The Conical Glass: The quality of shopping

Thursday, November 13, 2008

The quality of shopping

I made an offhand comment about hating to shop a few days ago, which caused some consternation among those whom I do occasionally shop for. It is true that I was born without the shopping gene, but what I really hate is (a) buying clothes for myself, which explains why I am fairly fashion-deficient and (b) malls. Here are some tips for places where even a non-shopper can love to shop:

1. Online. Well, duh. But shipping & handling charges add up, and I like to keep sales taxes in my community. Still, if you want to make shopping really easy this Xmas, why not just buy this for everyone on your list -- and be sure to use that link, because I'll get 84 cents in affiliate fees from Amazon!

2. Bookstores. If I tend to give a lot of books as gifts, well, it's because I love any excuse to visit a bookstore! Sometimes I even find "like-new" volumes at library sales, where you can score a $25 hardcover for one or two bucks.

3. Street fairs. My city loves nothing more than to close down its main street and let a whole bunch of food and crafts vendors set up shop for a day or two. You can buy gifts while eating funnel cake and listening to music!

4. Museum gift shops. They are always full of fun, innovative and beautiful things; whenever I visit a museum, I make sure to budget some time to check out the shop. If I had kids, I think I would buy their gifts exclusively at museum stores.

5. Grocery stores. I'm in them at least twice a week anyway, and this being the Bay Area, there are always tons of gourmet products on the shelves: fancy teas, nuts, preserves, etc. If your giftee doesn't have a Trader Joe's in his/her area, that store is a cornucopia of great gift ideas.

6. Tickets to plays, concerts and other cultural events make welcome gifts.

It's probably a good idea to give tickets to something fun, which would sort of rule out the current show at ACT, "The Quality of Life," because it's a colossal downer -- but it's also one of the most powerful pieces of theater I've seen in a long time. I'm finding that more and more, the ACT shows that are imported wholesale from other companies ("Life" was brought in from L.A. with 3/4 of its cast intact) tend to be better than the ones with its core acting company; maybe they need to rethink their casting strategy. "Life," written and directed by Jane Anderson, is the story of two couples: conservative Christians from Ohio, and a couple of freewheeling Bay Area aging-hippie types. The women are cousins, and the Ohio pair goes to visit the Californians after the latter's home is destroyed in a fire. The hippies, Neil and Jeannette, are living in a yurt on their property, with no plans to rebuild. The midwesterners, Bill and Dinah, think that's a bit, well, odd -- and that's just the beginning of the culture clash.

But what could easily have been a routine red state vs. blue state, Christians vs. secular humanist clash of the baby boomers turns out to have so much more depth. We find out early in the first act that Neil is dying of cancer and that Bill and Dinah's only daughter, a young woman in college, was brutally murdered. The two couples have very different coping mechanisms, and Bill heartily disapproves of Neil and Jeannette's methods. He seems harsh and judgmental, but we never forget that he is a man in great pain. Act One ends with a shocking revelation -- it reminded me of another theatrical drama, "Proof," which does the same thing, making you wish they'd rush back from intermission so you can find out what happens.

"The Quality of Life" is brilliantly acted by Broadway veteran Dennis Boutsikaris and a trio of actors best known for their TV and movie roles: Steven Culp ("Desperate Housewives"), Laurie Metcalf ("Roseanne") and JoBeth Williams (the "Poltergeist" films). They really make these characters come to life as believable people, not just one-dimensional mouthpieces for their points of view. "Quality" plays for another 10 days, and I highly recommend it to my local readers.

posted by 125records @ 1:54 PM

1 Comments:

At 8:09 PM, yellojkt said…

I don't know when it happened but museum gift shops have gone astoundingly upscale. I couldn't afford half the stuff I saw at the de Young Museum.