Dante was wrong. There are not seven levels of hell. There are eight. If he had lived today, he would have had one more level just above Limbo. And unlike Limbo’s virtuous pagans and unbaptized children, this tier is visited regularly by us all. It’s called Wal-Mart, and it will suck the soul out of you faster than a kid with a melted McDonalds’ milkshake.
I thought Wal-Mart was supposed to be a one-stop-shopping store. The term one-stop-shopping brings to mind grand images like convenience and efficiency. Wal-Mart, on the other hand, has no such things, and it conjures up images of painful searching and endless waiting.
What’s the deal with them moving stuff around all the time? I go in to buy a bar of soap, and it takes me an hour to get out. God forbid I should need something off the top shelf; I’d need Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to help me get it. And why are they all different? You go into a Supercenter in another town and you start feeling like you had one too many martinis at lunch.
In your dizzied state, you may try to look for whatever it was that made you go in there in the first place, only to be distracted by the aisles of lightning balls, pliable flatware and low-quality, cardboard furniture held together with cam bolts. What exactly is a cam bolt, anyway?
The check-out lines at “Wally World” are worse than the lines for Space Mountain at Disney World during Spring Break. What’s with these people? The cashiers were obviously fired from the Department of Motor Vehicles for not being motivated enough. Instead of “How May I Help You,” their blue vests should say “Please Don’t Ask Me For Help Because I’ll Give You A Dirty Look And Roll My Eyes.”
These places are like casinos; no windows, no clocks. You can spend an hour looking for light bulbs. Are they in the hardware section or the crafts section? Where is the hardware section, for that matter? I can’t find it. And why are cleaners and mops on the food side? Every time you walk one of the two front doors, one of the elderly greeters should earn their paycheck and give out maps of the store.
You lose all track of time in there, not only of hours and minutes, but of weeks and months. They put out their Christmas stuff before Thanksgiving, their Thanksgiving stuff before Halloween and their Halloween stuff around Labor Day. Valentine’s candy comes out around New Year’s Day, and Easter candy the day after that. If it weren’t for the unreliable heating and cooling system, which regulates temperature in there about as well as a junior high substitute teacher regulates a classroom, you wouldn’t know what month it is outside.
Wal-Mart also maintains every stereotypical Southern redneck fashion faux pas in existence. With all their camouflage and NASCAR paraphernalia, they must have the same supplier as every truck stop in the country. All they need to round out their collection are multicolored bandanas and tree stands. Oh yeah, they have those, too.
Not to mention the fact that Wal-Mart has come to small town America and undercut local businesses by offering “cheaper-in-every-sense” merchandise. Hardware stores, clothing shops, grocery stores and auto service shops all suffer because of this gargantuan retailer.
Now, I’m not asking you to boycott Wal-Mart, because that would be impossible. In many ways and in many cities, they have become the “only show in town.” But it doesn’t have to be so stressful when you go in. Simply allow yourself the required hour or two to buy bread and milk and make sure there is enough money on your debit card to pay for all the stuff you don’t need but just had to buy because it was on sale.
Nick Thompson is a senior communication major. He can be reached at [email protected].