Columnist John Katsilometes: This trend is mired in the cards

Monday, Sept. 25, 2000 | 9:31 a.m.

John Katsilometes is the Sun features editor. His column appears Mondays. Reach him at kats@lasvegassun.com or 259-2327.

The woman at the counter asked for my card, as she always does. I slipped it out of my wallet and pushed it toward her, flashing the yellow Blockbuster logo.

She swiped it through the electronic card-swiping device and frowned.

"This isn't right," she said, turning the card over and glaring at it. "Wrong card."

Or, right card, wrong business. I was at the gym. Unless I wanted to possibly rent "Perfect," the Blockbuster card was of no use in this place. I fished around, finally dumping the contents of my overstuffed billfold onto the counter. I found my gym card pinned between my insurance card and Buffalo Wrestling Foundation Fan Club membership card.

I've got so many cards I can't remember where I got all of them. I have a Venetian players' club card and I know danged well I never went to the Venetian and requested this thing. Maybe Sheldon accidentally dropped it after poker night. Whatever, it's never been used and still in its carrying case. I'll auction it off on e-bay someday.

Years ago qualifying for any form of plastic proof of membership was something special. Remember your first library card? With your name stamped indelibly in space-age plastic? I used to flash that thing around like I was Joe Friday -- just the Hardy Boys, ma'am.

The only reason I joined the Archie Press Club (since been expelled, sadly) was because every member was issued an Official Archie Press Club membership card. What sort of actual authority this piece of plastic afforded the carrier was irrelevant; it was quite the conversation piece in tree houses across the land, where little Bobby Woodward would ceaselessly browbeat his crooked little friends.

Possession of a card used to be a way of gauging the carrier's dedication to an organization or cause. The most egregious allegation to come from the McCarthy '50s (and I know, I was there) was to be a card-carrying member of the Communist Party. In 1988 it wasn't enough that Michael Dukakis was a member of the ACLU; he was a card-carrying member of the ACLU!

The man's militant, I tell you! He even has a card!

Now, no big deal. They give you cards for everything. Checking into a hotel. Joining a golf club. Attending a convention. Getting a haircut. Shopping. Especially shopping.

It's rattling to get caught without your shopping card at the check stand. I have a Vons card (as well as a Smith's card and a Costco card I would burn if I could ever get the bugger lit), but I never seem to have it on my person. So every time I go on a Twinkie-and-Fanta run I'm interrogated by an agitated cashier.

"Do you have a Vons card?" she asks.

"Oh, yes. I'm a card-carrying member," I say, beginning the futile self pat-down in a harried effort to save 19 cents on a 12-pack of Irish Spring.

Behind me, I sense customers fuming, "Oh, he's not one of us."

But I keep collecting. The other day I was at the pet store buying a $250 scratching post (don't ask) and the woman asked, "Would you like to sign up for a Petco ... "

"Card? Absolutely!"

Maybe I'm an addict, a cardoholic. I'm a card-carrying cardoholic.