Most non-homosexual men hate shopping. That said, if/when I’m forced to actually go shopping, I normally sneak out of the house before the Wife knows I’m gone; I only go shopping for the essentials, not the Apocalypse. This day, however, I’ve been caught, and as expected, she has a “few things” she wants me to get. As she hands me her “list,” a 3″ x 4″ sticky note with about 400 items microscopically crammed/scrawled on it using hearts, loops and curly-Q’s, I can’t help but complain; I feel like I’ve been ambushed.
“I’m only going for essentials, Wife, chocolate pudding, sour-bomb pops, not all this crap,” I moan.
“All this crap is essentials. We’re out of everything.”
She remains remarkably calm in the face of such stoic protest. I find the Boy and ask him if he wants to come with me and he runs away, shrieking in horror. As the Boy frolics away, I admire my handi-work, then I’m off to the grocery store.
When I get there, I grab a cart and go through all the usual BS, and of course one of the wheels on my cart is loose and spinning and makes a loud, steady clack as I push it over the tiled-floor. People who weren’t already staring at me are doing so now, like their carts are perfect. While any grocery store has a multitude of negatives for me to hone in on, one strikes me more than the others: By now, shouldn’t chickens have evolved to lay their young in something more sturdy than an eggshell?
After lapping the store in marathon fashion, I get to the check-out area and, of course, the place is packed and there are only three cashiers. I spot a line that isn’t too long and push my noise-maker into it. When I get there, the little fat, four-eyed cashier (sorry if that sounds harsh, but it’s very accurate) tells me: “This is the express lane; 12 items or less,” and she points to a white, letter-size sheet of paper hanging about 12 feet above her register, as if it’s a billboard, with “Express Lane: 12 Items or Less” printed on it, in 14-point font.
Now, I used to work at a grocery store and there was an unwritten code that you couldn’t point things out like this to the customer, but instead waited until they left so you could make fun of them behind their back. Since when did things change?
“I didn’t see the sign,” I protest. “It’s hanging too high and you can barely make it out.”
She gave me a “patronistic,” little sorry-smirk and went back to ringing up her customer. I momentarily debated whether or not I should invoke my “Customer is Always Right” privileges or just empty the contents of my buggy into 5 separate buggies, with 12 items in each, but quickly decide against both. I also imagined myself grabbing the floor-care guy’s mop and playing cabbage-ball with her head.
I pushed my cart into the next line and casually thumbed through an US magazine, to show her I wasn’t embarrassed, insulted or overcome with a sudden urge to violently assault her with a can of biscuits. She returned to ringing up her customer and, based on their body language, I can tell the customer has made a comment about me; she’d better watch her back, too. As my new cashier begins ringing me up, I can’t help but notice how slow she moves. She grabs each item, o-n-e-a-t-a-t-i-m-e, gives it a quick once-over, scans the serving/cooking suggestions to see if she can serve/cook it, mouth such, then places it into a bag behind her. I watch her with an exaggerated look of amusement on my face, as a subtle way of saying “you move slow.” Apparently, her entire body is infected with slow, because she doesn’t catch on to what I’m doing, even after she looks at me and nods an empty, generic greeting. After sizing up this situation, I figure out this girl has no motivation to move faster. Maybe if the conveyor belt on her register worked, like the one at the grocery store I used to work at, she’d move a little faster. Back then, those who were sloth were quickly snuffed out, exposed and exterminated (with great prejudice , might I add); if you failed to move faster than the conveyor belt you worked behind, you could end up on the business-end of a nasty pile of spilled groceries. I recall one slacker goofing around one-too-many times and having a frozen head of cabbage drop on his foot, breaking it right in half.
I quickly pay for my items and exit, before I get into trouble. If I’m banned from the store, I can’t come back and exact revenge. Remember “Hubba Bubba” chewing/bubble gum and the commercials with the cowboy?
