I‘VE NEVER been in a fight. I’ve wanted to fight, I’ve had people want to fight me—however, those two phenomena have never synced up, and THANK EVERY FORGOTTEN GOD FOR THAT. Fights only seem to happen for embarrassing reasons. Anger is rarely righteous; it seems like fisticuffs erupt over mishigas like perceived ownership of a sex partner, or because someone was louder and more obnoxious than you were hoping for, or for any number of dumb reasons.
Every time I’ve almost punched someone, I was SO GLAD I didn’t. Not punching someone is the best! You get to go back to your house and watch Gilmore Girls and eat avant-garde ice cream and complain to your slam piece about a shared negative brunch experience. That’s way better than clocking some knucklehead ’cause he cheesed you off on some “Macho Man Randy Savage if Macho Man Randy Savage Had Gone to High School in Tigard”-type shit.
Recently, though, I found my handsome self in a situation where an act of violence would have been righteous… I think… well, I’ll explain AND THEN YOU TELL ME ON TWITTER OR WHEN YOU SEE ME ON THE STREETS OR PERHAPS EVEN A BOULEVARD.
Dear reader, I was at Trader Joe’s, and I saw a Nazi. Now I don’t mean I saw some dude on a tank storming from ethnic food section to ethnic food section, taking them over. (That … that would have been glorious.)
What I saw with my two Jewish eyes, instead, was a man in his fifties, wearing a tank top, with a gigantic swastika tattoo on his shoulder. ON ACCOUNTA I was in Trader Joe’s, I assumed this was a Buddhist swastika. (Listen, I’m one of those very chill Jews. I’ll eat Indian food on Passover. My rabbi is a DVD copy of Blazing Saddles. I can accept a Buddhist swastika.) Further inspection revealed it was not a Buddhist swastika. A simple rhyme on how to remember which is which goes as follows: Swastika to the left? That’s a Buddhist, save your breath. Swastika to the right? THAT’S A FUCKING NAZI. RUN. RUN AS FAST AS YOU CAN. NO, LEAVE THE ART. WE NEED TO GO RIGHT NOW. WHAT GOD WOULD ALLOW THIS? WHAT GOD? It’s an old Jewish rhyme.
Anyway, this Kraut yutz and I traded frowning glances in the store. I decided to fuck with him by walking in front of him way too slow. He brushed past me to the parking lot and told me to watch where the fuck I was going—and it became evident… a fight could be had. I could bring to bear my Hebrew massiveness against this shithead anachronist and it’d feel so good and probably my father would be excited.
I didn’t fight, though. Even if you’re the most righteous idiot fighting in a Trader Joe’s parking lot, you’re still an idiot. I scoffed. I left. I ate my avant-garde ice cream at home, and it tasted just as good as if I’d fought over something stupid.
well he had a swasticka tattoo so he must have been a nazi right?
So we nearly fight people in grocery store parking lots over strange emblems on their skin down here? Indeed a fucked up time and space this is.
You know, Ian, the founder of Trader Joe’s is one of two brothers who grew the German supermarket chain Aldi into Western Europe’s biggest grocer. One brother left Germany for California, where he founded Trader Joe’s. You should do some in-depth, investigative work on the connection between German grocers and aging Nazis.
Occam’s Razor, commenters. If you see a guy under the age of 80 wearing a tank top with a giant goddamn swastika tattoo (rather than, let’s say, a proper shirt that covers, let’s say, armpits and giant goddamn swastika tattoos) he is at that very moment a self-identified, unrepentant Neo-Nazi.
Do you guys just like disagreeing with people? Is it fun? Doesn’t sound like it.
I think they’re just trying to provoke Ian into a fight. Well guess what idiots? It won’t work. He saw a fucking Nazi and walked away.
Haven’t you retards ever heard of AB? Or any of the 100+ other prison gangs that get struck up with swastikas? It doesn’t mean they are nazis. I would even go so far as to say most of the dumbfucks who get the swastika tattoo don’t even grasp the significance of the symbol. They just know its offensive and means they don’t give a fuck what society thinks.
If we didn’t have middle-aged men who still openly display swastikas, then we’d never understand just how feeble and insane they make the wearers appear. You did right, you handsome, Jewish blogger, you.
@eprophet You’re story is completely wrong on how the chain was developed. It’s true that two brothers started up Aldi’s, and that one of them became the owner of TJ’s. But a man by the name if Joe Coulombe started a small chain if convent stores called Pronto markets, then 7-11 started to gain popularity, so he changed his business format. He sold the company in the 80’s to one of the Albrechts. Both are dead now anyways, so really, who cares.
I almost punched some guy at Kohl’s, he had a tattoo that said “Mom” and he wouldn’t tell me how he met her, doesn’t look like Mom’s type though she has been hanging around in some sketchy bars since Dad ran off.