Like life, grocery shopping is a 24/7 deal.
Plastic is cheap and easy, but it takes about a gross to encompass what you need and makes you look like you don't care. Paper seems sensible and responsible, but it has hidden drawbacks. Reusable cloth is the most practical and conscientious but you come off as a bit earnest, which is just fine if you don't mind the looks you get.
If you check the labels you'll often find that many things described to you as "choices" are illusory.
Apples are always good.
The world has waaaaay too many "flavors" of dog and cat food when you consider that the end users involved employ their tongues to clean their asses.
The visual and auditory cacophony of our system of food supply is pretty intimidating when you just stop and let it overwhelm you.
Mind you, there's something to be said for fewer flies on your goat haunch.
If you're cute, you can take a lollipop right out of the bin and start licking it, and people will smile at you. The same goes for apples right off of the shelf.
Which, when you think about it, explains a lot about cute people.Looking around the meat and poultry aisle goes a long way towards explaining why most most of us can't connect the dots between the wars we see on TV and real slaughter and butchery, either.
Did you ever stop and think how strange it is to have salad greens, cob corn and oranges on sale in an Oregon June?
Small things matter. It's flip-flop season, gals, but a pedicure and $80 nails won't make you look deliciously attractive if you don't wash those feet. And guys? How about wearing clothes that cover your peniculum and your gluteal cleavage? I know it's only WinCo, but, really, what would it hurt?
Marshmallow Mateys?
It takes longer to get the shopping done with a little person to "help". But it's not as much fun without her.
No matter what, you almost always find that you forgot something when you get home.
No matter what it is you forgot, it's always good just to get home.
8 comments:
Chief, I don't know if you've looked at Buggieboy recently but you are in SERIOUS danger of getting drafted. Just thought I'd make sure you were in the loop BEFORE the chocks were removed from the airplane and it has started down the runway.
P.S. - You've evoked many fond and chaotic memories from when my two boys were small. Treasure your experiences because it will change all too quickly.
Now my boys are of much greater assistance but my household is consuming 7-8 gallons of milk per week. Yikes!
I love your ruminations on shopping. I, too, often see the implication in packaging, product placement, etc. I love Vance Packard, too.
I once worked at the Yugoslav-American office while a student (it was on its way out). It was a scholar exchange program, and the secretary would take the new arrivals for their first grocery trip.
Invariably, she said, the would stand, mouths agape, in the cereal aisle in a hypnotic reverie. Never had they seen such exotic concoctions created of dry cereal flakes.
Real oatmeal, Farina and Corn Flakes. Those were the days.
And all the junky stuff is at the little one's eye level, to cajole you into deciding against your better self. They say just do the rim of the store and you'll do o.k., with the occasional foray into the center -- it's a jungle out there!
My worse memory of the grocery store was with my youngest who had the penchant to point out the obvious...to my everlasting chagrin!
There we were, standing in line to check out, the youngest, close to 4, just chuckling up a storm while I'm trying to run through my head the shopping list the wife told me, and the lady ahead of us is off-loading her cart.
I'm about to seize the memory of the one item I was suppose to get, but is absent from my cart when my son belts out, "she's got big-uns!"
Pointing to the womens breast which were... large, firm, but definitely quite large.
Yes, out goes the memory of the item I was suppose to get, pop goes my eyes in both horror, and a serious attempt to hide the agreement I had with my sons observation...and I'm expecting a fusillade riposte from this woman who probably is going to say some uncomplimentary things about me as a parent, and the rudeness of my child.
All I get from her is a smile, which I was grateful for her restraint...but my son...how can I be upset with him, he didn't know when to keep those observations to himself.
The cherry to this unexpected sundae came from the guy behind us who half-whispers to his wife, "kid's got a good eye."
His wife bopped him pretty hard, too.
Pluto: Got you on the cross-check - I'm up for it - let's get something together.
8 gallons! Great googlimoogli, those boys are going to have bones and teeth like tool steel!
Lisa: Every time I go to the grocery store here in the land of the Big PX I can't help thinking of the story told me by one of the guys from the 162nd Infantry after they got back from Iraq. While patrolling the local market in wherever West Buttfuckistan they were posted, he came across something beyond the usual bootleg CDs, car parts, fly-encrusted meat and veg - a little girl selling rocks. Just plain rocks. That's all she had. He said he bought one.
Rocks.
The gulf between "us" and "them" is like the fucking Valles Marineris.
Sheerah: Out of the mouths of babes comes stuff that'll get you in trouble. I'm still living down my facetious comeback to Sheadon, who, at three, just couldn't "get" that his mom was out of town visiting with her friend Chris. Now my wife gloried in a rather opulent frontage in those days, and her friend was downright abundanza, so I have to admit that the thought had crossed my mind...but after replying "Mommy's in Seattle" for about 398 times to the question "Where's Mommy?", the 399th time I said: "Mommy's jumping up and down on the bed in her undies with Auntie Chris so they can rub their boobies together." After getting that off my...chest...shall we say I went back to "Mommy's in Seattle" for the remaining 455 times I answered the "Where's Mommy?" question.
Mojo returns the next day, and what's the first question out of little man's lips after the hugs and kisses run out?
"Mommy, why were you and Auntie Chris jumping up and down and rubbing your boobies together?"
Jesus wept, did I pay for THAT little bit of smartassery...
Per rocks: of course, we have sold them, too. Pet rocks, and all manner of foolishness. It is the Capitalist way.
But that girl was more serious, no doubt.
""Mommy, why were you and Auntie Chris jumping up and down and rubbing your boobies together?""
roflmao!
Oh yes, that'll cost some!
Cute. Cute. Cute!
""Mommy, why were you and Auntie Chris jumping up and down and rubbing your boobies together?""
That got BOTH boys laughing hysterically. Hopefully they won't quote you when their mother comes home...
Out of the mouths of teenagers...
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