Urban Recon Mission #3729-X, Codename: Eyeballman

So there was this one time when I was driving from my job at ArtTix to my class up at the University of Utah when I noticed a giant eyeball staring at me from inside a book store on about 200 w. and 300 s. Intrigued by the presence of this giant eyeball, I quickly looked upwards slightly so as to discern the name of this establishment that so blatantly displays giant eyeballs in their windows. The place was called "Red Light Books" and I noticed a list of their sundries beneath the store's name: books, cds, movies, and comics. I was intrigued. I already like all four of those things, but throw in a giant eyeball and I'm sold. I didn't have time to stop and check it out, so I made a mental note to go sometime in the near future. That sometime just happened to take place this afternoon...

I popped a quarter into the parking meter outside which gave me 15 minutes to skulk around inside (I think that you have to skulk in a place like this, otherwise you'll be found out and sacrificed to Astaroth). The store was indeed dingy, complete with that dingy store smell, but it added to its oppressively creepy ambiance. The walls were decked out with circa 1970's movie posters (Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, Charles Bronson stuff) as well as some bizarre local (at least I think it was local) art of the headless-baby-doll-with-many-nails-poked-through-its-plastic-body variety, as well as some abstract portraits of Josef Stalin and Jeffrey Dahmer (I'm not making this up). Of course, I was both repulsed and attracted. I made a quick survey of their wares, which were indeed books, cds, movies, and comics, but damn...this was some crazy weird stuff. For starters, I noticed one book titled The Erotic Art of Olaf which really needs no further description, and another called Cinema Sewer: The Adult's Only Guide to History's Sickest and Sexiest Movies. As I skimmed over the other titles, I began to get a little worried that hanging out in the books section for too long would brand me as some kind of sexual deviant. So I decided to check out the movies. They didn't have many movies. I almost bought Wes Craven's The Last House On the Left because it was only eight bucks, but I remembered that I was on a strict recon mission and didn't want to blow my cover. Growing tired of spinning the VHS movie towers around, I skulked over to the music section. I learned on MySpace that the proprietor of this store is also in charge of an indie record label that I can only assume specializes in proto-goth-industrial-speed-thrash-metal-core. I made one more sweep around, had a look at the T-Shirts (which were touting many of the names of the bands whose cds I wasn't buying), and decided that my 15-minute recon mission should come to a close. As I left, I nodded congenially to some gangly bohemeans that were bringing a drum kit in from outside, and was glad to be wearing my Stabby McKnife t-shirt because of the hipster camouflage it provides.
Though this place didn't exactly have anything that I would particularly want to buy, I remain intrigued at its existence because I thought stores like this only happened in the movies. Perhaps next Saturday I'll check out the "dismal ululations of black ritual noise" show and see if Black Seas of Infinity, Ghastly Hatchling, Night Terror, and The Tenants of Balthazar's Castle can't depress me into a puddle of emo-goth mascara.