Tag Archives: grocery store

Thanks! Have a great day!

I was at the grocery store the other day, and after the cashier gave me the receipt and handed me my bags, she looked at me, she smiled and said, “Have a great day!” And I wanted to be like, excuse me, but don’t tell me what to do, OK? Why don’t you concentrate on your day? You want to have a great day? Fine. But how about just leaving me alone with my day, to do with it as I see fit?

And so, fuck that lady, bossing me around, I had the shittiest day ever. I went home and left my groceries out on the table for the whole day. The milk got warm, I had to throw the whole gallon out, the ice cream melted, my dog wound up jumping on top of the kitchen table to lick everything up. It was chocolate ice cream, and so of course he got really sick.

I had to call in to work, “Hey boss, my dog just ate a bunch of chocolate ice cream, so I have to take him to the vet,” and my boss was like, “Listen Rob, you can’t keep calling out like this so last minute. What am I supposed to do this late in the day? It’s way past time where I could’ve gotten someone else to take your shift.”

So I got fired, yep, my day was taking a sharp turn south. I got to the vet and my dog, he was like collapsing, I kept having to prop him upright just so he could take another few steps, and then it was the same thing, collapse, throw up, cough, prop up, walk. Finally we got to the office and the vet told me, “I don’t know that there’s much we can do right now,” and right as he said that, standing there scratching his chin, my dog dropped dead.

Totally not a good day. And the vet told me, “Look, I’m really sorry, but it’s going to cost two hundred bucks to dispose of the body,” and I was like, “Are you kidding me? I don’t have two hundred bucks,” to which he said, “Well, how were you planning on paying me today if your dog wound up surviving? Nothing here costs less than two hundred bucks.” And I didn’t like being talked down to like that, so I said, “Oh yeah? Nothing? Well what about those,” I was pointing to this display of leashes and collars that he had by the door.

“I was talking about medicine, treatment. That stuff over there costs twenty, thirty bucks, depending on the leash.” I said, “Nice try doc, you said nothing. You weren’t specific.” And so I hoisted the dog’s body over my shoulder, I threw a twenty on his desk and grabbed a new collar on the way out.

It took three black garbage bags to hold the dog without ripping the plastic, but I got him in there, that and the new leash I bought for him post-mortem. Everything was settling in, the dog, he being dead, me throwing away twenty bucks to prove a point. I had a lot of trouble carrying the bag to the park, and when I finally managed to get it inside one of the public trashcans, some Parks Department employee came running over, “Hey! You can’t dump that here!”

So I took off, I got back to my house, and, never having cleaned up any of that milk or melted ice cream, the whole place stunk. I don’t know how the flies got in so fast, but they were all over it, the spill, the rest of the groceries. I couldn’t find a mop so I got some old newspaper I found in the basement to sop everything up. But the newspaper print bled, the paper wasn’t absorbent, I just wound up making more of a mess than I had in the first place.

Eventually I just gave up, fuck this, the whole dog thing was really starting to weigh on me. I felt like I needed to cry but I couldn’t muster up the emotion necessary to really have any relief, it was just a ball of misery sitting right under my throat. Finally I decided that I’d better eat something, so I went back to the grocery store to get some bread, I’d make some peanut butter and jelly or something.

“Thanks a lot!” it was the same cashier ringing me up again, I couldn’t believe it. “Have a great night!” and I took the bag, I looked her right in the eye and said, “The fuck you just say to me?”

So you know what I did?

The other day I was driving in my car when this guy totally cut me off in an exit ramp on the Grand Central Parkway. Traffic wasn’t even that bad. I was maybe ten, eleven cars back, waiting for my turn to get off. And yes, of course I considered coasting along the left side of all of the other waiting cars, cutting in front right at the last second. There was plenty of room, and cops never pull drivers over on the Grand Central Parkway. But I waited my turn. And right when I was on deck, this guy comes out of nowhere and noses in front of me, very aggressively, looking back at me to make eye contact, like saying, “What are you going to do about it, huh?”

So you know what I did? I gave him a big smile and waved him through, as if to say, “Go for it, friend. Please, help yourself to my spot.” Because, who am I to get angry? Maybe this guy just got fired from his job. Maybe he was a professional driver, but his boss called him in to the office today, he was like, “Listen, you’re a nice guy and everything, but this isn’t working out. You’re too soft on the road. We need someone a little more assertive. Sorry, but you’re fired.” And this guy’s driving home, he’s thinking, I’m not soft behind the wheel, I’m very assertive, aggressive even. And then he cuts me off and he looks at me and, what? What is he expecting?

