American Glut

It needs to be said that I'm writing this from the Boulder Reservoir. A full four bar wireless signal is powering this blog post while I sit at a picnic table on a patio out on a beach. I may hate a lot of what the world is coming to, but free public wireless at an outdoor venue is certainly fine with me.
And speaking of the res., I'm here to watch Kate race a triathlon. Given that we're in Boulder and the game today is one of expensive gear, we're seeing the requisite number of waspy, shorn men and women. Look, I'm one of these salt of the earth, lunch-bucket Democrats, so it would be rude to deride my own people. Nice Audi, Schuyler Winthrop Hansen, Jr.!
But how did Kate and I get to this race on a beautiful Saturday morning? We came through Thornton, of course. But why would anyone drive to one of the most sprawling, soulless suburbs of Denver in order to get away from that very thing? To buy a couch, of course.
Kate and I are moving (don't tell my Grandparents, the shock might undo them. Then again, it might not. A lifelong Republican, he's planning on voting Obama because he can't stand McCain. If he'll go that far, he might go an extra inch and allow that boyfriends and girlfriends can share a set of keys.) and we needed to get a few things for the new house. High on the list of priorities was a couch and end table, but we were pressed for time and would love to avoid the $2,000 Restoration Hardware loveseat, so to American Furniture Warehouse we went.

Before we delve into the drama, it should also be noted that I really hate to shop. I feel like most, if not all, sales pitches revolve around the principle that you are fat, ugly, and stupid, but you might, MIGHT, just get laid if you buy our product. If you decide to buy the exact same thing from our competitor, then God help your worthless soul. I also feel like the vast majority of Americans have bloated credit card debt because they can't differentiate between the fleeting and ultimately hollow happiness of a big Target run with living with some sort of passion and consciously spending your time on the planet. But what do I know? I don't even have a nice car.

Jake Jabs runs American Furniture Warehouse (AFW), and his empire includes a billion square feet of showroom space. I told Kate when we got to the store that if the place caught fire, we'd never hope to find our way to an exit. The place is like a Vegas casino, except without any remote possibility of winning money. Blue hairs and oxygenated air come standard, though.
As Kate and I were helplessly stumbling around room after fake room, Bob Rizzo found us and quickly got us pointed towards the correct fake room with a real couch. With Bob's intimate knowledge of the store gleaned from over a decade as an AFW employee, we found the couch of our dreams, or at least one that would work for our purposes, in about 4 seconds. Bob got us to the checkout station quickly enough to keep me from having a nervous breakdown, but then I think he realized I let my guard down. I assumed that since we were handing over the dinero, he'd release us from the Casino/Showroom/Prison with haste. Instead, we were treated to his tale of survival. Bob, real name Norbert, had recently suffered a stroke.
"Three, in fact. I'd been back on the job for about five months, long enough to get back into the swing of things. It came on suddenly, no pain. I was picking up a box..." From here, things get fuzzy, but I know for a fact that Bob talked for 15 minutes without taking a breath, lest we make a getaway. "I hates hospitals, so he got out of there ASAP, but man, those doctors sure had a tough time diagnosing what caused the stroke. They finally settled on three usual suspects: diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol."
Wait Bob! How could a man contract such maladies?
"I eat two Big Macs, a large fry, a coke and two pies for lunch every day. And you wanna know what I eat for breakfast? (not really) Six eggs, six sausages, six pieces of bacon, coffee and a doughnut. I figured it out, and I averaged 37 eggs a week. I'm cutting back now, though."
Well, no shit Bob. You're lucky you aren't dead. Can we leave? Eventually.
Bob really was a nice guy, just a little talkative.
All of Bob's talk about food, and the miles we put in on the Baton Death March before Bob rescued us, got Kate and me pretty hungry. The only suitable way to finish up the day filled with American Furniture Warehouse, a labor day sale, and a spending spree? That's right, a drive through burger and fries. Hell, we had a triathlon to race this morning, and it's not like we were waking up to bacon or anything.