
Rice, at times a symbol of asceticism, will soon be a symbol of affluence.
The Great Rice Panic of 2008 is upon us, ladies and gentlepersons, and the Panic Blog is here to provide you moment by moment coverage of the ongoing side dish debacle from our PanicTracker9000 Mobile News Center (aka my SUV which is only two years younger than the SUV of my least favorite Los Anchorage panhandler).
My wife works at a BigAssed Membership Warehouse Store and these are her observations from the battlefield.
Thursday there were two people having a tug of war over the last BigAssed bag of rice and said bag ripped, spilling rice all over the aisle. Security, or the biggest loss prevention guy, had to separate the combatants. Oh yes, and someone else bought the damaged bag of rice.
Every morning people have been crowding the front doors prior to the store opening, ready to stampede like they’re at a Who concert. They shout to the employees going into work “hey, do you have any rice today?” People are taking rice out of other people’s carts in the store. There have been several fights.
It’s not just her store. Stores all over town are running out of rice. Small Fashionable Yuppie Asian Market didn’t have any white rice for sale, just small packets of wild rice. And wild rice isn’t even rice, it’s like twigs and dirt and stuff.
The Powers That Be tell us there is no actual shortage of rice just a perceived shortage. Well, brothers and sisters, perception is reality. It’s easy to be an existentialist in the foxhole of a Grain War.
Will this escalate into rampaging violence in the streets? Shall we form the Minute Rice Men? Will Uncle Ben have to gird his loins for battle? Where will this end?
Oh the humanity.
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and hey, the Los Anchorage Daily News has a story today on the same topic.. great minds, eh? Here's the story:
Rumors of rice shortage spur daily rush at Anchorage stores
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Monk receiving breakfast rice in begging bowl photo: www.kheper.net
Uncle Ben photo: www.racewire.org