The Shoelace

A smiling store employee approaches the door as my wife and I enter a trinket store on Palm Canyon Drive. The following is what transpired.

“Hi. Welcome to Nick Nack Paddy Wacks, Everyone Is Gay. How are both of you this lovely morning? Isn’t Palm Springs super awesome?

Just to let you know we are having a sale. Yes! Exciting! I can tell from your faces you hate me already. So fab!

Some items in the store are ten percent off, but – and here’s the fun game for you today – the sale is only on items that are pink, orange, mid-century, or have Marilyn’s face on them. So I guess….like everything is ten percent off then. Yay! How fun! My scarf is terrible.

Where are you two lovelies from? Kansas City! Oh my. Well, welcome to Palm Springs. How fun! It’s so amazing you are from Kansas City because I’m originally from the worst town you can imagine in Iowa. Yeah! My hometown is an absolute bump in a winding country road that was recently paved with hot manure. I moved to Palm Springs twelve years ago to live that California lifestyle y’all! Plus I just had to leave my hometown when my family and friends in Iowa tried to have me burned at the stake for being a witch.

Let me show you some of the cute items we have. Our store owner Jeffrey just has a knack for buying the cutest plastic crap made by little Malaysian slave children. They have such tiny hands. So adorable!

Over to the left are the shirts you would never be caught dead in. Next to those are shorts you would buy your friend as a sick joke. On that wall over there are the greeting cards with dicks on them. To the left are gummy bears that turn you gay for an hour.

Oh and don’t leave without checking out our art wall. The art is so extra! The wall is filled with caricature paintings of famous women I’ll never come close to looking like. Hash tag aspirations y’all!

So fun! Have a wonderful time in Palm Springs!”

This pretty much happened exactly as written (with quite a few liberties taken by me of course).