Author Archives: Luke Bennett

I need to finish my story about picking up the printer at Target and then catch you up on my recent life adventures.

Even parking is an experience in Florida. In the Target parking lot I pulled in between two lines. It was a nice day so I had the windows down which allowed me to audibly inspect my surroundings. It just so happened that as I cut the engine a high pitched annoying beep echoed through my windows.

“This vehicle is backing up” it screamed. Everyone in the parking lot stopped and turned their heads. Smiles went across the faces of all as they watched some woman move an SUV into reverse. This isn’t the first time I witnessed this event since being here. I’m not one to laugh in the face of safety but whatever happened to just paying attention in reverse. I drove an SUV for four years and never felt the need for an annoying woman to announce my reversing. I anticipate this to be a feature that will come standard on every motor vehicle in the coming years. I also anticipate this to be a feature that cannot easily be deactivated by snapping a wire like the annoying seat belt alarm in all modern vehicles.

For some reason or another, I never think to grab a shopping cart. Because of this I carry the awkwardly oversized box towards the cash registers. I see several open up ahead and one near by. A very attractive woman with a small basket turns into the register nearest me. She’s rocking the business casual sexy librarian work. She looks back, and for lack of a better word, she makes love to me with her eyes. Amen. I follow her into the lane.

What should I say? As my memory strolls every meaningless comic book I’ve ever read or shitty video game I’ve ever played, she reaches for a pack of gum. She looks back and sees my eyes following her movement. “You can go in front me, I have a bunch of coupons” she offers. Success, she broke the ice for me. Wait, she’s a coupon~er? Probably a little crazy. That’s all right. I can work with it. Damn, what should I say now? I put my huge box on the cashier belt and look back at her.

She has a big smile on her face. She knows I want her body on this conveyor belt right now. My lips start to open to say something even though my mind doesn’t know what yet. She tilts her head so that her hair falls in front of her face in sexy fashion. I love it. Still trying to process something to speak in my mind I watch her hand move towards her face to brush the hair away. Instead of a normal swipe she uses one finger. Her ring finger. Her ring finger which displayed a gargantuan rock. Bitch.

The next day I was meaninglessly roaming the few walls of the apartment when I decided I had a hunger that could only be satisfied by shitty Asian food in the mall. I could really go for some Bourbon chicken and some orange chicken. The usual. And of the three shitty Asian Food places in the Clearwater Mall foodcourt, none of them had bourbon chicken and orange chicken. One restaurant did have “grilled chicken” and “mango chicken” thought. It tasted great. That’s because it was bourbon chicken and orange chicken. This left me curious as to whether or not this was a regional naming convention. I must further investigate before a conclusion on this issue can be had.

I didn’t have the need for anything in the mall other than shitty Asian but I did walk around for a while. After my recent comments about the shitty decline of Best Buy’s inventory I was shocked to see a Best Buy Mobile store. This leads me to the conclusion that while most electronics are imminently approaching death due to digital distribution, cell phones are most definitely not. As such, Best Buy must be making a killing off of iGeneration kids buying up the latest and greatest cell phones out of false pretenses. This world is going to hell and there’s nothing I can do about it.

My roommate plays live music at a trashy little bar on the beach on Thursday nights. Mainly 90’s cover music but its usually a great time. I listened to my favorite decade of music and played some pool. Apparently my billiard shooting skills take off when I’m at the local oasis because I somehow managed to go 5-0 at the table.

On the way home I found out that the state of Florida doesn’t like it when you don’t change your license plate over. I tried to put some gum in my mouth before I had to interact with other humans but before I can do so a cop is shining the light through the passenger window at my hand. He asks me to roll down the window and asks what the hell I’m holding. He laughs at the outcome but quickly lets me know there’s a drug dog in his vehicle. I don’t know why he felt the urge to let me know this but as we weren’t riding dirty or breaking any laws so we talked about Kentucky for a while. He was also curious why there was furniture in the back of a truck at 4AM (long story, don’t ask) but after some explanations and a cheap fine we were free to go about our business.

There’s time for a few hours of shut eye before I start my temp job with my roommate at a warehouse of an online retailer. Fortunately, the warehouse runs later hours so I managed to get somewhat rested before a day of what I absolutely can not spend the rest of my life doing. After work I came home and slept for 12 straight hours. There’s a lot to be learned and said about online retailers and warehousing as well as shipping processes in America. (Obviously I have nothing bad to say about an employer as any job is a good job in these times and rent ain’t gonna pay itself; but I do have insightful comments to bring to the table that could even potentially help). But I am over 1,000 words and kind of tired of typing so I will save my experiences for another day.

