Tucson
I was in Tucson, Arizona this past week. Oxford, England the week before. The time zones are like notches on a combination lock. Five ticks right. Eight ticks left. Three ticks right. My internal clock is messed up. I travel enough to know this feeling well. I know that sleep isn’t coming tonight of its own accord. So, I just knocked back a couple of sleeping pills. I’ve got a few minutes before they kick in.
I drove by a store front in Tucson that caught my eye: House of Hubcaps. I love the name. I love that stores like this still exist out there in America. As far as I know there isn’t a hubcap store within fifty miles of my house, maybe more. The House of Hubcaps is on a busy Tucson road with countless other small businesses stretched out across the desert from one mountain range to the next. Also on the House of Hubcaps sign, below the name, were the words:
BUY SELL NEW USED EXCHANGE
That’s useful information, I thought, driving by at forty miles per hour. Those five words pretty much said it all for someone in the market to buy, sell or exchange a new or used hubcap. Or two. Or four. Basically, this is your one stop shop for hubcaps. It kind of bugs me, though, that EXCHANGE is at the far end of the sign. Shouldn’t it be in the middle with the other verbs?
BUY SELL EXCHANGE NEW USED
This is what I was thinking as I drove on past the House of Hubcaps towards my hotel. That’s all I could think about. It’s hard for me to shake a thought like that. And I’m not finished thinking about it. This is going to stay with me for a long time. Perhaps forever. Five words. A nearly perfect advertising statement except one of the words is out of place. My brain is full of useless crap like this. It hardly seems fair. My car doesn’t even have hubcaps.
12:21:43 AM 
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