I went to UC Berkeley where I was an art major all the way through to a Masters degree. Why? Because in the words of the great Joe Strummer, “There’s only one answer to what you’re going to do after school and that is art school: the last resort of malingerers and people who don’t want to work.”  I admit that  I may have screwed around an awful lot in the name of academia. But  I also learned a few things. And I was thinking of those few things today when I was waiting to get out of  Bed, Bath and Beyond.  While I was trapped in a lengthy check out line,  I was stuck staring at the big wall full of the theoretical “art.” they sell.  It was directly in front of me. There is enough of it to  take up one whole side of the store.

So I started playing a game called ‘Which of these pieces of art would you buy if a terrorist had a gun to your head?” (And by the way,  it took something that melodramatic for me to motivate myself in this game because  the selection of framed pieces I was looking at each had the ability to ruin my mood in just a second. ) (Though even in the context of the game, I’m still not sure what would be motivating the terrorist to make such a threat . Except perhaps  gleeful sadistic thrills from punishing a western infidel floozy with the rotting fruits of her culture’s decline. )

Fortunately for me, it was time to hand over the credit card before I had to  finalize my difficult decision. Because there was no way I was able to pick a piece out.  But on the way to the car, I began wondering what one might call the ’school’ of art this store is selling . Not Moderne. Not Cubist. Not Impressionist or Fauvism.  Not Abstract Expressionism. Not Pop. And then it came to me:

The works are Early Twenty First Century BedbathandBeyondian.

Worse by half than Twenty First Century CostPlussian and twenty First Century PierOneian.

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My reality show is going to be about the highs and lows, the pitfalls and the triumphs of being a single woman. You will share in the heartaches and the struggles but you will also be there for the good times. My problems will turn out to be not so different from your problems because I will do the research necessary during pre-production to make sure that we are in sync.

I don’t think the fact that I am not actually single right now will get in the way of my reality show. The man I live with has a studio out in the front yard. You won’t ever see him. He will be restricted to using the back door to get to the bathroom or the bedroom while we are filming. Plus he gets up early. No one will know he’s around.

Once he is out of the house for the day, the cameras will come bursting into my bedroom. I see a great panoramic shot of me sprawled out on my pastel sheets, my hair splayed gently across the pillows as the dogs leap up to wake me, barking happily, on my beautiful four poster bed. (I am totally going to buy the antique chestnut carved king sized canopy bed with the genuine button tufted Italian leather headboard that is for sale on Ebay for $3569. the very minute I get my first paycheck from my reality show.) My four dogs will obviously play a big role in the show because everyone knows how much my dogs mean to me. But since my actual dogs are not particularly obedient, I will have some better dogs standing in for my dogs on my reality show. They will be nicer looking and will know how to make the kinds of faces on command that make everyone say “aww”.  I have been told I am too dead pan and needlessly esoteric so when something emotional happens, we will  cut to a shot of one of “my dogs,” making a sad or quizzical face.  That will underline how the dogs understand me better than people. And during these “cut-aways” the crew will be able to add a drop of glycerine to my cheeks so that, in the finished edit, a single tear rolls gently down my face.

I will try to make frequent use of a tender smile on my reality show.,

The way a typical episode of my show will work (as if any aspect of my life could be called typical!!) is that after I ‘wake up’ in the morning ‘my dogs’ will bound in to my bedroom and one of them will bring me the newspaper. (If newspapers have all gone under by the time my show starts to film, one of the dogs will bring me an IPAD instead.)  We have now embarked on the hilarious section of the show where you can expect the unexpected as I make astute comedic observations about the day’s’ current events’. Because I am alone in the room, it will seem like I am just adlibbing these remarks. But I will have “help” from as many ‘idea helpers’ as our budget will allow.  Was Brad happiest with Jennifer or Angelina?  Who is Snooki dating?  If anyone still knows who these people are when my show gets on the air, you can bet I will have some really great things to say about them!

There will also be plenty of funny reactions from the dogs in this segment that are certain to “go viral”.on You Tube the next day.  For instance, if I make a remark about swine flu, we will cut to one of the dogs wearing a pig snout!

But the fun is just starting. Probably about ten minutes in to this segment, we hear the door bell ring and uh oh! My best friend Felicity, the psychic/fashion designer that lives next door, will drop by. Since my real neighbors The McShanes have a 9 to 5 job in the restaurant business, the proper casting of my psychic.fashion designer neighbor Felicity will be very important.  Fingers crossed that one of the Kardashians will be out of work by the time we get our air date.