I thought I drank and suppressed Celine Deon’s theme song to Titanic to the far depths of my brains, much like the Titanic in the ocean. I thought wrong.

On another note, my motivation returned and I drove back to Target to pick up the printer I desired. I could probably write an entire blog with entries everyday about my driving experiences in Florida, but I will spare you of creating a new blog category.

At a red-light I look over at car with a window sticker that caught my eye. It was a circle with a line crossing out some text. The text… Casey Anthony. Really? ****ing really? Somehow the desire to put a window sticker on my Jeep that said “Just get over it” came to mind. People in Florida like to really support their opinions for all to see. Hell, this Zimmerman stuff is getting out of hand. (Notice how I referred to the defendants? I think I have a passion for playing devils advocate. Or just supporting our legal system).

Point is, how could someone be so engulfed in a trial that they felt the need to buy a window sticker? Now maybe this person is related to the family or something and I don’t mean to cross boundaries but window stickers of a little boy pissing on a giant number 3 are less tacky. And even family stickers that say R.I.P. are tacky. When I die, if there’s somebody out there who thinks they are close enough to me to warrant putting a R.I.P. sticker in your window, you’re not. And please dont. I will haunt you.

Whether this person bought this sticker before or after the courtroom decision, it has been a long time since, ya know, the courtroom decision. Take that shit off. What are you trying to say? That people should ignore Casey Anthony? Its not like things are going to come easy for her the rest of her life. Or are you trying to say you disagree with the courtroom decision? You should be happy that we have a good legal system and it does the right thing.

Which leads me to my next point. Florida has been like a gun with a painted target on Zimmerman’s head. Now I’m sure there’s a story we don’t know buried deep in all the media. And by all the media, I mean the cover of every Tampa Bay Times for like the last month saying the same thing day in and day out. I did see one photo in the paper with a protester protesting the right to a fair trial. Thank God we have reasonable people in this country. Now I’m not saying he doesn’t deserve to go to prison but do we really need to change gun laws. He is gonna go to prison. The system works. Lets not change self defense laws. What am I even ranting about?

“So this is how liberty dies… with thunderous applause.”

My body required food. I didn’t know what, but I was hungry. Just around the bend there’s a new Winn-Dixie that I needed to explore. So late last night I rushed to beat closing time. After browsing the food aisles for a few minutes I decided a steak and egg sandwich was the solution to my hunger.

At the front of the store there was only one cash register open. Without much thought process I began putting my food on the conveyor belt. It wasn’t moving though. That’s because the old hag in front of me was bitching about something. She looked back at me to say sorry. Damn I thought. How long is this going to take?

Apparently she came to Winn-Dixie specifically for some kind of discounted hamburger meat in the weekly ads. Unfortunately, this particularly priced meat had all been purchased. This woman couldn’t seem to wrap this concept around her head until the chick at the register called the butcher to the front to hear so for herself. Instead of accepting the fact that she came to the grocery at 9:30 PM and missed her opportunity, she complained and got her way with the manager discounting a different type of meat.

Now call me old fashion but this logic doesn’t work out in my mind. I don’t show up to Best Buy on Black Friday 20 minutes before close and expect to buy a 75% off discounted 54 inch 3D TV that has probably been sold out since 4:01AM. And I definitely don’t anticipate that since I missed my opportunity by sleeping in, that I deserve a 60 inch 3D TV for the same discounted price. Old people.

Speaking of Best Buy, I made a trip there today. When you job hunt in the classifieds, all you have is a mailing address for your cover letter and resume. Which means I need a printer. Somehow, I managed to make it through six years of engineering school without a printer(I suppose this was due to the fact that I was a Computer Science major and all of my professors preferred a digital copy). But I don’t desire paying for printouts at Kinkos every time I need a physical copy so I decided to go printer shopping. Hell, laptops are like 500 bucks nowadays, a printer should be pretty cheap.

I was closest to Target so that’s where the shopping began. Surprisingly they have quite the selection of printers. They were a little pricey for me; Printer companies show no consideration for Moore’s Law. If I’m going to pay for one of these bad boys I might as well get all the bells and whistles (copier, sd card slots, etc…). Once I finished browsing the aisle of printers I decided I wasn’t happy with the price and I should check out Walmart. After all, Walmart is Walmart for a reason. Everyday low prices.

