25 Baffling Items Sold at Gas Stations

Image via Complex Original

When we say sex items, we're not talking about condoms. Condoms actually make sense to have in gas stations, and it actually might be a little less embarrassing to buy them there than at the local grocery store, where some 70-year-old lady will either shun you or come on to you. We're talking about pocket rockets, vibrating rings, all and sorts of lubes. We understand that it's extremely fun to be spontaneous, but we can't imagine that gasoline fumes and slurpees are going to spur those feelings of immediate intimacy. We also don't think that that will be a place where a couple finally agrees to venture into new avenues of their sex lives. 

Baseball caps we understand. Sometimes you just need the sun out of your eyes. What we can't wrap our heads around is the endless array of ridiculous doo-rags, bucket hats, and floppy cowboy hats you see at gas stations. Someone has to be buying these things or they wouldn't be selling them, but who? None of this headwear is practical, so someone has to step inside to pay for gas and think that they would just look great in a doo-rag with flaming skulls on it, or a Looney Tunes bucket hat.

We want to meet that man.

There are so many easy ways for you to listen to music in the modern world, and if all of them inexplicably fail as a result of some apocalyptic event, you can always fall back on the selection of terrible CDs at your local gas station. We're pretty sure that radio stations pay gas stations to stock these CDs. That way, when you are unfortunate enough to have to listen to the radio, you can stop in to your local Sunoco and think to yourself, "at least I don't have to listen to that."

Nothing says romance like a mood ring or a gaudy necklace featuring a a bird or a cross (and sometimes a bird AND a cross, if you're a high roller). We have never seen someone wear jewelry purchased in a gas station, but we continue to see these lovely items sharing display case space with the temporary tattoos and out of season holiday items. If every kiss begins with Kay, then numerous bewildered stares begin with gas station jewelry purchases.

What a wonderful modern convenience. If you're pricey Otterbox somehow breaks or that charger stops working, you can just stop in a gas station and waste your money on a flimsy case that will break while you take it out of the plastic wrap or a charger that was never meant to work. This may be the only time in our lives that we say this, but you can certainly hang in there until you make it to the nearest Radio Shack.

Who has a phone that can't take better pictures than one of these? Not only are most of our phones going to produce higher-resolution pictures, but when was the last time you got film developed? For those of you pining for lower image quality and a week-long turn around from CVS, apparently gas stations are still willing to cater to your photo needs. At least you still have somewhere to go after your great-aunt loses her phone on Thanksgiving and demands that she be able to take pictures of the family gathered around the turkey.

You ever need just one egg? Usually, the answer to this question is no. Even if we are just one egg short of our brownie recipe, we can usually spare the two dollars to pick up a dozen eggs so we don't have to come back to the gas station to buy a single egg next time. We have a hard time believing that any customer has used their last thirty cents to pick up a single egg after realizing they couldn't afford the full dozen.

It is even more ridiculous that gas stations sell DVDs. Most places that offer bargain DVD sales also have a Red Box, so even if you are at grandma's house without hi-speed Internet, you can rent a movie. This means that a person who buys DVDs at a gas station is thinking to themselves, "Why rent Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift when I can buy it and finish my collection?"

Under no circumstances should you be buying wine at a gas station. The government should actually track gas station wine sales, and then connect the buyer with a complimentary call from a suicide hotline. If you end up at the dusty rack of off-brand wines, nestled between the Pringles and the frozen dinners, you're going to have to ask yourself some series questions about the choices you've made that have brought you to this point.

We love the idea of healthy choices in gas stations. We just aren't seeing much effort on the part of gas stations. Why even bother selling salad when it's wilted, fruit when it's bruised, or yogurt parfaits that are a week old? We know that ninety percent of gas station revenue comes from Combos and Mountain Dew, but as a people, we're never going to think about coming around to healthier eating if our salad looks equally appetizing before and after we throw it in the garbage.

Gas stations sell some of the most truly worthless items that tourist money can buy. Paperweights, pencil holders, decorative towels, you name it. As long as someone slaps the name of a nearby city or state on it, and maybe adds a graphic graphic of local wildlife for good measure, some poor sap will buy it. We know that these items are there for deadbeat dads who forgot to get their kids anything on their business trips, but isn't about time we stopped enabling them and freed up that valuable snack shelf space?

Have you ever perused the magazine rack at a interstate truck stop? Maxim, Playboy, Sports Illustrated, US Weekly: these magazines sell. There are still several dozen more titles sitting and gathering dust next to them, untouched until they are replaced with next month's issue. When was the last time a weary traveller stopped in for a Snickers, a Five-Hour energy shot, and a copy of Better Homes and Gardens? Ditto for Southern Living, Martha Stewart Living, and the many other titles we've never heard of and will never read. Unless these magazines start incorporating pornography in some way, they're forever doomed to simply fill the space between Hustler and Field and Stream.

