{"id":1895,"date":"2025-08-03T22:36:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-03T22:36:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.craigsilliphant.com\/?p=1895"},"modified":"2025-08-03T22:49:19","modified_gmt":"2025-08-03T22:49:19","slug":"been-caught-stealing-comedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.craigsilliphant.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/03\/been-caught-stealing-comedy\/","title":{"rendered":"Been Caught Stealing (Comedy)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Have you ever shoplifted anything?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ever been caught?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have. Sort of. Not exactly. But also, yes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I lived in Regina for four years as a preteen, from grade five to grade eight, 1985 to 1988. It was a time that was as formative as it was felonious. The golden Gen X latchkey kid era, when children were free-range animals with cable TV and cigarettes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recently, I was back in Regina on business and decided to take a nostalgic stroll through one of the most hallowed hang outs of my youth: Victoria Square Mall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It was somewhat surreal, as these time-travelling excursions can be. The bones of the mall were the same, but much had changed. Safeway was still Safeway, but everything else was different. The Zellers was now a Jysk. Bi-Rite Drugs had become a Dollar Store. The old record shop, where I\u2019d once debated the artistic merits of \u2018Slippery When Wet,\u2019 <\/em>was now a jewelry store.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As I wandered through the mall, I remembered being about 12-years-old. I came from a so-called good family. Suburban, middle class, \u201crespectable\u201d people. But like most Gen X kids, I was raised by television and benign neglect. I flirted with the boundaries of right and wrong like I was doing R&D for The Kingpin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back then I was deep into my skid phase. I wore denim with an Iron Maiden back patch, hair that said \u201cI cut this myself, with safety scissors and spite.\u201d I had a rat\u2019s tail at the back that dangled like a tiny middle finger to society. I smoked cigarettes. I loitered. I was Regina\u2019s tiniest dirtbag.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

That said, I was pretty soft as far as any truly serious delinquency went. But at some point, my friends and I discovered shoplifting. It was like learning you had a superpower. Want that Mad Magazine? Grab it. Fancy a New York Seltzer? Reach in the cooler and take it. (New York Seltzer was a thing in the 80s, don\u2019t ask). You didn\u2019t need your allowance; money had become optional. To quote Jane\u2019s Addiction\u2019s<\/em> \u2018Been Caught Stealing\u2019: \u201cWhen I want something and I don\u2019t want to pay for it. And if I get by — it\u2019s mine. Mine all mine<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In shoplifting, like poker, there are tells; those subtle signs someone\u2019s about to steal. One classic move: when they\u2019re pretending to browse but they\u2019re staring at the cashier to see if they\u2019ve been detected. Their hands are flipping through racks, but they\u2019re not looking at the thing they\u2019re shopping for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As kids, we were so hilariously brazen that we didn\u2019t have those tells. I\u2019d walk into the store, saunter right up to the cooler, take out that seltzer, and then, to paraphrase Perry Farrell once more, I\u2019d \u201cwalk right through the door<\/em>,\u201d strutting through the mall, taking fat swigs of seltzer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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