Shocked is the only word that can describe my reaction to the selection of printers at Walmart. Nothing was on display. And very few options existed for purchasing. This is when I realized the slow and inevitable death of the printer was finally among us. When Walmart quits carrying a product, you know its necessity in society has met its end. We have no need for physical copies any more. PDF that shit and email it(Yes, I just used the word PDF as a verb, applaud me).

Upset with Walmart’s selection I drove to Best Buy. The selection was slightly better but not by much. Taking in all of my options, I elected to search for a SD card to USB  adapter instead to help save costs. My mind determined Target was my best option too. At this exact moment, I received a text from my roommate saying I practically had a job lined up, so my efforts to purchase a printer died.

Well, I was at Best Buy so I might as well look around while I’m here. Best Buy has changed. Maybe its just the two Florida locations I’ve been too, but the stores seem desolate. Much less merchandise than the Louisville counterpart and definitely much less merchandise than I remember the stores having just a few short years ago. Maybe Best Buy has fallen on hard times. It could also be due to the high demand of digital distribution. Whatever the case, I felt unsatisfied with my experience and left thinking Best Buy was on a roller coaster towards destruction.

The best thing about my apartment is location. Yes, it is located in St. Petersburg but its located at the northern tip right between the two bridges to Tampa. My temp job hunt began in Tampa. Why you ask? Because that means I get the privilege of crossing one of the bridges everyday if I do land the job.

Most people wouldn’t consider crossing the bridge a luxury but that is because they are too consumed with living in 2012 to stop and realize what they are actually missing. Unlike crossing the potholed Kennedy bridge in Louisville, the integrity of this structure is actually quite pleasant. There’s not a million poorly planned on and off ramps within a mile’s span causing congestion either.

Now I will say I’ve not had the misfortune of crossing this bad boy during rush hour. I would assume the experience is quite different. Probably a stand still. But I’ve always been a fan of traffic jams, they’re like a Tetris puzzle of car pieces that need to be solved in my mind.

Even with a stand still though, people should stop and take the time to absorb the beauty. Just when I was crossing it yesterday I was overwhelmed with the beauty it possesses. There were several swarms of seagulls flying high above the bridge. I watched one spin in several circles then perform a straight nose dive towards the water to grab its prey. It was quite the spectacle.

I guess I should note that the Howard Franklin Bridge gaps the Old Tampa Bay and it is lays rather close to the water. At some points you actually feel like your on a natural land bridge between the two pieces of land.

There was a lot of wind on this particular day. I could see the waves of the water being quite turbulent as I envisioned myself in another life time being a surfer. As I came closer towards the St. Pete side, the waves began crashing up against the water barriers and splashing towards the roadway. This sight made my drive that much more enjoyable.

It is my hopes that those given the opportunity to actually cross this bridge in the near future don’t think of it as a chore but rather an opportunity to soak in the natural wildlife in a seemingly endless metropolis of outlet malls. Or the opportunity to see open blue ocean water in every direction. Or even the beautiful waterfront structures and Tampa skyline that has been established along the bay.

“It’s hard to stay mad when there’s so much beauty in the world.”

As you could probably imagine my sleep patterns are all shot to hell. I don’t have a routine in place at all. Somehow I was able to wake up fully motivated at 7:30 this morning. 7:30 on a Saturday morning can lead to only one good thing. Flea Marketing.

I really only enjoy flea marketing for one reason. Trying to finish off my collection of original Nintendo video games. Everything else at a flea market is typically junk. There might be one or two things that might throw a shimmer in my eyes. But not usually.

As I begin walking I notice an empty booth displaying a might fine comic collection. I stop for a minute to take a gander but there are no prices on anything, my comic collecting days are over and I’m not really looking for anything in particular. But out of nowhere comes a goober to talk me.

This is Weatherby 2.0 so I will entertain the conversation with a smile. But it soon turns into a sausage measuring contest for this guy and there is only one participant, him. He loved going on and on about his collection and how mint it was. And as I’m walking away, probably 10 feet from the booth or so, he catches up to me and reels me back in. Jesus man, I don’t care bro. Apperently he’s filming a TV show about comic book collecting and will be shooting it in the local comic book shop. There’s already some show like that with Kevin Smith on A&E I believe. But of course, his show is going to be better. To be fair though, I’m probably the only person that will stop at his booth all morning so he was like a dog waiting on its master to come home at the end of the day I suppose.

Finally, I manage to escape the clutches of evil comic book guy and I start to notice a trend. There’s like a bagillion cigar shops in the flea market. Now I know this is Cigar City but comeon, in a flea market, really? I suppose its a cheap product to be produced and easy to sell. Like Avon. I guess its the Avon for men.

