"I have seen my last Stones show" goes the final line of an amusing short video on utoob. Perhaps you've seen it?... portrays Hitler with his senior staff discussing an upcoming European tour of the Rolling Stones playing the numbers on Sticky Fingers, their seminal 1970 album. Hitler, a big fan of the lp - and along with some unknown but sizeable number of other misfits who followed the band for 6 decades - idolizes then-lead guitar virtuoso, Mick Taylor.
Hitler gets quite agitated, alarmingly so it seems, as he talks about this tour. He assumes that Taylor will be performing along with the Stones. But in the meeting he's informed that the guitarist, who quit the band in 1975, was not invited to join the band on the tour. Needless to say from that point on Hitler's mood turns to the darkside. If it piques your interest or you don't know wtf I'm talking about or perhaps have nothing better to do in the next 4 minutes, you might enjoy: youtube.com/watch?v=OF5R-4HA2Zk
I've gone at lengths to describe this because of something that happened as I was leaving Trader Joe's in Greenbrae the other day, or to be precise I was "trying" to leave TJ's... At that moment, being stuck in the usual jam of cars vying for an opening in the line to enter or leave, a thought came to me. It was more a kind of resolution, one due partly but not exclusively to the massive clusterfk of cars that regularly jams this location's narrow and only way in'n out.
What dawned on me then was that I had arrived at much the same perspective as our rock'n roller Hitler: Exasperation that an obvious fail has been, is and will be forever without hope of improvement. Hitler's final solution, insofar as concerns the once-billed "Greatest rock and roll band in the world" (now considered "Greatest Rolling Stones tribute band in the world") was simply never to return, ergo pour moi: "I have been to Trader Joe's for the last time."
The TJ franchise originally claimed that it offered special deals on food because it searched for alternative suppliers to those sold by large grocery chains. The claim was that these were smaller companies making equally good products that were available at lower prices. The Trader discovered these and could sell them to YOU at substantial savings. So along came brands like "2 buck Chuck" wines. Today, fact is the Trader actually has his own products made by whichever supplier offers the best deal for copacking. For the most part you can't find these same brands anywhere else, even to do quality/price comparison. But still the pitch persists, "we look for high quality items and sell them at lower prices than, like Safeway". Perhaps, and if that's what you've found true, go for it. For myself, I find quality so-so and prices perhaps lower, but just. The other issue for me is that shoppers here are akin to Whole-paycheckers... true believers of a kind. Somehow, yet again, they are saving the world from disaster, environmental poisoning or the like. All this comes by way of an activist lifestyle, prudent habits and... cheaper food?
This mindset, or at least the one I perceive here, is naive albeit harmless; in any case I never argue matters that concern anyone's beliefs. If you still harbor some these days I envy you, consider yourself fortunate. Whatever the case may be, there's a downside in the TJ scene for me, traffic congestion in the parking lot being the least of it. It's the self-righteousness of do-gooding, birkenstocking, virtue signaling, fauxkindness pervading the air unavoidably/undeniably, like the stench of raw patchouli oil. Spare me, please, i'm off to safeway. I have been to Trader Joe's for the last time. read more