As the segment gets rolling, cameras will follow us as we move “the party” in to my cozy state of the art kitchen where Felicity will hold the audience spellbound with celebrity predictions while I make us both a lo- calorie , budget conscious recipe that will appear simultaneously  on our website (and later be featured in a best selling book.)

As you can imagine, Felicity’s special powers always seem to propel us both in to some unpredictable fixes. For example: Imagine how I might react when  Felicity says, in that droll way of hers,  “Wear something nice today! The love of your life will be shopping at Trader Joe’s.”(Possible sponsor? If not check with Albertson’s, Kroeger’s, Ralph’s, Safeway etc.)  But then, before I can find out what time of day true love will occur,  Felicity runs off to give an emergency psychic fashion reading to  one of the Real Housewives of Somewhere !

So I go to all the trouble of getting dolled up and calling in sick at work (at my job as a fashion magazine assistant if we can find someone who will let me assist them) and then driving  all the way to ( market TK) where I have to figure out a way to remain in the store for many hours,  monitoring every man who comes in the front door, always wondering if he is ‘the one.”.  Naturally we will fill the store with our own ‘unlikely suspects’. One guy will be way too young! Another will be way too old or too heavy or else he’s just too ugly! I will shake my head and roll my eyes as we cut to the spinning hands of a clock.  Well! Needless to say I am pretty ticked off after wasting all day hanging around a damn super market and meeting no one except the attractive store manager, Keith, who is already engaged. Darn the luck.

By the time I am driving home,  I am hopping mad.  I think I’d better confront Felicity and let her know how her stupid predictions totally ruined my day. I figure she must be out at one of the many super hot Hollywood night spots where we are both regulars. (note: We will definitely know what a few of these are by pre- production.)

So I throw on one of my perfect little dressy outfits topped off with a pair of my many five inch sling backs.,( which will also be for sale on our website. And by this time I will not only have learned how to walk in stilettos but will also have taken enough dance lessons that I can cross promote the show with an appearance on Dancing with the Stars. ) Then I will pin my  blonde hair up on top of my head , ( I will be  blond on my new reality show. Also I will get breast implants and liposuction!) and to the throbbing rhythms of the hottest new hip hop song we can afford (or a song by John Mayer  or some other guy who will cut a deal in exchange for publicity)  I will get out my I Phone (possible sponsor?) and call a few of my friends.  Look out! We are ready for action!  (Since I know that my real friends are getting kind of old for my core demographic, on my reality show they will be replaced by some “new friends” who are recognizable “types.”  For example, my dear friend Sue will be played by a  mixed race twenty something girl who teaches stripper-polercizing classes . She and I hate each other. But we also love each other.  So every week who knows what will happen!)

Right after the last commercial break of episode one, we will go to a close up of me as I reapply my lip gloss. The tension builds. And then in a medium shot, set to  whatever power ballad we can afford,  I burst through the doors of the (name tk) club totally ready to give that so-called friend Felicity what for! Still, how could I ever be prepared for what I see?  There at a table in the center of everything is Felicity, in a low cut dress, pouring champagne and toasting my old boyfriend Gunther.  Gunther! Who I haven’t seen since he broke my heart six months ago! Gunther, who the audience knows all about because he is in the opening credits! I had no idea until right now that he and Felicity even knew each other!   My old boyfriend! My best friend!  I hate them. I love them.  Knife in my heart! Tears in my eyes.  End part one.

Of course everyone will be back next week to see what happens!  Set that tivo right now! Especially after they play the teaser for episode two, where we  see me outside another club searching for my valet parking ticket. Meanwhile, unbeknownst to me right behind me in line is an impossibly attractive guy.  I am trying to ignore him because he is so not my type. Or so I think. But somehow I can not help but hear him talking on his cell phone complaining that all the girls he has met at this club are just too young and shallow.  And then, uh oh, when I am trying to pay the valet, I drop my purse. And  this gorgeous guy squats down to pick it up. We practically bump heads, then look in to each others eyes and :BOING . It is Keith! The store manager I met at Trader Joe’s! Was Felicity’s prediction right after all? Was I wrong to get mad at her? But if I hadn’t, then I would never have known about Gunther!!