So that’s me, giving him a thumbs up, I’m telling him through my body language, “Yeah man. You tell ‘em. I can’t believe your boss incorrectly pegged you as the passive type. You. You, my friend, are most certainly one of the stronger drivers I’ve encountered on the road. And that’s saying something, because I’m driving a lot. Let me tell you something, the way you saw that six inch gap open up in front of me, the attitude expressed as you inched your front bumper into a position that I was in no way capable of arguing with, that my amigo, that was some ballsy driving. In a good way.”

And then later in the evening I went to the grocery store to get something for dinner. I had a craving for Mexican food, and I always make this great sauce, you need smoked jalapenos canned in adobo, whatever that means, I found this recipe a while ago that called for smoked jalapenos in adobo. Anyway, this grocery store had just one can left. What luck, right? So I threw it in my cart and headed down the dairy aisle to pick up some eggs and milk and stuff.

But I was looking at expiration dates, making sure everything was fresh, when I noticed this lady kind of shadowing behind me. It was weird enough that I was definitely picking up some strange vibes, but not entirely noticeable that I’d necessarily call her out. Besides, I had no idea of her intentions, if anything, it was my fault that I’d automatically assume something negative going on. But unfortunately, my instincts proved correct, because while I was opening up a carton of eggs to test the strength of each shell, I caught this lady in the corner of my eye reach into my basket and snatch my can of peppers.

By the time my mind registered what was actually happening, she had already shuffled half an aisle down, her head turned back just enough so I could make eye contact with her left eye, and without saying anything, I could read her, she was telling me, “Go ahead and say something. You want to make a scene? Let’s make a scene. I’m crazy enough to steal groceries out of your cart. You think I won’t scream? Or throw stuff? Try me.”

You know what I did? I flashed her a big smile, almost like I was in the middle of a good natured, sincere laugh. I opened my hands and raised them in the air while I shrugged my shoulders, almost like saying, “You got me! Yep, you certainly got me, you devil you,” and then I made a mock-squinty face, wagging my finger at her, like, “Oh you, I see you, but you got me!” because, why am I going to get so upset? Over peppers? She obviously needed those peppers, or at least wanted them more enough than I did, because I’d never steal groceries out of someone else’s basket, not unless I had a really good reason. Maybe she had a really good reason. Maybe her dad grew those peppers. Maybe those peppers were his most prized peppers, out of all of the other peppers he’d ever grown. And maybe when he wasn’t looking, the farm owners came over and harvested everything and put them in cans with adobo sauce, and he came running home to his daughter and was like, “Honey, you saved the big ones, right? My prized peppers? When they came for the harvest, tell me you saved my favorite peppers!” and she didn’t know what to say, she knew how much her dad loved those peppers, and seeing the pain it caused him, watching this once proud man fall to his knees, weeping like a child, she had no other choice than to follow the chain of production, to buy back every single can of peppers that she could get her hand on. Surely if she could present her father with all of those cans, he’d see how sorry she was, that maybe one of those peppers was in one of those cans, somewhere, somehow.

And that’s why I stood there in the aisle, still fake laughing at that lady, like I was telling her, “No need to be so sneaky, I’m not mad at all. Please, help yourself to anything you need. Can I help you with anything else? Maybe I have some old cans tucked away in the back of my pantry. Might those be of any help? Can I help you carry your bags to the car? Do you need me to find other cans of peppers in different groceries? I could ask the manager if they have any stocked away in the back.”

But she still looked really suspicious, still shuffling toward the register, still with that one left eye trained on my general vicinity. I couldn’t possibly know what she was going through, no more than she could know about me, about how while I was doing my best to let her know that I was OK, I lost the grip in my left hand, that carton of eggs, it slipped just a little bit, and I caught it, but the carton jolted slightly, and one egg fell out, it was open after all, I was checking all of the eggs, I don’t know why, it’s something my mother taught me as a little kid that you’re supposed to do when you buy eggs, and so this one egg fell right at my feet, egg everywhere, on both shoes, on my left pant leg, and I was just standing there shrugging and grinning and throwing my other hand in the air, like, “Whoops! What a klutz! Right? I can’t believe I dropped that egg on my shoe. Clean up on aisle six! Please, I’m fine, I can handle this. Give me the mop. I’d like to be the one to take care of this mess. No it’s fine, I insist. If this is the worst thing that happens to me today, then I’ll be A-OK, I’ll be in great shape, just terrific!”

