Consumerism Americana

On Sunday I went to seven stores (craft store, clothing stores, grocery store). I was looking for a handful of very particular things and found most of them at the first store, and then spent 3 hours looking for that one last elusive item. At the end I had wasted 3 hours, had not found what I was looking for and was most likely responsible for the death of a tree somewhere with all the gas I wasted.

Aggravated at not being able to find that one thing I was looking for (blue, 4-ply, worsted-weight cotton yarn, I really, really needed some. go ahead. call me crazy.), I realized before going to bed, that there is probably no other place in the world with more stores and more stuff more readily available at all hours of the day, no matter the day of the week. The grocery store (which carries many things that are not in fact edible) is open 24 hours, and whatever you can't get there, your favorite, large, evil megastore probably carries it (and how dare they close the changing rooms after 11pm!!).

If I was l iving in my hometown, yester-ville, my search for navy blue cotton yarn would have looked something like this:
Walk out the front door, take the bike if the weather is nice, otherwise walk into the town center. This involves walking across a bridge over river and walking up the cobble-stoned market square, which has probably been some sort of market square for many centuries (Roman artifacts that back to 3500BC, the town was first mentioned in records almost 800 years ago). Then I go into the old alley ways of the city, which house most of the stores and restaurants in this part of town. The craft store is next to a church, and a real bell rings when I walk in the door (the bell is rigged to the door with a pulley of some sort). The store is probably about 20x30 feet, and the walls are lined with wooden cubbyhole-shelves filled with balls of yarn. After asking for blue cotton yarn the lady either shakes her head and offers me some other shades of blue, or immediately pulls out a ball of navy blue cotton yarn. Then she writes a receipt by hand, asks me if I need a bag, and if yes, put the yarn in a paper bag. I leave with my yarn, pass by a church, walk down the market square, maybe have some ice cream, walk over the bridge, walk by another church, walk by the brewery and arrive back home after a 10 minute walk.

And, of course, the store is closed on Sundays, and after 5pm Monday through Friday, and after noon on Saturday, and during lunch. Wait. WHAT? That's it? I can only shop during business hours? Yes, and on weekends people go and see things like this:

Snow-covered flower pasture on a mountain just outside of yester-ville (April 2007)