Happy Holidays and welcome to December 15. That's right. You have 9 legitimate shopping days (and one day to pick up stuff at Kwik Trip) for Christmas. If you're ordering from anywhere other than Amazon, don't bother, it won't get here in time. Wrap a picture of it and put that under the tree. If you're ordering from Amazon, you MIGHT get it in time...but you should probably pay for the super-premium shipping just to be safe.
Your best hope at this point is to shop old school. Get in your car and drive someplace. (If you haven't seen the latest "5 Below" ad for their store, that's what I imagine people doing right now.)
Me? Oh, I started shopping in June. I have a chart that I keep for exactly what got everyone last year, what I got them this year. I make sure people have the same number of gifts under the tree, befitting their relationship to me. Skippy and Peaches have the same number as Hubby. Children's partners have the same number as each other. Nieces and nephews have the same number of gifts as each other. I even have a box of "just in case" gifts wrapped and ready to go in case someone I'm not aware of shows up on my doorstep Christmas morning.
Don't be jealous. I haven't baked a thing. I've got premade cookie dough out on the counter waiting for me to do something, anything with it. I doubt I'll do anything. I've already informed Hubby there will be no homemade Kringle this year. Also, I'm thinking Christmas Eve dinner is going to be Pizza. Frozen Pizza. Christmas cards are probably going to be Epiphany Cards, which we'll then push to Easter and then decide nothing's really gone on that much that people need a card from us.
So yeah. I'm still the same old mess you all know and love.
Now today I was going to write a nice 5 for Friday about 5 holiday songs you don't have on your holiday playlist, but you should. It was going to be a very nice little blog that was going to put you all in the right mood to get you to Christmas morning.
And then I went to the grocery store. My dad is sick so I offered to pick up a few things for my mom, so they won't have to go out in the snowy slushy mess that's happening in our weather right now.
And now we have a different 5 for Friday. It's FIVE THINGS THAT PISSED ME OFF AT THE GROCERY STORE THIS MORNING!
Ready?
5) DON'T YOU PEOPLE HAVE JOBS OR SCHOOL?
Seriously. 9:30 on a Friday morning. Even allowing for the senior citizens (isn't Wednesday supposed to be the day we let the oldsters out to shop? What are they doing blocking my way on a Friday?) and the shopper people shopping for people who don't want to shop, there were a TON of job aged people dragging school aged children.
Yes, when my kids were small I took them and the kids I babysat to the store. Sure I did. It was an outing. I taught the kids how to make a shopping list, how to navigate the aisles in a store, and when to use a coupon and when it doesn't pay. (Not that any of those kids remember those lessons, but whatever.) That said, NOW if I'm in the supermarket on a weekday morning it's because 1) I'm in the middle of a cooking/baking project and realized I need one weird ingredient and I need it NOW or 2) I'm picking up a few things and I have a busy day so I need to MOVE.
And yet, I'm trapped behind a family of FIVE kids and every single one of them is shouting about some sugary snack or whatever and the parents, who clearly would rather be at their jobs, are ignoring the children and arguing with each other about which can of yams is a better value. (Here's a hint: NO ONE IS GOING TO LIKE THE CANNED YAMS. Stop buying them. The stores will stop trying to sell them and then they can use that shelf space for something better, like cookies.)
4) Could we PLEASE go back to stocking at night?
Oh, my lord. I know that Covid changed the landscape of retail grocery stores forever. I realize we'll probably never have our pick of 24-hour supermarkets to shop at ever again. But...for the love of all that's holy, could we PLEASE at least have the stockers go back to working when the store is closed?
When stores were opened 24 hours a day, I was okay with having to weave around flatbeds of boxed goods at 11 at night. There weren't a lot of other shoppers to contend with, so it was okay. But now, now I'm fighting traffic with shoppers AND stockers. It's like the opening five minutes of "Office Space" where the office employees are stuck in traffic.
Oh, and here's a rule: If it's something I need...either a giant pile of boxes will be in front of it, or a couple grannies in those motorized carts will be double parked in front of it.
3) If I hear that joke one more time...
We've all been there: We're rolling down the big aisle of the grocery store and some jackwagon pops out from a crossing aisle and you very nearly crash and one of you says, "Oh they should put traffic lights up here." Ha ha.
To quote a wise saying from my youth, "Gag me with a spoon."
Repeating that stupid joke does not clear you of stupid cart driving. If you're crossing the main aisle, slow the bleep down and look! Don't just shove your 300-pound cart (with your fourth grader riding on the rack underneath, even though the signs on the cart say, "Don't put a child in the bottom rack.") out into traffic and then act all shocked when someone nearly sideswipes you. Hey, if your fourth grader loses his fingers in an accident like that, you're probably not going to find the joke funny. Or maybe you're a terrible parent (which one could surmise, given you're letting the kid ride under the cart) and you still think the joke is funny.
