In so many ways it’s good that memories fade as time passes. The hurt of a break-up, the embarrassment of losing your skirt onstage, the bitterness of rejection from a school or a job you really wanted—all fade into the tapestry of our long-term memory as we move on in life. But every year I manage to forget that attempting to go to the grocery store between the Monday before Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day is enough to drive the most angelic among us to insanity (and I'm not one of them, so I get there a lot quicker), and every year I am reminded anew of the horror as I innocently make another weekly trip to the store and realize that the Season of Angst Irritation Exploding Headaches Joy has begun again.
I am not a patient person. I am not an overly tolerant person. I realize I lose a lot of karma points for this, but I figure I get at least ½ point back for admitting it and not trying to rationalize and justify why I’m that way. I’m generally amazed the level of Stupid present in the world, and for some reason this is never more true during the crowded holiday season. I know there’s a few more Scrooges out there like me (who just won’t admit it publicly), so I’m offering some shopping tips to help the Holidays be a little more Happy for all of us:
1. You are not allowed to sit with your blinker on, with your big-ass (literally) truck hanging out in the throughway in front of HEB blocking THREE lanes of traffic, waiting on someone who has not even started unloading her groceries yet, because you are too lazy to take the spot that is four more spaces down. I’m annoyed with you. Everyone else is annoyed with you. Santa has put you on his naughty list, and you’ve lost more karma points than even I have. I’m too nice to actually say this to your face (though I do daydream about it) so I’m just going to yell at you in my car like a good little American with road rage, and then write this blog.
2. Make a list. Do not stand in a crowed aisle staring at the shelf trying to decide what you need. It’s a grocery store. You’ve seen it all before. Get what you need and move it along.
3. Do no bring all of your screaming children to the grocery store.* I realize it’s too late to make an investment in birth control, but consider that for the future. In the meantime, invest in a babysitter. (Yes, I realize that children are necessary to the propagation of society and that I should be more tolerant of them. But I’m less interested in the propagation of society than I am in once, just once, leaving a grocery store without a splitting headache.)
*Please don’t email me and berate me for my lack of sensitivity towards children. In all reality I know I just have to deal with them, so please allow me the release of at least complaining about it on (my) blog (that I pay for).
4. 10 Items or Less means….10 Items or Less. If you have 20 yogurt cups, that’s still 20 items, because they all have to be scanned and bagged. I realize we’re in the midst of an education crisis in this country, but I assume you have mastered 1st grade math. Those of us who parked 5 miles away so as not to block traffic, made a list so we wouldn’t block the aisles, didn’t bring screaming children along, and are now standing in the 10 Items or Less line with 5 items (that’s less than 10—see how that works?) deserve to get out of this store as fast as possible. (And frankly, if you’re buying a lot of produce, I think each item should count as 2 because the cashier has to weigh it and look up every single code. So to the man in front of me at the HEB at Bandera and 410 last night who had 10 produce items and 20 yogurt cups: I’m really really upset with you.)
5. On the flip side, if you only have one item, that SO doesn’t mean you get to cut in front of everyone else and go first! I can’t think of a single plausible reason why you shouldn’t have to stand in line because you’re only buying one thing. I might make an exception if impending death or voluminous blood loss is involved, but in that case groceries really shouldn’t be your top priority anyway. I paid my dues in this line, and you’ll have to do the same.