Can it ever work out between me and Keith? We are from two different worlds! He is blue collar. I am from the arts. Oil and water.  Or so the tabloids will be buzzing.  The ladies on The View will all have something to say. The whole world will want to know what I am going to do.  But my viewers have a feeling that somehow it will work out because my viewers all know that on my reality show, I always put them first.  All my stories will be based on research about the kind of things my core demographic thinks might happen to them.

My reality show will definitely take the country by storm because,as my viewers all  know,: nothing is more compelling than real life.

Also, there will be vampires.

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I was going through my notes and came to another piece that never made it out of the gate.  It was going to be about  my collection of obituaries.  I read them because I like seeing whole lives summed up in a couple of paragraphs.   Only about one in thirty has what it takes to get me to tear it out of the paper. But I just added one to the collection yesterday: Bill Aucoin, the one time manager of Kiss. In addition to his KISS legacy , he left behind this memorable  quote which he offered as advice to one of his other bands :”Well, you know you need to check what the wind is like if you’re gonna drop cereal from the helicopter because those Froot Loops could fly up into the propellers.” Seems like pretty good advice in general.

What I do, after I tear them out, is paste them in to a little book full of other obits I have saved. For instance: Thomas Soffron, the creator of Howard Johnson’s  ‘Clam Strips’ and James Jordan, the advertising man who coined the phrase “Zest-fully clean.” each have their own pages.  When I was in grade school, I used to contemplate that Zest commercial, which went “You’re not fully clean until you’re Zest-fully clean.” I spent a lot of time not feeling fully clean because of that guy.

Then there is the obituary of Joyce Carlson who wrote the song “It’s a small world after all” for the Disneyland ride of the same name. Her’s was a song that made me feverish, hysterical, afraid of being trapped forever in this motorized lagoon having to listen to those dolls clickety clacking up and down in place with their scary twilight zone dummy smiles for all eternity as I swam frantically from  my boat, searching for the exit but not finding it,  seeing only madness and agony ahead as I listened to yet another chorus of the song. .  But despite the effect her awful song had on me,  Joyce Carlson died artistically fulfilled. And I love that.

Then there’s  Wanda Toscanini Horowitz: daughter of world renown maestro Arturo Toscanini Horowitz and wife of legendary pianist Vladamir Horowitz.

Wanda T. had my favorite obit ever.  It opened as follows “Wanda Horowitz wore a permanent scowl and was famous for her fiery temper. Once she exploded at a reporter when he asked her about life with Toscanini and Horowitz, her legendary father and husband. She replied “Don’t talk to me about them.  My father made me neurotic and my husband made me crazy.”

Now that’s an obit to be reckoned with.

It goes on: “In an interview shortly before her husband’s death she said “ He was very difficult. For 12 years I heard ” I will never play again. I will never play again” but I kept my silence. I never said “Oh yes, you have to play.” I never prompted him to play.”

If that is what she says in her obituary, just imagine how it must have been in real life when she was probably thinking “So don’t play again. Just stop whining about it.” Oh, and also he was gay. But otherwise it was a perfect 55 year marriage. “Thank God he died before I went to prison for strangling him with my bare hands.”is what she forgot to tell the reporter .

But it gets more intense: “I have my own personality,” she is quoted as saying,” I wish I would have done something for me. I had a lovely small voice. I can act because I have a very severe face but I can be very funny. I have a great sense of humor. I was thinner then I am now and I used to dance very well. I was not bad looking. What more do you want? I could have done a little bit of dancing or singing to be, you know, an operetta singer.”

If it hadn’t been for that damned legendary father of hers, Arturo Toscanini, who spooked her in to giving up hopes of being a performer even tho she was the most musically talented of the Toscanini family. “I remember I used to play an upright piano,” she recalls in her obituary, ” and on top of it there sat a photograph of my father. Young. Dark hair. Dark eyes. It made me so nervous I couldn’t look at him. I was afraid to practice when he was home. Every time I made a mistake it was like a stab in his stomach.”

Poor Wanda T.    I’m sorry she’s not around so I could go over to her house and film her performing her  operetta. Or at least  cheerlead her in to going to a few auditions. Talk about a cautionary tale.  I should write something about her. Although I guess I just did. Anyway, Happy Independence Day, whatever that means at this point.

love merrill

At the end of the nineteenth century, when Marcel Proust was still in his teens, he answered a questionnaire in an English-language confessional album belonging to his friend Antoinette, daughter of future President Felix Faure, as was the fad among English families . The one that the young Proust completed was entitled “An Album to Record Thoughts, Feelings, etc.” and it has been studied and replicated many many times since then.Hoping to put a much needed end to the constant recycling of these questions in various magazines, I asked my dog Puppyboy to answer them.

