I spent some time walking around the mall over the weekend, and there were some cool things seen and heard in the aftermath of Hurricane Corbin.   Mel and I went up there Saturday after my Aunt’s funeral, and after grabbing an Almond Steamer from Starbucks (it’s my new life’s blood, by the way) Mel had a shoe incident, and we had to go to Payless.  I rarely ever venture down into that end of the mall’s second floor, so it’s almost like visiting a mall in a distant town.   On leaving I noticed that Pac Sun was blasting one of my favorite obscure musical groups, The Aquabats. In fact, they were blasting “Look At Me (I’m A Winner)” from the Charge CD, which I reviewed here almost two years ago.  Hooray for them.  It almost made me want to venture into the store, but not quite.

After that, we trekked on down to Game Stop to wish Michael Tawney a happy birthday.  Tawn’ will be contributing to the new Plugged In blog here at thegazz.com, and like most of our friends at the mall, he was somewhat shell-shocked following the teenybopper invasion earlier that day. 

We also popped into the newly-remodeled and relocated FYE music and DVD store.  They still charge more than any other retailer for music. Down at Steve and Barry’s they have new Hasbro-licensed shirts featuring Transformers, Mr. Potato Head, Operation, and of course, GI Joe. 

Sunday I made another quick trip for another Almond Steamer (it’s the only way I can get rid of the nasty tobacco cough that I picked up over the summer) and ran into a few members of bands who have some cool shows coming up this week.  You’ll be hearing more about them later.