I’m fascinated by the proliferation of ‘vaping’ stores in the suburbs and their degree-zero aesthetics — cheap digital-print banners lashed up over derelict signs and the like. This kind of business neatly bundles up a lot of big trends: precarious/ephemeral entrepreneurialism, low barriers to entry (capital, educational, vocational), leftover gearhead-ism in a world without garages (just carports, neighborhood covenants, and no one can fix their own cars or invent their own hobbies or sports anymore), consumer-gizmo otaku, and of course the great working-class hobby — hanging out and smoking cigarettes. Every one of these stores will eke its way along and then fail as e-cigs are rationalized: legitimated, centralized, monetized mechanisms for distributing drugs.