Failing At Shoplifting, Life With Kesha

As Jezebel reported today, music-minus-melody person Kesha got caught trying to shoplift a stuffed dinosaur out of the Museum of Natural History in LA. (Wasn’t she once Ke$ha? I couldn’t make up something that marvelous, right?) Jez got the story, naturally, from the “on it!” folks at TMZ.

Kesha was at the museum Saturday for a wedding. On her way out she went to the gift store with her assistant and admired a faux T-Rex. She held the 3-ft tall critter in her hand and walked out of the store.
On her way to the car security stopped them and asked them what was up with the prehistoric beast. Each said they thought the other paid and apologized for the misunderstanding. Kesha forked over the dinosaur and left.
Problem is … it was covered in glitter, so it had to endure a dino-wash … not sure you can resell that.

We must assume the glitter was sent to Kesha by an enemy for $9.99. Anyway, the “Oops, sorry, I totally thought I had paid for that” excuse stops working when you’re ten. Unless you’re a celeb, I guess.

My favorite shoplifting/petty theft scenes in pop culture comes from the sublime Empire Records. The movie begins with one of the music store’s loyal employees taking the contents of the register to Atlantic City to see if he can turn that dough into enough bread to save the business. When he fails, losing everything, he muses, “I wonder if I’ll be held responsible for this.”

Later Joe, his boss, asks him what happened to the money, leading to this priceless exchange:

“Where’s my money?”
“Joe, the money’s gone.”
“I know it’s gone. Where’s it gone to?”
“Atlantic City.”
“What’s it doing in Atlantic City?”
“Recirculating.”

But he’s not the bad guy. The bad guy, at least for a while, is “Warren,” the shoplifter who swipes a bunch of CDs (“rap, metal, rap, metal, Whitney Houston”) before getting collared by the resourceful staff.

Other properties with great shoplifting / petty theft scenes include “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” High Fidelity, Reality Bites (she’s totally stealing from her parents with that whole gas card thing), the Julie Christie movie Darling, and that early supermarket scene from Franzen’s the Corrections when Chip slips frozen steaks down the legs of his pants.

Please share your best shoplifting or attempted shoplifting stories! Did you get off as easy as Kesha? Or has your experience of small-time thieving been relegated to books and movies, like mine?

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