Please See Cashier For Details

The Flying J is a gas station and convenience store in Gibson, PA. It is a gas station and convenience store with aspirations of being so much more.

Homeland security threat level today YELLOW. Please see cashier for details. I thought about seeing the cashier for details. I thought about asking the cashier if YELLOW meant that I should stock up on duct tape, or if the government recommended that I simply buy consumer products to bolster the sagging economy. I thought about asking the cashier if YELLOW meant that travelers could no longer carry nasal spray and dental floss on commercial aircraft. I thought about asking the cashier if she expected that al-Qaeda operatives in Iraq had collected chemical weapons to use against civilians in the continental United States, or if the biggest threat was conventional attacks against United States citizens abroad. I thought about asking the cashier if YELLOW took into account the illness of Shiek Omar Abdel-Rahman -- serving life in prison for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center attack -- and his repeated calls for attacks in the event of his death. I thought about asking the cashier if she expected trouble in Gibson. After all, Gibson is just 20 miles from Carbondale, the fourth oldest city in Pennsylvania and home of the historic Gravity Railroad which was completed in 1822. Surely Carbondale is a terrorist target if ever there was one, and Gibson might just get caught in the crossfire. I thought about asking the cashier about the threat level of all the junk food in her store, especially considering that more Americans are killed by obesity in one month than by terrorism in... 230 years and counting.

I even thought about asking the cashier if she felt the United States should be securing its borders, monitoring its ports, equipping its first responders, supporting its allies, and promoting peace in the Middle East; or if the United States should spend a trillion dollars and thousands of lives waging an unprovoked war. But I already knew the answer to that question. I'll bet even in Gibson they know the answer to that question.    Gibson, PA -- 12/17/2006