Flea markets have changed a lot in my day and age. Like it doesn’t feel like a flea market anymore. Half the items are pieces of plastic made in Vietnam. Everything feels like it was pieces of shit bought in bulk off of an infomercial. Hell, what happened to the days where you could get good quality shit? I don’t think I saw one skillet all morning.

One big difference I noticed from a Kentucky flea market is the lack of guns for sell. There must be some sort of more strict gun control laws here. At a Kentucky flea market a man can make a killing picking up some good deals on some paperless pistols. No such luck at a Florida flea market. I saw some samurai blades though, in case anyone wants to act out Lord of the Rings.

I did manage to find some booths with NES games. I like to think about my purchases before I act on impulse so I walked around after I found a couple of games missing from my collection. The guy told me they were six and four dollars. But when I came back to make my purchase he tried to get me for fifteen. And one of them had a ripped label. Then he tried to haggle down to twelve but it was too late and I had already been insulted. I walked away. A nice old man with some NES games at another booth offered to come down on his prices for me. I went with him.

It was about 8:30 AM. I was at the end of a Romeo and Juliet and the bottom of a bottle of Basil Hayden when I found myself. At a time when smoking ashes and masturbation have both lost their fun I watched the sun rise and my spirits rise with it. They say it takes about 3 weeks of vacation time to truly unwind from the stresses of everyday work. I can now vouch for this statement as I have been unemployed for three weeks.

The three week vacation is a luxury most Americans will never meet in this high paced society we live in but it is truly a mind unraveling experience that we should envy the Europeans of. The first week your too exhausted to do anything. The second week your unaccustomed to the freedoms you now possess so you party party party. Beginning the third week your body requires rest from the extraneous amounts of partying. Once recovered you find yourself. And you find motivation again.

At least that’s how it happened for me. It just so happened that these three weeks lined up with my move to Florida like the rare phenomenon when all nine eight planets in the solar system line up. For some reason I choose to work right up until my move to Florida. And with work I never truly had a vacation as I was still doing work on my days off. It leaves the spirits quite low.

But now that I’ve seen the bottom of every bottle in the liquor cabinet and had the free reign to sleep until 4 PM in the afternoon for three weeks I’ve grown quite bored with myself. I know my funds are limited and like a ticking time bomb waiting to expire so I mounted myself up for the ever pending job hunt i must perform. When I found myself, I didn’t know where I was going with my life, but I found where I wanted to be. I must have lost sight of it. I don’t know exactly how I want to get there but I have learned that I want to take my time.

So in the meantime like spacehog, I decided I would look for a temp job. Maybe Best Buy, Barnes and Noble or Lowes or something. So I fixed a pot of coffee and readied myself for the day. Drove across the beautiful Howard Franklin Bridge and started hunting.

The funny thing about job hunting for a temp job today is that its not like it was when I was in high school. You can’t just go into a store and ask for a hard copy of an application. The chick behind the desk at Best Buy told me I needed to go online and check out Best Buy’s career page. “Lame” I offered as a friendly comment to show her I acknowledged her statement.

And what do I get in a response from the girl? In a smart ass tone she replied “And by lame you mean the way of the future.” My god what have we (Gen X) done? What have we created? This girl probably has no idea what the world was like before the internet hand fed her every little thing in life she will ever need. I couldn’t keep my cool with her tone. “Actually I like having a hard copy in front of the manager’s face so he will know I made the effort to come in the store and talk to someone instead of being one of hundreds of stat sheets on a computer that will probably never get called back.”

I thought I would try my chances at the used record shop in St. Pete after this. After all, I had worked at a record store before. So I ask the manager if she had any job openings or an application to fill out. No, she said. So I asked if she had an application I could leave with her. Actually I dont take applications. I dont have any openings and just so many people ask for jobs here. I had a dumbfound look on my face. How could a business not take applications? I had anticipated the fact that she probably was asked this question a lot. Hell, we were asked that a lot too at my previous record shop. That’s why I left an application with them and they called me back when they had an opening. How could she possibly expect to pull a good applicant for a position if she takes no applications. I don’t mean to sound bitter but if she just waits until she is understaffed to hire the next random person for a position she could get any kind of rift raft. I understand its just a used record shop but come on, its business. But hey, thats probably why shes running a record store.

Maybe my failed attempts to find a temp job are a sign that I should just hold out and search for a real big boy job. Who know’s. But you have to stay head strong and not  give up. And at least in the mean time I have rediscovered my drive to write some more.