The Candy Aisle

I was at the grocery store the other day and I when I got to the checkout, for some reason, I don’t know why, I turned my head to the side, right at that wall of candy they always put next to every cashier. That’s so lame, what a cheap trick. It’s like, we’re already shopping at your store because, well, we have to. This is where we get food. And we’re just trying to do our thing, get our meat and veggies, our bread and juice and milk, whatever, take the money. But then we have to wait on line and get taunted by candy?

And I can’t even imagine what that’s got to be like for a mom or a dad, like if they’re raising little kids and can’t find somebody to watch them while they get the grocery shopping done. I remember being a little kid myself, I would be super bored having to walk through the whole grocery store with my mom, not watching TV, not playing with any of my action figures or Legos.

And once you finally get close to the end, you’re on line to check out, this time the waiting is worse, because you have to stare at this whole wall of candy taunting you, it’s saying, “Hey buddy, why don’t you ask your mom if you can buy some of us? We’re so tasty and sweet! Come on do it!” and you’re like, “Hey Mom. Mom? Mom. Mom! Mom! Mom!” and she’s like, “What? What is it?” and you’re like, “Mom. Can I get some candy?” And she’s like, “How many times do I have to tell you to stop asking me to buy candy? We’re not buying any candy!”

And then you look back at the candy, at those sugar covered peach rings and Skittles and giant peanut looking pink gummy things, and you’re like, “Sorry guys, my mom said no.” But they don’t stop. They start giggling, taunting, you’re thinking, what’s so funny? Are they laughing at me? They say, “No, we’re not laughing at you. We’re laughing because it’s so simple, just pick us up, put us on the conveyor belt. Your mom’s not going to see. And then after she pays, just take us out of the shopping bag and bring us up to your bedroom.”

So you look to your mom, she’s counting coupons or helping bag the groceries and you think, yeah, maybe I can get away with it. Maybe I’ll just go for the Sour Patch Watermelons here, and as long as the cashier slides them into the bag before … “Hey!” your mom saw you moving your arm toward the candy, “Don’t even think about it!”

And that’s the end of that. But I’m an adult now, I’m a man. I was at that grocery store the other day, I looked at that wall for the first time in I don’t know how long, and I heard the candy again, they were like, “Rob! What the hell man? You’re an adult now! You’re a man! You can buy all of us! Come on dude, don’t be such a pansy, buy every single one of us, go home, open all the bags at once, and start eating until you throw up. Do it! We’re not fucking around here!”

So I was like, all right, all right, I’m going to buy some candy. It was weird though, it all looked so much brighter and better when I was a little kid. None of this stuff was even name brand, it was all just random loose candy in a generic plastic pouch, nothing even had any labels on it, it was like these grocery people bought the stuff in bulk and put it out for sale in cheap-o individual packets.

And while, yes, the selection was huge, when you go to inspect just what’s available for purchase, it’s all kind of weird stuff. Like one of the bags were these individually wrapped colorless, clear hard candies. With no label, I couldn’t figure out what they’d taste like. I took the bag and brought it close to my face, seeing if the individual labels might not provide a hint. They said, “menthol.” That was it, menthol. What the hell is that? Isn’t that a cigarette flavor? It’s like, it’s not mint, but it’s cold like mint, and that’s it. What kind of a psychopath buys a whole bag of plain menthol hard candies?

I was getting a little freaked out, so I went for a trusted classic, some sour gummy worms. At least, I though it was a trusted classic. I got home and opened them up, they didn’t really taste like sour gummy worms. They tasted like cotton candy. Not even. They tasted like cotton candy flavored bubble gum. And the consistency was all off. Instead of being like chewy and gummy, they were soft and gooey, like fruit snacks, like a really warm fruit roll-up.

But I still ate the whole thing. And now my mouth hurts. It’s all dry. I drank like three glasses of water but it didn’t quench the thirst, it just made me overly full and nauseous. I went online and started searching, seeing if there wasn’t anything that might help alleviate my discomfort. “Try some menthol hard candies!” it said, and I was like, no fucking way, this ends right now. But the next time I was at the grocery store, I turned toward that candy wall, and the menthol candies started screaming out to me, they were talking in this hoarse old-lady voice, “Come on Rob! You know you’re going to do it! Don’t make me ask twice, because I’m in your head now, get ready, it’s all menthol for you from here on out! Pucker up baby!”