Q,What is your dream of earthly happiness?

A. Imagine if you will a world in which everyone, everywhere I go, would have the good sense to be fully prepared for my arrival, with appropriate items for throwing (ie: the green ring, the yellow squeezy ball, Stinky Mickey, Filthy Headless Froggy, the purple barbell, the faceless Santa, etc.) And then within this utopian situation, each would take the initiative to get a game going without me having to stare and beg.

What to your mind would be the greatest of misfortunes?

Well, let’s say you throw something for me. And why wouldn’t you? I’ve certainly made it convenient enough as you will see if you look down into your lap. There are already three things down there for you to choose from.  I recommend the green plastic ring.  So for the sake of argument,  let’s say you pick up the green ring and throw it. It’s barely out of your hands before I bring it right back. Unless by some inexplicable fluke one of the other dogs gets to it first, an awkward circumstance that is very painful  and humiliating for me since I’m here to tell you not one of them  really cares about the game. You can’t even be sure that any of them will   return it.  Jimmy takes off to the other side of the house and pulls it apart.

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Whereas my reputation is built on consistency. You throw it, you will get it right back only a few seconds later ….that is my guarantee. You will see the truth in this for yourself, as soon as you look down  and make the throwing selection that is right for you. By the way, no pressure but just between you and me,  you can’t go wrong with the green ring.

What natural gift would you most like to possess?

I would like to be larger, more charming and a lot more persuasive. If I were twice as big and ten times as adorable, something on the scale of ,say, a baby panda, then people wouldn’t be so cavalier about pretending they haven’t noticed when I pile toys in their laps and stare at them. .

What is your most treasured possession?

That would be the green ring. And the  yellow latex squeezy coney. It is shaped like an ice cream cone but has a face that seems to be saying “I taste delicious!” See how its tongue sticks out so it can taste itself? And when I pick it up in my mouth, it makes a loud shrieking noise like a disemboweled rodent .

Though I do love the faceless hedgehog. He’s filthy. He’s damp. He makes our guests shudder with disgust when I place it on their laps. Ah…I’ve had a lot of good times with that one. I still remember when I removed his face . We’d only had that thing two or three minutes. Good times.

But to answer your question:  I would have to say the green ring.  And the yellow squeezy coney.

What is your most marked characteristic?

My consideration for others. I know that everyone wants to throw something , but not everyone wants to throw the same thing. So I always try to pile a variety of things on them so that they may go with whatever mood strikes them. Unlike so many of today’s dogs, if I bring someone the yellow squeezy coney, and for some unknown reason they decide not to throw it, then I’m right there a second later with the green ring or the headless seal. I provide everyone with access to that critical juncture where preparation meets opportunity. It’s the job of a good host.

What quality do you most like in a man?

The desire to please. Just once I would like not to have to remind people what I expect of them.  True, I will always do what I must. But people, can we all just take a little more responsibility for our own actions  and not always leave everything up to me?

In what country would you like to live?

A country with no walls or fences where every surface is covered with mouth sized objects of every shape and description.. I fear a world in which everything is bolted down. What would be the point of living in  a world without projectiles? A world in which nothing could be thrown?

What is your greatest accomplishment?

Well, I have a special instinct for always knowing just where an intended projectile should be dropped to inspire throwing. For instance, when the gardener comes, if he is planting a tree, I might drop the green ring in to the fertilizer. And then, a few minutes later, I will drop The Faceless Santa in to the hole with the hose.

If we are talking about a repairman, I go straight for  the box of tools. If someone is asleep, with their back to me, I know to pile the toys behind their neck. And I just keep piling them in a pyramid til they are over come with the desire to throw. I am a genius at this.

What do you really like in other dogs?

I like them to show the proper respect. When we go for a group walk,  I always take the lead as befits my station in life. That way each and every member of the group is able to observe me as I pee everywhere first.

