Grocery Store

Why do I always get the shopping cart at the grocery store with the bad wheel? I don't know, maybe all the carts have bad wheels.

Monday I had a cart that would not make right turns. I had to "muscle-slide" the cart through right-hand turns, and the fuller the cart got the more grunting came from me.

Being a decent cook, and being someone who loves to eat, you'd think that I would enjoy the grocery store. Roaming the aisles searching for inspirational ingredients to create a great meal. Nah, it's nothing like that.

Groceries are so expensive these days that we make a very well-organized list to ensure that we get everything we need and nothing more. The trip to the grocery store is more of a mission, with plenty of obstacles along the way.

We have the luxury of being able to go for groceries during none peak hours, on none peak days. If I had to go to the grocery store on a Saturday morning I think I'd just run away screaming. I've seen it. It's scary. It gets so full they actually run out of parking spots.

But even on a Monday at 10 a.m., the store is quite full. Aisles are crowded and blocked. It's an adventure just trying to get the cart from one end of the aisle to the other. For Christmas I'd like Santa to bring me a shopping cart with rubber bumpers, perfect skateboard wheels, and a loud horn that I can blow at will to clear the aisles.

My main function is to pack the cart neatly so we can fit everything into it. Also I try my best to stay out of everyone else's way. Now it doesn't seem like anyone else is concerned whether they're in others way, as they park their cart on an angle across the aisle and read the ingredients on a can of soup for half an hour.

That's when I need that horn!

Barb is the master of the list and she carefully picks out everything we need. We build a two week menu before we go to the store, and build our grocery list from that.

I park the cart in rare open areas and warn Barb if she's about to get run over my someone in a speeding cart.

"Heads up Barb!" I yell.

Every time we go to the store we forget one thing, never two things, but always one. I think that's a pretty darn good percentage though.

Checkout is an exercise in craziness. There are 64 checkout lanes, but only four are ever open. Each open checkout lane is at least three people/carts deep. When it's finally our turn everything I carefully packed into the cart is quickly whipped out onto the conveyor belt. The conveyor is wide where I place the items and then narrows near the cashier, intelligently planned to crush all your products just as your about to pay for them.

The bag boys are monkeys, tossing everything into bags inconsiderately while paying attention to everything but what they're doing. On Monday I gave our bag monkey a big "GOOD MORNING!" with a smile, and I swear I got nothing but a grunt in return.

The gal at the cashier hated her job. She didn't say that. But it was clearly written all over her face.

The store for me is pack, pack, pack the cart. Then it's unpack, unpack, unpack the cart at the cashier. Then it's pack, pack, pack the bags back into the cart. Then it's unpack, unpack, unpack the bags from the cart into the car. Then it's drive, drive, drive home. And finally it's unpack, unpack, unpack the bags from the car into the kitchen.

Then I fall over into the La-Z-Boy and Barb takes over from there.

Another grocery day in the bag.