The New York Times At Bargain Rates

My goal yesterday was to acquire a copy of the Sunday New York Times. We actually get the Times for free here on campus. They're located in half a dozen buildings, and I'd seen a few upcoming stories in the Sunday edition I really wanted to read.

Little did I know...

I walked a couple blocks that morning to a nearby Shell station, which of course didn't carry the Times. This was disappointing, and since it took me a while to find the newspaper rack (in the middle of the store) it looked like I had been shopping around. Not wanting to look suspicious, I bought a couple Cokes and a bag of chips.

Back home, I got into my car. All the way on the other side of town (I make this sound like a goodly distance...it's not) is a Safeway. I drove across town, decided instead to stop at Starbucks, which is next to the Safeway.

Surely, Starbucks, being modern and hip, will have the Times. In I waltz, and Whammo! their stand claims to sell the very paper I am after. But there are no copies.

Excuse me, mame, but do you have any more copies of the Times?

No. That stand is a liar. We don't carry the Times.

Not wanting to appear suspicious, I order a coffee and a donut.

To Safeway, where I'm sure I can find the times. Can't find any newspaper rack up front, so away I go to the magazine isle, where it makes sense to perhaps find the news. But alas, there are no papers here. Only magazines.

I go to the counter.

Excuse me, mame, do you carry the Times?

Of course. Billy, get this man the Times.

Thank you.

Wait. That's not the Times. I'm a liar. We carry the Wall Street Journal.

Not wanting to appear suspicious, I buy a copy of GQ and Entertainment Weekly. Who the hell knew that Patrick Swayze died anyway?

To another gas station. Conoco. A last ditch effort, which doesn't pay off.

Now, faced with failure, it is obvious there are no Times in Cheney. I must go to Spokane.

Not like I'm doing anything better.

Twenty minutes later I'm in Spokane, at the mall, in Barnes and Noble. I know I will find what I want here, so I take my time. Oh, a newly reduced copy of a collection of Stephen King comics. How lucky I am to have come today!

Excuse me, mame, where can I find the Times?

We don't carry the Times.

Excuse me?

We don't carry the Times.

A pox on your house and a curse on all of your grandchildren.

Thank you sir.

A plague upon the moist places of your body.

Perhaps you could try the Starbucks across the street.

Not wanting to look suspicious, I buy the Stephen King comics.

Across the street, there is a Starbucks. I'm losing hope. I wander across four lanes of vicious traffic and enter this last resort.

My God! There is the Times! It is here! Like finding water on the moon!

My hopes, once dark and dreary, light up like an all night liquor store.

Praise be to Jesus and all the sons of Abraham!

I'll take one of these, mame. And a thousand blessings on all your relatives.

Thank you. That will be six dollars.

No. Just the paper, mame.

Six dollars.

Listen, don't play with me, sugar. I can't take it any more. You don't know what I've been through.

Six dollars, sir.

And thus it was. Six lousy dollars and all of an afternoon, to get the damn Times.

I need a subscription