If someone comes toward me, no matter what the circumstances, I dominate them right away.. A lot of dogs don’t understand my urgency or why its such a big deal that they understand my power.  They stand and bark pointlessly. They hang around hoping for treats or affection. If you ask me, its all bullshit and they are in my way.   Which is why I am not asking you to please sit down and pay attention,  I am demanding that you do so.  Sit.  I have something to bring you.  You wont be disappointed. In fact, if you look down right now its already in your lap.

Who are your heroes in real life?

Zig Zigler, Master Motivator, author of “See YOU at the top.’ His motto was “Always be closing.’ Mine is   “Always be piling stuff in people’s laps and staring at them until they throw it..”

Ah. “Usquequaque exsisto piling effercio in populus tractus tunc astrum procul lemma insquequo they conicio is.”?

Exactly.

1. I have more additional things to say and

2. I know that about half of the pieces I wrote will not be appearing in the book. Therefore I might as well begin to put them up here.  I thought I’d start with this one, which was written a few years ago.

Costco: A Love Story in Four Acts.

Not only have I never been much of a joiner, I am the rare female whose gender software didn’t come bundled with the genome for “love of shopping.” That makes me the very portrait of someone who didn’t want the bother of purchasing a membership to a market. Already a coerced card carrying “member” of two markets in my neighborhood, I lived in dread that they’d one day hold a meeting. And I had gotten so used to living in overpriced Los Angeles where every trip to the market felt like a mugging that I had given up on even looking for a solution.

But my boyfriend started pushing me to visit Costco and have a gander at the enormous bargains.I resisted at first. It conjured images for me of the way they portrayed Communist bloc totalitarian life in my grade school textbooks: no sparkle, everything colorless, generic, utilitarian, depressing. I half expected to find ladies in babushkas fighting over a potato.  But eventually, in the interest of pleasing him, I agreed.

Then to my utter shock, I found I wasn’t just wrong, I was smitten and spellbound. So much so that by the second year, I sprung for the pricier Executive Membership that guaranteed a refund of 2% of my overall annual purchase total. I kind of I doubted it would actually work.  Or that there’s be a hidden catch. So when I received a check for $100 worth of free merchandise, I was thrilled—and I knew I was a goner.                                                                                                                                                                               Now that I’m in my fifth year of being a Costco-ian, I wondered how exactly the transition from repulsed to semi-fanatic happened. So I decided to take a look back at our golden precious memories, Costco’s and mine, as I explain what I now see as the four stages of my only loving commitment to a Big Box Store.

Act 1: The Honeymoon

The first time my heart beat a little faster was when I realized that Pellegrino water at Costco cost half what it did at my local market. Then I noticed that the dried chicken strips for dogs—a dollar apiece at a nearby pet store—were available in a half-pound sack containing 120 of them for…eleven dollars! Could that possibly be right? A savings of 90 percent? Turned out it was right. Even hamburger was a dollar a pound cheaper. A heavenly choir began to sing as the cavernous warehouse that is Costco was bathed in a rosy hue.

Still, I was not completely sold until I followed up my visit with a little research. Expecting to encounter the usual bad news I read about everything, I learned instead that Costco marked up the items they sold by only 14 to 15 percent, instead of the standard 25 to 50 percent they use at supermarkets. Better still, Costco was apparently nice to its employees, offering both good hourly wages and good benefits. *

Now I was falling in love. No more figuring out where to find the best prices on everything from power tools to potato salad. No more guilt about tortured underpaid workers. I felt safe and warm pushing my wading pool-sized shopping cart past the dozens of free samples tables; enjoying a microscopic shard of chicken/lettuce wrap, a speared morsel of chimichanga, a thimble full of pomegranite juice or steel cut Oatmeal. Yes, sometimes waiting behind the Costco lifers who arrived at noon already wearing lobster bibs, ready for free lunch, could be trying. But wow! That bottle of olive oil so large it required a system of hoists and pullies to lift just lowered the price of sautéing to only pennies a serving. And look… hoists and pullies  for sale just one aisle over! The only hard part was deciding what not to buy. There were so many opportunities for savings lurking everywhere that the trip to the cash register was like crossing The Bermuda Triangle. On my way to buy a crate of gum, I accidentally stumbled into a cache of beautiful leather chairs that cost hundreds less than the very same ones downtown. No, I didn’t actually need any furniture. But one day my furniture might decide to disintegrate. Why spend wastefully! This was too good to pass up.

