tag fags

every now and then it’s the little things that hypnotize me…

…and the other day it was the gently oscillating tag on a guy’s ball cap as it flapped in the breeze.

he’d already paid for the hat, or so i’ll assume. it was a jordan one, and he was at mcdonald’s. as they don’t sell ball caps at mcdonald’s it would make sense that yes, he had already made the purchase…or gotten away clean in a minor shoplifting incident. either way, i guess he wasn’t sure about his choice, even though it matched in both color and design his jordan basketball shorts and shoes, the latter of which also still had the tags on the hang.

i guess if the whole ensemble hadn’t worked than back to footlocker it would go?

maybe i’m showing my age (or caucasianess?) here but i’ll never understand why folks leave the tags and/or hologram stickers on their goods AFTER they already own them. are you going to return them? do you think this makes them look more authentic? i dare say the people that can deconstruct a jordan shoe and combine leather and rubber and what-not to make a $200 shoe for five bucks in china (which is exactly what nike does, but they still sell it for two bills) can also fake some tags. just saying. so if it doesn’t show the authenticity, and you don’t plan on taking it back, what’s the fucking point?

baffling.

i famously had a guy at sharp things (harold’s former tattoo studio in san marcos) remove and hand me his crisp looking astros hat, and then in front of him (and his girl, and my girl, and shane, and harold) i rather ceremoniously removed the dangle tag AND the hologram sticker, handed him back his hat, and then did the exaggerated extended remix version of a handshake that most white folk assume all black folk still do (read: they don’t) saying, “don’t worry, g – you bought it. it’s legit. we get it, and we’ll vouch for you!”. harold feared a shooting in his place of business. i thought it was insanely funny.

of course, i was BEYOND lit at the time…

i had just told this story to one of the juneteenth bbq guests when the next day harold sent me an instructional thingie he found online showing kids how to remove the tags from their hats, saying he thought of me. i had just opened said file when i saw the guys at mcdonald’s as i was returning the ufc’s redbox stuff and thought, i need to do a bit on this…

…and here we are.