I was out and about Saturday afternoon after seeing a movie and decided to go and look for some Cd's and books to lay my grubby hands on and by grubby I mean obsessively clean. The same thing happened in both stores and then I thought about all the times it has happened and decided to ask others to see if it's just me. I assume it isn't but you never know.
Anyway, it went like this, I browse for a while, make my selections and take them up to hand over my cash in an empowering display of capitalism. The person on the other end of the transaction feels the need to comment on what I've chosen to buy. Not in a "Your taste sucks and I mock you" way but in a "Your taste is strange to me and I feel the need to say something to get you to say something so that I can better understand" kind of way. In both stores this is and it's not like this is the first time.
Does this happen to anyone else? Have you ever been questioned or had a comment dropped because you bought things that, on the surface, may not seem to be of the same sort? Most people I know (granted this particular group isn't exactly the ideal control group) enjoy lots of things across many genres and find absolutely nothing strange about that but the repeated comments and questions sometimes make me wonder if that's an aberration and not at all the norm.
Almost forgot, the movie was Hot Fuzz. Go see it. Now.
9 comments:
This used to happen to me all the time.
I guess I encourage it, because when I go to JB Hi-Fi (that's Australian for "CD and DVD mothership") I usually stop by every isle from the front of the store to the back. By the time I get to the counter I'll have something of everything, my left hand crammed with CDs from Hip-Hop, Rock, Pop, Dance, Easy Listening... my right hand trying to keep the TV shows, cartoons, classic movies and titles that no one else buys from spilling everywhere.
Some of them liked to take a guess, "You stocking up on birthday presents or something?" others just said what they thought straight up "Dude, do you like... all... this stuff?" but after a while I was shopping at the same locations enough that there's an unspoken understanding of "Hey, he's back... get the big bag ready!"
I think you'd be surprised how many people listen to just one type of music. A lot of my mates do. It works for me because if I'm hanging out with them I can usually listen to what they want, but if they're traveling with me and I'm not playing a CD that they're into they last about 5 minutes before asking if I have any [insert their favourite artist] in the car.
Of course, it's just one of those things that you have to spin the right way and feel good about. Because I've done the whole music discussions / arguments with those people and it never works out. Seriously, ask one of the people at the counter what they listen to and they'll probably say "A bit of everything!"
Turns out a bit of everything to most people is Top 40. Golf clap to them for not turning off their radio when it deviated from one commercialised take on a genre to the next.
This also reminds me of the absolute most idiotic thing a person that works in a music store ever said to me. I was looking for a CD of Thelonius Monk (!) and John Coltrane (!!) performing together (!!!) that had just recently been unearthed and released. When I asked the person behind the counter about it they said:
"Who?"
You. Fucking. Dolt.
Anyway, yeah, it's kind of annoying. It was all in the genre of "good shit" so why do they have to give the weird looks or say something stupid about it? It must be so sad to live with your head up your own ass.
Ah well, so long as they keep ordering the stuff that they don't actually recognize to sell to us, we're in the clear.
I actually just came back to see if late night typing screwed me up again, so far I'm only seeing "isle" instead of "aisle"... but maybe I should start reading and replying to this during the day.
Oh, and regarding Hot Fuzz... seen it, three times at the movies. Will be buying it as soon as it's out on DVD, might catch it at the movies again if I can find someone that hasn't listened to me and watched it already. Have you seen Spaced? You probably should...
The only copies of Spaced I can find come with the "Will not play in the U.S." warning. It makes me sad in the pants.
Your face makes me sad in the pants.
I couldn't resist, but also, yes.
Bitch please. I walk into a room of blind women and they sense my beauty and get aroused. Women that can see don't have a chance.
I ordered it off amazon.co.uk and it had all that jazz about not playing on DVD Players that don't support different region codes... all the ones in my house and my best mate's house play them, but I do know some lame people that have DVD Players that won't have a bar of it.
Of course, I downloaded them long before buying them seemed like a viable option (I wanted to make sure I could watch them) so you can probably track 'em down somewhere... or I can put them up somewhere for you... SPEAKING OF WHICH, how'd you go with Icky Thump, mofo?
I can neither confirm nor deny reports that I listened to it with the speakers stuffed in my pants.
*confirms it*
Damn it!
I specifically learned how to download not so legal things so I could own all the episodes of Spaced. If I could've bought it, I would have. And I will if they release a North American version. I absolutely had to get the whole thing, as the Series 2 Episode 4 on YouTube was borked.
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