I also hate the new novel I'm attempting to write and am avoiding looking into field trips or dealing with the mysterious maggot-laden bags that I found in the basement and threw outside into the yard, so it's Blog Time.
Grocery Shopping!
I think when I was about eight or ten or so, grocery shopping was fun. You have a list and you go on a quest through the store to buy all the right items at the right prices. You get to push the items around in a big cart that you can get going and jump onto and ride down the aisle. Also, I don't think I was allowed to accompany my mother to the grocery store until I was an older child, so it carried an air of grown-upness that is always appealing when you're not a grown-up.
Sometimes, we even went to this awesome grocery store that took your bags of groceries and sent them outside for you. You'd pull your car around to the side of the building and your groceries would come out in paper bags on a conveyor belt. Then someone would help put them in the car. It was super cool.
Grocery Shopping...
Fast forward to being an adult. I am now responsible for making a list of what to buy - and I frequently don't make one. I default to buying the same foods again, and again, and again. I can always use an onion. I always drink milk. Must have Diet Coke. I become familiar with grocery store layouts, able to hunt down cooking wine and peanut butter. I start to memorize prices of items.
Hannaford has always been one of my favorites because they don't put 6000 items on sale every week or have ridiculous activities like "Mix and Match! Buy 10 of these 25 different items and get them all for $2 each!" ... I invariably wind up buying 9 items and paying full price. Grocery shopping is already complicated, and I'm always in a rush, and I have to time to fulfill quests.
I get my groceries in a slew of plastic bags that rip before I can get the groceries into my house. Some bored-looking teenager puts the cans on top of my bread and we have weird-shaped sandwiches all week. I save the plastic bags that don't rip and they fill half my hall closet.
Grocery Shopping with Things and Baby
One of the first things I did as a newly-minted housewife was organize the coupon holders that The Husband got me for my birthday. I also started keeping a notepad on the fridge where I write the items we run out of or are running low on, so I have to make fewer substitutions in recipes. I feel confident and capable.
Then I go shopping with Thing 1, Thing 2, and the Baby.
It turns out every child, including Things 1 and 2, wants to ride the cart up and down the aisles. And if they don't ride it, they try to push it and run into little old ladies or grouchy men, or hit the shelves and send food flying everywhere. They also argue -
"I want to pull the number at the deli counter!"
"I hate that kind of Pop-Tarts!"
"It's my turn to ride the cart!"
"He said I smell!"
"Why does she always get to put the onion dip in the cart!?"
Then Baby gets fed up with sitting still and starts pulling items out of the back of the cart and eating them - "No! Not the box of rice! Here, try this green onion!" - or throwing them on the floor - "Now we have to buy a bruised apple!" - and screaming when you take away the jar he was about to throw to the floor.
Oh, and those belts they put on the seats? Those do not contain a small wriggling child. He stands up in that seat faster than you can say:
"Grocery Shopping Sucks!"
It's not my favorite task, that's for sure.
But today we needed milk (like always) and muffins (like always) and also a lemon, so Baby and I went to this new Big Y and I was wandering around trying to make sense of their sales. Is the unit price of 3 Danimals Six Packs-for-$6 cheaper than the unit price in a 12-pack? Why don't they have a generic soy sauce?
Since I'm an experienced shopper, we found all the items (soy sauce is with Asian; cooking wine is in baking; rice vinegar is in the aisle labeled Vinegar), and made it through the jungle without maiming anyone or overspending.
...And then I get to the checkout and they handed me a gold coin along with a flyer explaining what you can do with a gold coin. I'm a nice person on the outside so I said nothing, but on the inside I had some not-so-nice thoughts about what the folks who run with Big Y should do with their gold coins. Now I have to keep track of gold coins on top of everything else?!
They also have a slot machine game that you can play to win a reusable bag. I did not participate.
I'm going to start sending my children in to do grocery shopping while I wait in the car reading a book. I'll just tell them it's a treasure hunt. They'll be thrilled with the gold coins and they can practice their reading and math skills.
 |
| Srsly? |
No comments:
Post a Comment