My point is, WATCH WHERE YOU ARE GOING. And if you're a slower shopper, MOVE OVER for those of us who have an organized list and know what we're doing.
Also, if you're comparison shopping, and that's fine, how about if you DON'T angle park your cart so it takes up the entire aisle. I'm not in the store to make chitchat. Asking you to please move so I can get by might just use up every spoon I have and then I won't have the energy to make dinner for my family and they'll wind up ordering pizza which will raise their blood pressure and blood sugars and make them fat. DO YOU WANT THAT ON YOUR CONSCIENCE? NO? Then move your cart OVER if you're slow shopping.
2) I bet you train your employees, right? Then why do you assume we all know how to do this?
Self-checking. I've been against it from the start. First of all, stores spend time training their employees on how to be cashiers. I remember. I worked for Aldi for a brief time. The training was intense. So I make a point to use those highly trained employees whenever I can.
But somedays the line for a cashier at Woodman's is ten deep. Sure, they have like fifteen cash registers, but only two lines are open. The other fifteen checkout stands are self-check. Sometimes I don't have the time or patience for it, or I've made the mistake of wearing my coat into the store and now I'm melting because the store's thermostat is set to "SUN" and I'm already a warm person (thank you, Menopause). So I wind up in self-check.
Like I said, I've worked as a grocery cashier, but not everyone has. Case in point, the two women in front of me at Woodman's today.
Woman 1: A TON of stuff in her cart and she was picking things out in a particular order.
Woman 2: Less stuff in her cart, but she couldn't find a UPC code to save her life.
I got behind woman 2. And I struck up a conversation with the guy who got behind woman 1.
Woman 1 got her groceries scanned first. Annoying. Woman 2 had to flag down the ONE cashier in charge of the SEA OF CHECKOUTS because she got herself a big old bag of rotten bananas for 99 cents, but there was no UPC code on the bag. (I know this because believe you me, she checked every side of the bag and half the bananas in it.) I don't know what she thought she was doing, but apparently WAVING HER CREDIT CARD in the air without saying anything out loud was the move she hoped would attract the cashier's attention.
Did it?
Would I be blogging if it had?
She finally murmured something like, "Excuse me?"
I was melting, I was annoyed, and I was watching my new bestie scan his cart and leave the store and I hadn't' moved an inch. So, I yelled, "EXCUSE ME!" in my best teacher voice the same time little Miss Timid murmured. She looked shocked. Not because I was yelling, but because she honestly believed that sound came out of her.
The cashier came over, scanned the bananas and that should have been the end of it, right?
Nope. Now it was time to stick said credit card into the machine to PAY for the groceries. Little Miss Timid, and I'm not even kidding, took a deep breath and slapped her hands against her thighs like a gymnast gearing up to mount he uneven parallel bars.
Spoiler alert, I give her payment routine a 4.2. She got the card into the payment machine, but it took her a couple tries to get the right PIN.
1) If you're going to make us use self-check, how about if you make sure ALL THE SELF-CHECK LINES WORK?
Every single store I go to has self-check now. And in every single one of those stores, no less than 30% of the self-check machines (and it's usually closer to 50%) are OUT OF ORDER. How is this EVEN POSSIBLE??????????? HOW??????????
Had all the self-check lines at the grocery been operating this morning, there would have been no blog. I wouldn't have gotten stuck behind Little Miss Timid. My buddy would have been behind me, not behind Woman 2, who while she scanned faster than woman 1, bagged her groceries like she was playing Tetris and if she didn't get every bag perfectly packaged someone would skin the child she had riding on the bottom of the cart.
Instead, half the checkouts don't work. I get they can't find people who want to work as cashiers. It's not a great job. The hours blow, it's not a great paying gig, you're on your feet the whole time, standing on concrete, and you have to deal with just the worst people on earth: The check writers who don't bring ID. The people who HAVE TO PAY with EXACT CHANGE. Or, you know, me.
What was my point? Oh right.
Anyway, I get that stores are having a tough time getting cashiers. But you can't even get your self-check machines to work for you? GIVE ME A BREAK!
So there you go. I meant to write a nice blog, but then this happened.
Oh, and the five songs you should have on your holiday playlist, but probably don't?
5) Selah Light of the Stable
4) Rick Springfield Christmas with You
3) Mike Westendorf Nativity Song
2) Ana Gasteyer Sugar and Booze
1) Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings Big Bulbs
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