Over Thanksgiving I flew down to Richmond and rented that epitome of “perfectly adequate transportation appliance,” the Chevy Spark, to go visit my parents. I didn’t opt for the upgrade to the fancy satellite entertainment system, so I got to listen to local radio the whole way.
And on Richmond’s best source for hip-hop and R&B I heard an ad for a beauty supply shop featuring two women talking about getting a great deal on hair extensions. At least half the airtime was given to talking about how you could get low low payments when financing your hair, even if you had bad credit. I know that it gets super expensive but holy crap, when the beauty supply shop is selling weaves on credit, your economy is in a bad place. And what happens when some of the clients inevitably can’t pay? Does someone come and repo the hair?
I sort of forgot about that until I saw this article in the Guardian about how Americans can’t generally afford to die, and so we’re all crowdfunding funerals.
And of course first example is a young man who actually did have life insurance, which would normally cover this sort of thing, except that his death is still in litigation: he was arrested, hogtied, and suffocated in police custody, so insurance may not actually be available for his family.
I don’t even have a conclusion here. It’s just awful.
Secretly Ironic 