Went to Bloomington this weekend. Walked around in the sun, enjoyed the semi-warm weather, caught up with some old friends. It was a good day.

My official business of the day was buying a birthday gift and card for my dad, whose birthday is the 15th. Buying the gift was no big deal, but when I went to buy the card, I found out that Greetings, my favorite card store ever, was ON FIRE that day and had, indeed, pretty much burned to a crisp. No one was hurt, thankfully. But it looks like all of those paper products are toast. I don't know why but I've never found a card store I like as much as I liked Greetings. Hope they come back.

So I went on to Viewpoint, a claustrophobic and heavily scented card store. Lots of Mary Englebreight-gacky merch. With some difficulty I found my dad an appropriate card.

I also noticed something bizarre. Since Sept. 11 there's been an apparent surge of demand for patriotic greeting cards. Now you can send someone a picture of the flag, or the Statue of Liberty, or some other red-white-and-blue motif.

It puzzled me. Who sends these cards? And who gets them? If you receive a greeting card that says "God Bless America" on the inside, what message does that give you? What does it say about the person who spent 3.95 plus postage to send it to you? I can't think of a more impersonal, generic message--not even "get well soon" which presupposes that you know the recipient might be sick. If you send me a "God Bless America" card that means...you know I'm American? Might as well just send me my tax forms, at least I'll use them.

On a related note, I thought about sending my dad a George Bush card, but he might not appreciate the humor. And, sadly, a Bill Clinton card isn't really that much better. George represents many things I don't agree with, but Bill is just kind of tacky.