End of an era

[abilouise]

I'm sick, and I'm in mourning because my favorite video store closed (City Video for the locals). I drove there tonight on my way home, looking forward to a Sex in the City DVD to entertain my sick brain and City Video had vanished! No more cute guy to have conversations with, no more different sections for each nationality rather than a "foreign film" section! No more 20-year-old video collection with gems like the Doonesbury TV special to discover, blow the dust off of and rent! No more rentals at $3.75 apiece with double rentals on Tuesdays Wednesdays and Thursdays! My frequent borrower card was two stamps from full! They can't do this to me!
I don't know what they're going to put in the empty hull, but it had better not be either A)Starbucks, B)the McDonalds, relocated, C)another boutique shop with merchandise I can't afford or D)anything else I'm not gonna benefit from.
I just hope that I'm overreacting and they will come back, a phoenix reborn! Until then it's time to suck it up and go to Hollywood Express, which has better selection of new releases anyway.
I think that other people must not get as attached to their favorite businesses as I do. I assign them this place in my pantheon and then I feel betrayed by capitalism, which snatches away everything good. A moment of silence for other businesses I have loved that cannot be here with us today...

Dolly's, Pennington Video, New New York Deli (rte 1 in NJ), Celia's Fresh Market & Deli, Denise's Ice Cream, Wordsworth Bookstore, Sage's Market, the Harvard Square Army-Navy Store, Lucy Parsons Center on this side of the river, am I forgetting anything else?

Comments

[cme]

Denise's! <sob>

No, you're not the only one who gets attached to local businesses.

[abilouise.livejournal.com]

but am I the only one who has a hard time going to the new places because it feels disloyal?

[cme]

Well, maybe. I don't feel disloyal to things that have gone and left me, but I do refuse to go to new places out of resentment for a while, or out of a bitter certainty that they will never be as good.

And you know what, not even Christina's has Cherry Denise. So there.

[lakmiseiru.livejournal.com]

Completely! I had lots of trouble accepting the new place when they moved out...

They're apparently in Columbus, OH now and still in business... but so far away!

[cme]

Actually, I've refused to go to JP Licks after trying it once after the change. They're a worse value- more expensive, smaller portions- and the flavors are uninspiring. If I get strawberry-rhubarb ice cream, it shouldn't taste like "generic sweet", damnit.

[chenoameg.livejournal.com]

There is a bookstore, now, though. That's a slight consolation.

[mjw.livejournal.com]

I can't believe I've forgotten its name -- you know, the cyber cafe on Nassau Street where Connie used to work? The one with Monday Night Quake? I feel like it was Java something.

Somewhat relatedly, it may lighten your heart to know that the Nassau Street Burger King closed down.


mjw

[abilouise.livejournal.com]

Well, the second time it opened and my friend Jasmin worked there, it was "The Verge" or something dumb. I really can't remember the name of Princeton's first cyber cafe, home of "Monday Night Frag Fest"

[76trombones.livejournal.com]

I love City Video! I hope it exists again!

Then again, I hadn't been there in a while. But not because I was going elsewhere! I just seem not to rent videos now that I'm single. (I have watched a few things at home, yes, but even then, very little: a few things my convenient shopaholic housemate had (most recently The Incredibles), something my brother gave me for Christmas, something I like and wanted to show other people, and something chenoameg has that I felt like watching all the way through, in part to show myself that it is possible to sit around just relaxing, if I so desire).