Wednesday, August 30, 2006

People watching

So I was stranded outside the HyVee in Ames today after buying my food because my roommates and I had a little miscommunication; I thought they were done shopping when they weren't. Anyway, had a chance to do a little people watching; we definitely have some interesting people in this town.

First these two attractive 18 or so year old girls come out of HyVee and get into their gigantic Chevy conversion van. So that was kind of weird. Then this older black gentleman rolls up in an ancient Mercury minivan. He's smoking a cigarette, so he pauses after stepping out of the car to smoke the cigarette for another 15 seconds. When he comes back out after shopping, he's already got another one lit and is puffing away. These two Asian chicks pulled up in a sky-blue Ford Explorer listening to, of all things, gangster rap. Speaking of music, the next guy seemed like a rather interesting character. He looked like your typical teenage hipster who should be driving a piece of crap late '80s car and listening to Good Charlotte. Instead he's driving an extremely well kept gold Sebring convertible with the top down and is blasting Justin Timberlake's SexyBack.

The person that took the cake, however, was the owner of the car parked next to me. He had four bumper stickers on the back of his car: a peace sign, "Legalize Freedom: Vote Libertarian," Free Tibet, and "Don't blame me; I voted Libertarian." He walked up sporting Birkenstocks and a scruffy beard, carrying bags full of soy milk and organic food. As he drove off, the strains of Phish filled the air.

It was perfect.