Not long ago, I had a near-death experience in the grocery store. I was bending over to check out Mrs. Fields’ fat grams when a woman wielding a grocery cart like it was a runaway bumper car rounded the corner on two wheels. If it weren’t for quick thinking on my part, I might have required a trip to the Crisco aisle to disengage that buggy from my body. For a second I thought I saw a bright light, but it turned out to be Register Six calling for assistance.
Later, when I got lapped in frozen foods by a gray-haired granny with a number 5 pasted on the side of her grocery cart, I could see the need for a list of safety rules posted in a conspicuous place, perhaps tattooed on Little Debbie’s left cheek. With that thought in mind, I offer 8 Simple Rules for a Successful Supermarket Experience.
1. Show proper care for your vehicle. For the safety of everyone on the floor, do not select a buggy with uncooperative steering that can be guided only by a team of Iditarod sled dogs. Also, be on the lookout for features that may interrupt the aerodynamics of the cart such as toddlers left over from a previous shopper.
2. When perusing different item choices on the supermarket floor, please be sure to park only in traditionally acceptable parking areas. Nobody cares if you set up camp in front of internal organs in the meat department, but if you pause to check the fat content in the cookie aisle, we will forcibly transport you to the dairy case and secure you to the yogurt section with string cheese.
3. Please observe crowd-friendly speed limits. I know you’re in a hurry to rush home and get those tacos on the table, but don’t careen around the corners so fast that you initiate a forceful meeting between Betty Crocker and Orville Redenbacher.
4. Practice defensive shopping. Try to remember that there are people with immediate dietary concerns that may require them to effect a sudden stop in front of you to compare chocolate chip content on the cookie aisle. Likewise, you must understand that if you stop in the middle of the aisle while trying to decide between creamy and crunchy, you are likely to become a temporary member of the fresh fruit display. Take heart in the fact that kumquats should not do any permanent damage to your complexion.
5. Please show concern for the safety of other shoppers. Do not execute a sudden lane change without at least warning the gentleman who is presently rolling his cart over the heels of your Reeboks that he may suddenly find himself neck deep in summer squash. Likewise, don’t speed up suddenly, causing the six-year-old boy who is riding below the cart in front of you like a mudflap on an tractor-trailer to wrap around your front wheel like freshly chewed bubblegum.
6. Do not accelerate like Richard Petty on the straightaway at Talledega to beat me to the Express Lane, especially if your buggy is loaded like a Conastoga and you’re counting all 24 cans of Little Friskies as one item to make the 10-item limit, and all I’m carrying is a gallon of milk, two packs of Ho Ho’s, and a box of Ben & Jerry’s that has created a layer of freezer burn up to my elbow. I have killed for less than that.
7. Remember to return your buggy to the cart corral after you load your car. You may feel justified in aiming it toward the gate and assuming it will roll downhill to the target by itself, but let me assure you that grocery carts are not domesticated animals and will take every opportunity to separate from the pack and make a break for freedom. Lassie is not available to pull the buggy from quicksand, a well, or the tailpipe of a new Jaguar that happens to be in its path. The aftermath of the ensuing chaos will involve your insurance, and this is one case when the term “deductible” might be unsetttling.
8. Most importantly, steer clear of the lady dressed in a New York Yankees T-Shirt, stretch pants, and flip flops, who is wringing her hands and doing laps with a cart that contains two boxes of Ding Dongs and a frozen pizza. It’s me and I can’t decide what to have for supper.
Laugh
Showing posts with label Crisco. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Crisco. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Seek and You Shall Fail
"Before beginning a hunt, it is wise to ask someone what you are looking for before you begin looking for it." -- Winnie the Pooh
I appreciate the earnest wisdom of Winnie the Pooh as much as the next bear of very little brain, but in all deference, what I could use is a little bit of insider information on the location of the thing I’m looking for. Here we are teetering right on top of the time of year when well-honed finding skills are of utmost importance and I couldn’t track down an Easter egg with an Indian scout and a dedicated Coonhound trained on pastels. What I need is for Microsoft to create a search function that works in my back yard.
Since the seek-fail gene is not the sort of genealogical wonder that skips a generation, my sons Ca$h and Wrongway have this happy talent splashed all over their DNA like egg dye.
My older son is 20 and, while he has no use for hen’s eggs died to match the purples and polka dots found in nature, he has a keen interest in plastic Easter eggs which are known to harbor money or crispy chocolaty goodies in their recesses. But since he is not able to get in touch with his inner GPS, this year he requested that the Easter Bunny hide his eggs in a row on the kitchen table, marked with his name and initialed by quality control. He’d have no problems if the Easter Bunny simply left a check.
