Blockbusters.
And this local business called Fat Freddy's Pizzeria. It was delicious and reasonably priced.
Candyopolis.
Picture little 10 year old you. You're going to the mall with your parents, shopping for boring junk, and you pass it. The most heavenly sight you could bear witness. Candy as far as the eye can see, not in bags, but in BOXES with SHOVELS. You finally harass your parents enough and they hand you a bag and you get to shoveling every damn type of candy you want into it.
Sure there's the Internet now where I can buy candy from any place on earth, but it will never have the visceral joy of all being laid out in front of me, smelling it all, and digging into it with a big shovel.
I'd say Blockbuster. Weekly Friday night trip with the parents to pick out movies to rent. Trying to con your parents into letting you rent something you shouldn't be seeing. The candy at the counter that my parents would never buy. Yep, that's it.
In general, though, I miss what I guess you could call Mom and Pops. There was a greasy spoon diner I used to go with my best friends after a night out. Literally could seat maybe 20 people, it was converted from the first floor of a house and the brothers who ran it lived upstairs. Best food ever for practically no money. Now, you can get the greasy part from a Dennys or IHOP or something, but it's so corporate and surreal. At JJ's, the guys cooking were the ones serving you, and a coffee pot just stood up on the counter for anyone to up and grab.
Local bookstores also count. There's two I still go to, but you only go to them to support them - it's easier to find stuff online, including esoteric and rare books. Especially those, in fact. Even though there are still Walden Books and Barnes and Nobles around, again, it's so sanitized and fucking gross in there, like reading a book is something hip that you should be waving around doing.
Last edited by Masark; 2020-01-20 at 08:30 AM.
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What the world has learned is that America is never more than one election away from losing its goddamned mindMe on Elite : Dangerous | My WoW charactersOriginally Posted by Howard Tayler
Considering Radio Shack and Blockbuster are the only two I can think of off the top of my head, the answer is "none". Radio Shack only stuck in my head because John Oliver had a segment for the death of Radioshack, and Blockbuster also because of John Oliver (and Russel Crowe).
" If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher.." - Abraham Lincoln
“ The Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress to - prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms..” - Samuel Adams