We'll give the local sports team mugs and t-shirts a pass. In the era of online shopping, you should never have to buy an ill-fitting shirt from your local gas station, but maybe you were invited to watch the game at your buddy's place and didn't want to feel left out. But, why are there so many Nascar-themed items, from t-shirts to bobble heads to vanity plates, sold in gas stations? Is the idea here that you've got fast cars on the mind because you're filling up your Toyota Camry with some of that premium unleaded? Though a mere $25 for a Jeff Gordon t-shirt sounds like a steal to us, we think we'll pass.

It makes sense that the kind of people who buy baby clothes at the gas station are also the kind of people who want their kids to wear only the best in cheeky and suggestive attire. We aren't sure where the trend of sexual innuendo printed on baby onesies came from, but it seems that they have the gas station baby clothes market cornered.

If we wanted to purchase statues crafted from seashells or birdhouses shaped like mascots from local sports teams, we wouldn't buy them at a gas station. People who are into that sort of thing already have stores specially designed for people who like to buy useless crap that other people made. Entire towns in New England have their economies built on shops that sell things like this. Get these wildlife scenes painted on tree bark out of here so we can make room for more energy drinks, damn it.

Ever since McDonalds got into the premium caffinated drink game, everyone else has followed suit. It used to be that you had two gas station caffeine options: coffee and that weird sugary french vanilla glop. Lately it seems like every gas station is offering the same specialty drinks as your local bohemian coffee shop. Of course, their version of the drink tastes nothing like "pumpkin" nor "spice" nor "lattè." If you are truly fiending for a carmel macchiato, remember that even in the middle of nowhere you are never more than twenty miles away from a Starbucks.

"Looks like I'm having trouble reading. I'd better head over to the gas station and take care of this." We've always struggled to understand why the most low rent stores imaginable tend to have a a spinning display of reading glasses. We should be thankful that their aren't cut-rate glasses marketed to near-sighted folks: the last thing the world needs is gas stations selling "driving glasses."

If the gas station in question is near hunting grounds, we totally get it. Camouflage has transcended the practical use for hunters and outdoorsmen and become a national fashion trend. Just as trendy boutiques are the center of high-end women's fashion, national camouflage fashion takes its cues from Wal-Mart and gas stations. At local gas stations you'll find creative takes on camouflage you never thought you would see. Adventurous gas stations may even carry camo socks or fake jewel encrusted pink camouflage bandannas. If you want to be on the front lines of haute camo, we suggest you take a trip to the nearest truck stop.

Trying to buy one of these is a rite of passage. Every kid who isn't named Michael or Ashley has to dig through the racks of these things and feel the disappointing sting of failing to find their name [Author's Note: this is especially terrible if your name is close to, but not, "Brandon"].

How did children keep their keys straight in style before these novelty key chains were sold? Previous generations really did have it rough.

This one goes beyond the level of absurd into the just plain dangerous. Selling items that, if put to their intended use, could blow up the building they're being sold in doesn't seem like good business to us. Thankfully, this is America, and in America we should have the right to buy fireworks wherever we want regardless of common sense.

It seems that gas stations are a hot-bed of American racism. Confederate flag paperweights, t-shirts that say "Welcome to America, Speak English or Get Out," and fake "immigrant hunting permits" like the one pictured above can be found in gas stations all over our great country. We understand that products like these appeal to a certain demographic (you know, like racists), but why is it okay to sell this stuff in gas stations, when partisan political gear would be almost unthinkable? We look forward to the day when we can pro-gay, pro-environment, and pro-diversity t-shirts and mugs in gas stations that aren't in Vermont.

Who decided that the only places that would sell bongs outside of headshops and hippie-run bookstores would be Spencer's Gifts and gas stations? We also love the obligatory "for tobacco use only" signs plastered on the display cases for these things. Yeah, if there's one thing that teens are getting into these days, it's smoking tobacco as fancifully as possible.

Sometimes you just need a smoke. We get it. But, we're pretty sure no one's ever said "I just need a ridiculous, glowing Bob Marley lighter to light this cigarette." With the exception of lottery tickets, novelty lighters might be the biggest waste of money in the gas station. If you are trying to impress people with the design on your lighter, it's time to rethink some life choices.

"Yeah, can I get a pack of menthols, a half-dozen donuts, and an appropriated Native American symbol please?" If you've ever been on a road trip in the South or the West, you've probably seen ridiculous, oversized dreamcatchers for sale in gas stations. It would be one thing if they were made on local reservations and sales benefited indiginous peoples who happen to live nearby. Instead, they are usually plastered with pictures of wolves and horses you see on those awful tie-dye t-shirts and are made in China.

We love America as much as the next guy, but is there ever a patriotic t-shirt emergency? There are roughly three days a year when you need a patriotic shirt to fit in, and you can always find one in the back of your closet. Maybe these shirts are for people who get struck with patriotic fervor out of the blue. Maybe they are addicted to American freedoms like the rest of us are addicted to caffeine and nicotine. Whatever the reason, we hope that they continue to buy t-shirts featuring bald eagles against a background of American Flags and lightning bolts, because that is how all of our countrymen should symbolize the principles this great country was founded upon.