Where's Bill Bellamy When You Don't Need Him

SPRING BREAK 2015!!! A drunken voice screams as if through the Horn of Gondor. It took me a minute to put 2 and 2 together, to realize why i couldn't park anywhere near our store located one block from the pacific, why there was an increased volume of young enthusiastic beach clad drunks swaying like frail trees in a hurricane while asking "have you ever heard of Zeppelin?" I remember when I was 19 and the prospect of going to a warm climate with an azure ocean and trying to bang a stranger while ferociously blind on hard alcohol, as Sublime's What I Got played in the background and Bill Bellamy cheered you on, sounded like a good time. Today, this literally sounds like hell. Like if I got drunk and drove a school bus full of adorable children and kittens off a cliff while listening to Deicide, I'd wake up in Cancun with a bottle of tequila in my mouth, Skrillex in my ears and youth all around me for eternity.

One loud posse thundered into the store. Their leader was one of those people you hate automatically, he never had a chance, neon orange shoes, ponytail, loud mouth and the confident opinion of himself. He had been poisoned with the belief that he was more of a comedian than a migraine. After making all kinds of high volume demands for reggae 45s he asked me if i wanted to go to a party after work. Generally when someone hands me a show flyer or a verbal invite, I always lie and say "cool man, I'll check that out" fully knowing that I'll be slowly trudging through season 3 of House of Cards in my jammies at 10pm, asking myself if I even still enjoy it. Thank god there's no Pinocchio situation, cause I'd have shot a brown dagger through the eyes of nearly every promoter (insert dick joke here) like some urban Cyrano de Bergerac. But for whatever reason when this guy asked if I wanted to party I said "NO!", emphatically, like so many spring break women will have to this evening. He tried to sweeten the deal by telling me what djs would be there as if their names would hold some allure or relevance for me, but it only brought out a "no means no, here's your change." 7 minutes after he made his purchase, a homeless kid came in and said "I found these records in the street, can I sell them to you?" Perhaps he was leaving a trail of vinyl so he could find his way back to the record store, perhaps he was so shitfaced he couldn't hold on to his Lionel Richie 45s and left them in front of Hodad's when onion rings peaked his interest. Sure homeless kid, here's a buck, get wild, it's SPRING BREEEAAAAK!!!!!

*when I was 19 I split a 30 pack of miller high life and a bottle of vodka with my roommate, after drinking it all we started walking to a party and I was throwing popcorn on the ground every five steps, when asked what I was doing, I responded "so I can find my way home like that fairy tail........Mitch and His Cookies!" My roommate, possessing slightly more clarity than I, realized I was so hammered I thought Hansel and Gretel was called Mitch and His Cookies and sent me back home for I was too far gone to continue, I followed the popcorn.