You’d think this would take some of the spirit out of the Easter morning egg hunt, but it’s actually a lot less painful than squiring a twenty year old to and fro past the back gate squealing, “Look! What's that behind the third tulip from the left? No, the other left.” Meanwhile, woodland creatures are gathering behind the bushes to place bets on how many eggs stay in the yard for another year.
He did find a group of colored eggs one year. Our Golden Retriever, who never met a food based item he didn’t like, rolled all the dyed eggs into the middle of the yard and licked the Crisco off. I thought the Crisco was to make them shiny, not lend them dog appeal. That's like rubbing meat tenderizer on the cat. Son One got up Easter morning, collected eggs like a hayseed in a henhouse and went back to bed.
My other son is an ace with Easter eggs. He has a multi-sensored tracking device embedded in his brain that can secure the enemy egg’s location in a nanosecond. It’s our house that he can’t seem to locate without help. In his defense, he hasn’t had his driver’s license long enough for the plastic smell to wear off. On his way home from the mall one day, he discovered a new school. In a different county. My cell phone rang that evening and an eerily familiar voice said, “Mom, I don’t think I’m in Kansas anymore.” "Honey," I answered, calmly twisting the telephone wire into accordian pleats, "We live in South Carolina." So I can count on him to come up with the goods on the annual egg hunt. If he can find our yard.
I don’t understand it, though. I’ve seen these guys play video games. Either one can pick out a sniper across three continents hiding in the broom closet in the basement of a fourteen story building made of concrete slab with no windows. If the sniper is crouched under an overturned mop bucket wearing an invisibility cloak, all the better. The only decision is weather to sneak across a landbridge with a simple shotgun or a fall back on a weapon with a little more finesse, say a flame thrower.
But for now, our Easter eggs are safe. Unless he drops them in an underwater volcano somewhere in the mid Pacific. Personally, I hope he hides them on a certain ship or two located off the coast of Somalia.
Those stinkin' pirates wouldn't stand a chance.
I appreciate the earnest wisdom of Winnie the Pooh as much as the next bear of very little brain, but in all deference, what I could use is a little bit of insider information on the location of the thing I’m looking for. Here we are teetering right on top of the time of year when well-honed finding skills are of utmost importance and I couldn’t track down an Easter egg with an Indian scout and a dedicated Coonhound trained on pastels. What I need is for Microsoft to create a search function that works in my back yard.
Since the seek-fail gene is not the sort of genealogical wonder that skips a generation, my sons Ca$h and Wrongway have this happy talent splashed all over their DNA like egg dye.
My older son is 20 and, while he has no use for hen’s eggs died to match the purples and polka dots found in nature, he has a keen interest in plastic Easter eggs which are known to harbor money or crispy chocolaty goodies in their recesses. But since he is not able to get in touch with his inner GPS, this year he requested that the Easter Bunny hide his eggs in a row on the kitchen table, marked with his name and initialed by quality control. He’d have no problems if the Easter Bunny simply left a check.
You’d think this would take some of the spirit out of the Easter morning egg hunt, but it’s actually a lot less painful than squiring a twenty year old to and fro past the back gate squealing, “Look! What's that behind the third tulip from the left? No, the other left.” Meanwhile, woodland creatures are gathering behind the bushes to place bets on how many eggs stay in the yard for another year.
He did find a group of colored eggs one year. Our Golden Retriever, who never met a food based item he didn’t like, rolled all the dyed eggs into the middle of the yard and licked the Crisco off. I thought the Crisco was to make them shiny, not lend them dog appeal. That's like rubbing meat tenderizer on the cat. Son One got up Easter morning, collected eggs like a hayseed in a henhouse and went back to bed.
My other son is an ace with Easter eggs. He has a multi-sensored tracking device embedded in his brain that can secure the enemy egg’s location in a nanosecond. It’s our house that he can’t seem to locate without help. In his defense, he hasn’t had his driver’s license long enough for the plastic smell to wear off. On his way home from the mall one day, he discovered a new school. In a different county. My cell phone rang that evening and an eerily familiar voice said, “Mom, I don’t think I’m in Kansas anymore.” "Honey," I answered, calmly twisting the telephone wire into accordian pleats, "We live in South Carolina." So I can count on him to come up with the goods on the annual egg hunt. If he can find our yard.
I don’t understand it, though. I’ve seen these guys play video games. Either one can pick out a sniper across three continents hiding in the broom closet in the basement of a fourteen story building made of concrete slab with no windows. If the sniper is crouched under an overturned mop bucket wearing an invisibility cloak, all the better. The only decision is weather to sneak across a landbridge with a simple shotgun or a fall back on a weapon with a little more finesse, say a flame thrower.
But for now, our Easter eggs are safe. Unless he drops them in an underwater volcano somewhere in the mid Pacific. Personally, I hope he hides them on a certain ship or two located off the coast of Somalia.
Those stinkin' pirates wouldn't stand a chance.
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