Act 2: The Awakening

One day a little voice began to whisper, “There is so much stuff for sale here. Is any of it not from China?” and “Hey, what happened to those end tables I liked? Where oh where did they go?”

A little more research revealed that Costco carries only 4,000 items, compared to 150,000 in a typical superstore. And one thousand of them are intentionally “treasure hunt” stuff. These are always changing to instill a “sense of urgency” in customers. In other words, that buyer’s hysteria I kept experiencing wasn’t my own, it was planned for me. Finding this out was a little like discovering that a hot new boyfriend is actually a manipulative narcissist who will leave if you request foreplay.

Act 3: The Disillusionment

It began the day I noticed my weekly grocery bill had somehow become $1800. All I’d done was go to Costco for some steaks…oh, and an aluminum storage shed, because it was $500 cheaper than the one at Home Depot.  Well, I’d had to grab it fast before it disappeared!

Now the downside to buying massive quantities came in to focus. That gigantic container of garlic salt was such an amazing deal, until three quarters of it solidified into a salt lick. And that bag of pre-washed spinach the size and shape of a small child required me to eat spinach three times a day for a week, and also open a roadside spinach stand, or try to sell spinach on E-bay. “I saw an eighty-year-old couple walking in Costco,” said my friend, comedian Elayne Boosler. “I said to them, ‘Get out! Go home! There’s nothing here that you can possibly finish.’”

And then there are the checkout rituals. The first time I forgot to say, “May I have a box?” I found myself making a million trips to unload the car, balancing an air mattress-sized package of chicken parts atop a cistern of laundry detergent. Why?  Because there are no bags at Costco, even though nothing for sale there really fits into those boxes (which, incidentally, are so indestructible they don’t fit in the recycling can). And Costco is the only market with border guards at the exit.  Take care not to misplace your receipt, because you must show it if you’re planning to ever leave.

For me, though, the bloom wasn’t wholly off the rose until I looked around my house, saw one too many dark walnut fake colonial pieces and thought…Damn! My house looks like Costco! Or maybe it was when I noticed, as I made someone a cocktail from my 8 foot high magnum of vodka, that they were looking at me with an expression that said “Whoa. Drinking problem.”

Act Four: Resolution and Mature Love

As with any long term relationship you take the good with the bad. In the end, I finally understood that as a savvy shopper I needed to use Costco for my own purposes, not vice-versa, as well as to understand that certain things I must simply accept. Maybe it is always going to be difficult to take those 10,000 dollar diamond stud earrings in the jewelry case seriously because they are only inches from a tower of Halloween candy? And maybe I will always be disappointed by the odd assortment of books they sell on a big flat table, next to the Big Bag’o’Socks bin,  that seem to have been selected for a mysterious demographic that I’d rather not contemplate. So what?— It’s still a great place to buy food I can freeze, cleaning products, and office supplies. And area rugs and tires. And then I just get the hell out! Oh, and swim goggles. Did I already mention mascara? And picture frames? And THAT’S ALL. Just those things, then grab some soup and a patio heater and head home! And a couple of dog beds. And oh my God a real piano for just $7000!

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I say this at the risk of sounding like a radio station, but …the contest lines are now closed. I just finished giving away ten free copies of the paperback version of my most recent novel  “Nose Down Eyes Up?”.

If you liked Walking in Circles Before Lying Down, you will probably like this one too.

Its got everything you have come to expect in a recent Merrill Markoe novel :  dogs who talk to people who also talk, bad behavior, too many contemporary references. And it just came out in paperback. A huge box of them arrived at my house and I don’t even have that kind of shelf space. Plus I need to figure out how to publicize the book a little.  The hard cover came out the day after the Christmas after the economy collapsed. That wasn’t a good time to put a book out, oddly enough.

Too bad you missed the big contest. It was the best reason for not writing that I have had in an hour.

Immediately I began to imagine visiting this place, since it is certainly the kind of thing I would pull off the road to see  if I were for some reason traveling between Venezuela and Brazil. 

Then I began to imagine the souvenirs that would be for sale. Would I buy the tee shirt? Probably.  Would I also want to buy a pen and a back scratcher? Almost definitely.  Would they be selling cups and shot glasses that say Jonestown? Not sure. It would be in such bad taste. But even harder to figure: will there be a stand selling Kool Aid? And if there is, will people line up to buy some and be photographed drinking it in a cup that you get to keep that says “I drank the Kool Aid at Jonestown?”