6.16.03 obligation

Wedding invitations just keep pouring in. I'm not sure why, but it seems like all my cousins are getting married this summer. Maybe it is a conspiracy.

Formal events require an appropriate response; my pesky concerns with consumer culture have to be set aside. This weekend, we went to the Bon Marche.

Byron generally feels that a trip to the mall is a form of pure torture, not only on the environmental level (we both tend to sneeze a lot) but also on the cognitive level. The whole family freaks out when subjected to flashing lights and tottering displays of china and silver.

Of course we didn't know any better and went to the store on a sale day and had to batter our way through crowds. Luckily two of the happy couples registered so we could huddle in a corner and read their lists and then just ask for the desired item. But I had to figure out what to get for the people who didn't register, and that was quite a challenge. Can't say what I picked out in the end, but we left the store with the task entirely complete.

Walking out I realized that the candy counter is gone. I stopped, mouth open with shock. Buying Swedish fish was an important part of the shopping ritual of my childhood. How very sad.

Byron was still grumbling about the hideously crowded store when we stopped at a 711 for water. I realized that I had been at this particular strip mall before, during a break from a Society for Disability Studies conference. Could that be right? It was either SDS or something like SDS. My brain went fuzzy like an old television with a broken antenna, and I held up one finger and started to recite all the reasons why the Bon is not simply annoying but also in violation of federal law.

ADA compliance takes up a phenomenal amount of my available memory given that I haven't worked in the field since 1995.

Driving through Renton I started to tell stories about my old colleagues, and realized that I never gave Jendle a wedding present even though I went on her first date. The etiquette deadline has definitely passed on that one.

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