Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Kentucky Fried Desolation

Well I don't know what I've gotten into here. I keep looking at these "blogs" about malls. Who knew there were so many "blogs" about malls? And I notice that there's a distinct subculture of people who are interested in abandoned malls and stores, and who take lots of pictures of abandoned malls and stores. Furthermore, I notice that many of the "blogs" of people who are interested in abandoned malls have not been updated in years, so that they are abandoned "blogs" about abandoned malls. In one sad case, I was reading a curious "post" about a mall that burned down, on a "blog" that had not been updated since 2009, and when I checked the comments, I saw that the man who wrote it had died. McNeil has been looking at these things, too, and mentions an old, faded photo of "a dog gazing into a Bath and Tile Emporium," poignantly, I assume, but I haven't found that one yet. I did find several photos of an abandoned KFC covered in overgrown bushes ("click" here) and that's when I found myself considering that maybe there IS something kind of interesting about photos of an abandoned KFC covered in overgrown bushes. And these aren't even the sort of old, faded photos that make you feel especially weird. The great thing is that almost all of these abandoned mall "blogs" have sidebars that list OTHER abandoned mall "blogs" so now I have something to do with the rest of my life. Hey so one of these mall "blogs" mentioned Lenox Square (not abandoned), which Ace Atkins brought up to Dr. Theresa and me just the other night. Ace used to live in Atlanta, as we did, and he asked whether we remembered "when Lenox Square had monkeys." We replied that we did not. "If you gave them a penny, they'd stick their tongue out at you," Ace said. Hey, look, I just went from being a guy who "blogs" about guys who "blog" about malls to being a guy who "blogs" about malls, you saw it happen.