Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Ack! Grocery Store Hell Week

Don't go! Don't do it! Unless you were smart enough to have bought your frozen turkey and all the trimmings weeks ago ... don't even think about doing your grocery shopping the week of Thanksgiving!

I bumped into ten people and nearly took somebody's shoe off with my cart. Then, two old ladies stood and chatted like they were talking in their backyard over the fence, hogging up the cereal aisle until I wanted to take somebody's head off next. Two babies were screaming their vocal chords out! (For God sake, do the rest of us a favor and find a babysitter. And if you can't -- stay home!) The last thing I need to hear is a two-year old throwing a hissy fit while I'm trying to find the last ten things on my grocery list!

People push their grocery carts like they drive their cars, with absolutely no care and concern about who's behind them. By the time I was through getting the last thing on my list, I was ready to take a life.

But that wasn't the worst part. I stood a half hour in the check out line while my friendly Southern cashier gabbed with every one of her customers about their purchases and how to make a good turkey. The three ladies in front of me had carts full to overflowing and every last damn one of them wrote a check. They're not smart enough to make out the check ahead of time; they wait until the clerk says, "That'll be $152.37." Then they start digging in their purse to find their checkbook. What's worse is if it's an old lady with a shaky hand that can't write but one letter every five seconds. Or maybe she writes it for the even dollar amount then picks nickels and pennies out of her change purse for the change amount. Then you wait another five minutes for the check to "clear." All while they record their check and subtract it from the balance. And lastly, the slow as molasses customer reviews the tape to make sure they got the 30 cents off their eggs and that the cashier only charged them $3.50 for coffee instead of $4.75.

For cryin' out loud, why don't people use their debit cards, or pay cash? By the time the cashier got to me, I said, "I'm having pizza for Thanksgiving, all this stuff is for somebody else, and I don't care how you bake your turkey." She didn't say another word. I smiled, paid her the exact amount in cash, and tipped the Salvation Army bell ringer on the way out.

I swore I would never do it again, wait until two days before Thanksgiving to go grocery shopping. And that was all last year.

Here I am this year, two days before turkey day, and I'm off to the store again! If you hear about a crazy woman that got arrested for running her grocery cart into every idiot that blocked her way in Walmart, that would be me.

Blessings to you and yours.

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