food went uneaten, too.
The point is, I love me a mean Mongolian BBQ.
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401 Pork Belly Crude Efficient Market Theories
I’ve often talked about the “three-legged stool” on this blog. No, you don’t have to leave. This post won’t qualify for a certain tag that shall remain nameless. I’m going to keep this post on a higher, more sophisticated plane.
So often, in fact, that I should probably elevate the topic to the level of a category so you can ignore all the posts equally at the same time. But that would be convenient therefore I won’t do it.
The future is something which “occupies” my thoughts from time to time. (Yes, my brain has little protesters in it.)
To refresh your memory, the “three-legged stool” is a metaphor rolled out around the time that piece of sassafras Ida May Fuller clutched her first Social Security benefits check in her kung fu death grip. I remember it well because I was there. On the floor. Licking her ankles. Whispering hotly, “Be my sugar momma? Mommy? M to the O to the M M Y.”
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Money Can’t Miserly Love
A wealthy man was generously offering his counsel to a poor man. He said, “The truth of the matter is this: Money can’t buy you love.”
The dispensing of wisdom was briefly interrupted by the arrival of a UPS delivery driver. “Ah. If you’ll excuse me, I see my daily delivery of useless plastic consumeristic widgets made in China has arrived. A box! A box! Oh goodie, a box!”
Spittle flew from jiggly jowls as the man lurched for his box cutter and sliced open the cardboard like a battlefield surgeon. There wasn’t even time for triage. In moments he held the widgets up before his eyes, which briefly glazed over as various pleasure centers in his brain were involuntarily activated, then in a few mere seconds he carelessly tossed the items aside. He was already bored with them.
“Now then, where were we? Ah yes, true happiness must come from within.”
Indeed.
Wrest Buy Drive By Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
Shortly before Christmas the online store known as Best Buy had a sale on iTunes cards. Twenty percent off. A $100 iTunes gift card was only $80.
What? You mean I’ve been paying full price this whole time in iTunes when I could have been getting my balance at a discount? Idiot… idiot… idiot…
I had never heard of such a thing. Of course, I’m always the last to know.
So I did something I rarely do, maybe a handful of times per year. I went on the information superhighway and made myself a purchase. I spent $80 on myself. “Merry Christmas to me!”
I figured Best Buy would link me to the code and I could punch it into my Apple device and the alternative death metal would soon be music to my ears. Sure, the order said “free shipping” but why would they spend money on that when they could be all digital up in that grill?
Boy, was I wrong.
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Shouts from the Abyss 
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