Today I was given a CD wallet apparently made of license plate metal, same size and screwholes included. Inside this rust-begging abortion are about 30 sleeves. The pinnacle of it's folly is that, while being a promotional product for the largest PC maker in the world, it says Taking It To The Streets on it. This is written tag style, with sloppy graffiti letters and ill-advised star-twinkles assaulting my tender eyes. I wish I had a way to show it to you. It's gone beyond sad and insulting into a new realm of perverted delusion.

Counter-cultures always get co-opted by the mainstream, usually for advertising purposes. It's a way for a product or company to ingratiate themselves with a newly discovered demographic, or just to keep up with whatever is hot and cool at the moment. Pepsi's got to be the worst right now, with the Pepsi Blue commercials portraying an embarassing hip-hop MC flowing about the virtues of the berry revolution, regular Pepsi hiring Outkast, and Mountain Dew, a PepsiCo product, hijacking snowboarders and skateboarders. Did I mention that I hate ads?

I wonder what stiff old suit approved this particular kink. I'm going to take it home and love it, and store my CDs in it, meanwhile betraying not one iota of irony. I can't wait to see which people look at me funny (as they should) and which compliment my rare new toy. (to which I will nod and thank them, hoping desperately to detect a trace of insincerity.)

If I keep this cultural misanthropy up, one day I'll end up eating granola and tofu while listening religiously to NPR, waxing nostalgic about the smell of tear gas in the morning and the thud of billyclubs at night.
7:06 PM - Bottle Rocket Fire Alarm