The Bane of My Exsistence

The only thing worse than grocery shopping is making the list and the only thing worse than that is putting the groceries away. I feel a little bit better about grocery shopping when I go to Macey's or Harmons but yesterday I went to Walmart. Dun dun dun. I dread grocery shopping so much that I always put it off until there is not a drop of milk, a stick of butter, or a crumb of bread to be found in the entire house. It is always a do or die situation.

Yesterday was bad because I only had an hour and a half to run the option until I had to get Gage to his soccer game. It was pouring rain so I thought my chances were good that the game would be canceled so I didn't rush as fast as I could. I found out in the produce aisle that the game was still going on despite the downpour. Tim is the coach and I was on treats so I grabbed a bag of oranges and literally ran to the check out.

Do I have some gift for choosing the lamest checker or does everyone chose the shortest line in length and still have people come and go 2 times over on either side? That seems to be my fate. The kids were pretty good during the trip. Claire was happy. Luke sat in the basket until the groceries nearly covered him and I had to get him out and I only had to tell Gage once that we were at WALMART and NOT on whatever spaceship he was pretending to fly at the time. All that went to heck and hand-basket as soon was we stood in line.

When I say my checker was lame I mean to say that a blind poodle could check groceries faster that this woman. She just talked and talked with little or no response from me. Listen lady, I didn't come here to shoot the breeze. I looked over to see that Luke had Gage in some kind of Kung Foo head lock and Gage was doing an impressive kidney punch. I'd already run my debit card when she says, "Oh, you're just waiting for me." Nothing gets past this woman.

As soon as I was able to grab the receipt from Mrs-I-bag-groceries-slower-than-cold- tar I ran the race to the car. Claire's hair was dripping by the time we got to the van and Luke was having an irrational fit over his shoes not being tied. I finally got all the kids and bags into the van and Walmart has like one cart return per 100 acres. I always pride myself on not being that lazy sack of you know what that leaves their cart everywhere and not even the rain was going to stop me. So I saw the poor illegal immigrant in the yellow slicker that was gathering carts a little ways down my aisle so I ran it to him and ran back to the car. I now had 5 minutes to get to the game and I'm searching frantically in my purse for my keys. I found 'em and pulled out fast to hear a sickening crunch.

I looked out my widow and saw the remnants of the cart return machine thingy. I knew I had just flattened the illegal immigrant guy. I was hysterical. I jumped out and ran around the van expecting to see blood and broken legs and arms and I see Mr. Illegal. I yelled, in a voice I hardly recognize, that would make Julie Andrews jealous with the high note, "I thought I just hit you!" Mr. Illegal thought that was the funniest thing he had heard all year. He practically doubled over in laughter. Once I saw he was living I wanted to throttle him. What a great place to park all your carts. Right behind my van...that you saw me get into and start. I know that Walmart doesn't exactly hire the latest MIT grads but this was a new freakin low. All I can say is that I hope Mr. Illegal and Blind Poodle don't get cozy at the next Walmart Christmas Party and pro-create. Oh wait, they probably already did and their off-spring is the Sandy City employee who decided that a downpour was not a reason to cancel a Kindergartner's Soccer Game.

About 45 minutes later, after I had ran up and down our stairs about 10 times, had put away all the cold stuff and left the remains wherever they fell on the kitchen floor and hiked through wet grass pushing a stroller with Claire in it and Luke yelling, "Wait up!" I finally made it to the last half of Gage's soccer game. I watched this yuppy running around the track with his spiffy heart monitor and ipod and I wondered what it must be like to exercise for fun?

I know the bible makes no mention of it, but it must have been lost in it's many translations, that part about Eve's punishment for eating the fruit was that she was going to have to grocery shop for the rest of her days!!!!!