It's A Fact Of Life, I Guess

You take the good, you take the bad, you take them both and there you have...my trip to The Devil's Playground on Saturday.

I didn't really NEED to go there. I already go twice a week now. But I had to return that cracked bargain picnic plate set that I got for Farmer H to cook his microwave eggs in. Might as well get it over with, I figured, even though I was using up prime Farmer H is Gone time while he drove to Kansas to visit the #1 Son.

The good part was...I went through that return line like Farmer H's money through a slot machine. So fast that if you blinked, you would have missed it.

I had a couple of things I wanted to pick up that I'd forgotten the day before when I bought the picnic set. Then I got back in line at the regular checkout area. I should have anticipated delays. It was Saturday, by cracky!

Of course I switched over one line when I saw that my checker was a young girl with a big white-and-black sign parked on the end of the conveyor, stating: No Alcohol Sales. Minor. Must Call Supervisor. That made ME no nevermind, because I wasn't buying alcohol. But the line was slow, and the lady up front had a giant load of stuff, and the guy behind her had a full cart. So I moved one line to the left.

Great. This guy also had the Minor Alcohol warning sign. Just what they needed on a Saturday, two novices. I swear this kid was slower than the girl. But when I left the girl, she was calling over a supervisor for some issue that wasn't alcohol.

While I waited, a kid came up behind me. "Excuse me, please. Can I get through here?"

I moved up my cart a little bit and turned sideways to allow passage. What a nice, polite, chubby boy, around 10, in shorts and flip-flops and a crewcut. Not so nice, in that he could have taken two steps and gone around the big square cardboard display of mini snack cookie canisters, and not made me shove over for his passage. He didn't even go to the next aisle to join Mom or Grandma or Older Sister who brought him! He went merrily flip-flopping along that aisle, having saved himself two steps. Kids these days.

While I waited for my checker guy to slowly inspect every item on his conveyor like it was an ancient artifact, four minutes passed. The only movement had been my ample rumpus out of the way of a spry child. Directly in front of me was a dude around 18-20, with his mom or grandma and a medium-filled cart. Dude wanted an energy drink, but it was not in our checkout cooler. He looked over to the next one, and spotted the beverage of his desire. I prepared to move and let him out. It's not like HE had another route. He went around the end and asked the guy waiting with a full cart to please open the cooler and hand him a white can of energy drink. Mission accomplished, he came back.

I was leaning on my cart/walker by now, over the child seat with my set of plastic picnic dishes, two jars of olives, two Chicken Bacon Ranch Pinwheels, and a pint of slaw. Oh, and a bag of Mini Reeses that I ration myself for an evening treat. As I was daydreaming about night-snacking, I felt something on my butt! I swear somebody was resting their future purchases on my ample rumpus!

I turned around to give the stinkeye. This is just not acceptable! Even in Hillmomba.

A little old lady noticed my discombobulation, and said, "Oh, I'm sorry." She needed to go back to school for remedial Personal Space lessons.

"I wondered what was going on back there. I think we're going to be here for a while." I hope she didn't think I was letting her go ahead of me. Not my fault she didn't nab a cart/walker to lean on. I only had 7 items. Just because she had 4 was not good enough for me to feel all generous and do-goody.

Just then, the guy in my original line, with the full cart, who had handed over the energy drink, started backing up. "I didn't see the sign! I have alcohol. I don't want to make everyone wait." He went on down the way of the lazy two-stepper. A man coming up behind him with an emptier cart took his place in line. Rumpus Bumper darted over there. And I followed.

Okay. So I DIDN'T beat the full-cart lady who took my place in line. But I got done at the same time. So technically, I didn't LOSE any time by switching back.

The underage guy checker gave me the stinkeye, though.