Growing up, when we needed clothing or bedding or towels or toys or basically anything that qualified as "dry goods", we'd look through the Sears catalog, or the JC Penney catalog, or the Spiegel catalog, and find something. Then you'd call up and give them an order number and if you were a big spender, a credit card. If not, no big.

Then you'd wait two weeks.

Then you'd drive five miles (if Sears) or 45 miles (if JC Penney) or 80 miles (if Spiegel) to pick up your order at the nearest store. If you prepaid with a credit card, you showed them a driver's license. If you hadn't, you showed them a driver's license and wrote them a check. Then you could put on your fucking Michael Jackson t-shirt.

At my feet are a brand new pair of Nike Janowski's in size ten anthracite. They are leather. They cost me $60. I ordered them on my phone day before yesterday.

That Sears still exists at all is a testament to their valiant efforts to reinvent themselves. They are fighting the tide in every possible way. If they were simply resting on their laurels they would have ceased to be six months after every person in North America received their first AOL CD.