Musings of a Catholic Convert

I am a child of the 1980s, and I can prove it easily.  Toss me some 80s trivia and I can demonstrate my knowledge of the 80s, but I can go several steps further.

• I can remember girls in my school crying because they didn't get a Cabbage Patch Doll for Christmas and overhearing parents talking about the absolutely primal way people were fighting for the limited supply in stores one particular year.
• I can remember asking if I could call the 900 number to place a vote with NBC/The A-Team as to whether or not A.J. Bancroft REALLY WAS Face's dad. (Yes, he was.  And Murdock figured it out.)
• I remember trying to feed Big League Chew to my cousin's Teddy Ruxpin, who seemed to really enjoy it, by the way.
• I remember watching live as Bill Buckner bobbled Mookie Wilson's grounder to first that allowed Ray Knight to score to give the Mets game six and take the series to game 7 and an eventual World Series championship for New York in 1986.
• I remember how so many of us signed up for Karate lessons after watching The Karate Kid, and how many of us quit soon after we found out how much hard work and how little fighting there was.
• I can remember not having a Members Only jacket, a Coke/Pepsi rugby shirt, or many of the latest fads and how other kids made such a big deal about that.  I also remember learning from my parents that fads are just that, and that the brand tag on my shirt was not important.

This post and maybe the next couple of posts, I want to talk about name brands.  Did you know for every name brand there are hundreds, if not thousands, of designer rip offs?  Go to a larger city and you'll see the vendors on the street, selling all sorts of clothing that looks remarkably similar to a name brand you might like.  In fact, you might have a choice of which name brand logo you'd like to have added to a generic shirt.  Want Polo?  Here's your little horse dude.  Rather have LaCoste?, here's your alligator, sir.  The same is true for Oakley sunglasses, Ray Bans, Nintendo games, designer jeans, DVDs, computer software, etc.  You can find counterfeit merchandise.  To most people it LOOKS just like the real thing.

But it's not.

Can any of you tell where I'm going with this?  Check my post tomorrow to see if you were right.