The Crib
It was the turn that took us off down a dark street that did it.
"We're lost, I think."
It was like some cosmic force was willing us not to get this crib. A crib. Any crib at all. It just wasn't happening. And now, fifteen minutes from shop close and who knew how far from the actual shop, well, it didn't look like it would be happening any time in the near future.
And I felt like a combination of Indiana Jones and... maybe Allan Quatermain, though you could argue they were similar enough to not combine legitimately. After all they were both exploring, adventurous types. At any rate, combination or not, I was wearing a pith helmet. The conversation about that one went something like this, earlier: "You're not going to wear that pith helmet out again, for the love of all that's holy and good." "But I like the pith helmet. And I can't find my Red Sox cap." As we were in a hurry to get to the shop before it closed and pick up the crib, well, I won my twelfth argument by default. Not that I mentioned that. If I mentioned that I was winning arguments by default quietly I was sure she'd put up more of a fight. A lot more. There'd be blood. Which may have helped, in our present situation. If not blood then some other kind of sacrifice of bread and fruits to whatever gods were leading us down dark roads and deserted landscapes when all we wanted was to find the damn Babies 'R' Us.
A port flanked us on the right side, stretching around, hugging the street ahead of us close and bending it around to the left. Which was unfortunate, because our directions told us we should expect to find a right turn in about... well, half a mile or so back. But any right turn would have put us squarely in the water. And though it was dark out and I couldn't tell, I was pretty sure that was not going to be the most pleasant water for swimming in.
"Hold on one sec..."
She flicked on the overhead light, which sent me swerving towards the middle barrier, and the sight of trees looming at the car sent me back towards the water, which I suddenly realized I couldn't see, because with the light on the fog gathering stealthily on the bottom of the windows glared back at me. So I tried to stop swerving between the barriers and just leaned forward and tried to ignore the creeping fog by squinting. It didn't help, but made me feel better. I made a mental note to explore the general effects of squinting in stressful circumstances, to see if it helped in any situation or if it was only driving at night with slightly fogged up windows that it helped.
"Are the lights bothering you?"
"Umm... no." I said nothing else for fear of driving us off the edge of the road and into the port.
"Okay." A few more rustles of what we'd determined a few miles back weren't entirely useful pieces of paper with, allegedly, directions to the baby shop on them. "All right. Well, I suppose we should turn around, maybe. I just don't see it."
"Umm." I couldn't manage anything else, as a streetlight, or at least a brighter patch in the now almost completely fogged up windows, loomed and then receded past.
"Okay, let's turn around. Hey, do you need the defroster?"
I nodded, which would have been imperceptible in the dark, had I not been wearing the pith helmet. I would have pointed this out, only the light was on, so she could see my nod fine, anyway, so no use bringing up the fact that I was wearing the pith helmet at all, for fear of bringing up the argument again. And it is increasingly difficult to win an argument by default if it is one that keeps being brought up again and again. If a certain argument I've won by default keeps coming up over and over again and silently going to me again by default, I suspect this may be a tactic of her own, concede the battle, win the war type of thing. But she couldn't be that devious. Could she?
I had turned at the next set of lights, my mentioning the pith helmet all but forgotten, as we didn't attempt to speak over the full-blast of the defogger working on the windshield. Which, of course, meant things got worse before the got better. On the windshield and when I nudged up... and then over the curb on the other side of the road during my U-turn.
She pointed off to the right. "Wait, what's that? Is that it? That's it, that's it!"
It was. Only, I hadn't the faintest clue how we were going to get over to the Babies 'R' Us, as if bastioned by the surrounding, completely non-baby and non-crib related buildings that rose up, cutting off the streetways leading into our ultimate goal.
disclaimer:
An actual disclaimer: this is fiction. Just sayin'. In case anyone, you know, thinks, like, this sort of stuff happens or anything.
We're number fifty seven thousand eight hundred sixty six! We're number fifty seven thousand eight hundred sixty six!
That's right, kids, all your hard work has kicked us right on up there in the Amazon sales rankings (based, apparently, on sales per day, according to super secret inside industry info... as well as a combination of carefully screened monkeys looking to move up from trying to bang out more Shakespeare every day).
Of course, that's only Amazon.com sales rankings... we're sure we'd be higher if all the purchases you guys have surely made at Booklover's Gourmet, in Webster, Massachusetts, Tatnuck Bookseller in Worcester, MA, The Concord Bookshop in Concord, MA, and The Odyssey Bookshop in Holyoke, MA, were counted. Be sure to write your local congressman if this sort of thing bugs you. It probably won't influence Amazon.com, but it'll give your congressman something to do other than sit around playing Solitaire and potentially infecting the rest of the governments computer with a virus or something.
We're also going to try our damnedest to not mention the shop this week. The shop on CafePress.com where you can buy our stuff: t-shirts, golf shirts, baby stuff, mugs, stickers. It's all in there. Anyway, not going to mention it.
Because you know what? We are worried you're going to think we're Anti-Commie, Anti-Pinko B**tards.
And it bugged us all week. So we sat down and thought it over, mulled it a little bit. And this is what we decided to do. Because you've been so patient, sitting through our subliminal and otherwise advertising, we decided to do something for you.
If you recall, oh, a couple of issues back, like ish 324 or so, we mentioned, in the issue, a website called PriceOfTeaInChina.com. Which wasn't actually an entity unto itself, it was just a subsite of Supertart.com. And it wasn't even finished.
Well, we went and finished it. It's very... sparse. Simplistic. Which is good. It delivers the message you intend to get from a site like PriceOfTeaInChina.com. Which is this: "What does that have to do with the price of tea in China?"
And for the answer to that, my friend, well, you'll have to go there and see for yourself.
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