Of the many household chores I hate doing, grocery shopping has to be near the top of the list, right up there with doing the laundry and unloading the dishwasher.
A trip to the grocery store can seem to drag on for hours. At least, it seems that way. First you have to navigate the parking lot, where many people seem to have no concept of what a fire lane is. I don’t care how busy you are or that you are just going in for a couple of items. Park that car in a legal spot, not the fire lane.
Then there are the folks who inch their car along the lanes waiting for that up-close spot to open. Come on, folks. You’re about to walk around the grocery store, up and down every aisle. You’re going to be on one side of the store and remember something you forgot on the other side of the store, so you’re going hoof it back to get that forgotten item. But you can’t walk the extra 30 feet from a spot farther from the door?
Going inside isn’t better. I’m convinced the inside of a grocery story is a microcosm of American society, full of rude, inconsiderate people who could care less about their fellow man. Among the worst offenders are the ones who put the shopping cart on the right side of the aisle, stand on the left side and stare endless at the shelves. And then, they get offended when I have the audacity, the pure unmitigated gall to want to go by them.
“No ma’am,” I always want to say, “I have nothing better to do today than stand here for five minutes watching you decide which brand of laundry detergent to buy this week. Been looking forward to this all day. In fact, I got here early just to be sure I didn’t miss you.”
Of course, it’d be my luck that Laundry Detergent Lady doesn’t recognize sarcasm when she hears it.
And checking out is the worst. I’m standing in line with a dozen eggs, a package of chicken breasts, two cans of tuna, a bunch of broccoli and a half gallon of 1 percent milk – hey, I eat healthy now. The woman in front of me had $138.26 worth of groceries. I know for a fact that it was $138.26 because it wasn’t until the cashier said, “That’ll be $138.26, ma’am” that the woman began to look for her checkbook. I guess she was hoping to have been the store’s millionth customer and, thus, get her groceries free.
All of this to say, my long hours in the grocery store may be over. My favorite store just started a grocery pick-up service and I tried it last week. The way it works is you use the store’s smartphone app to create your shopping list. Then you choose a time you want to pick up your groceries and enter your payment information.
At the appointed hour, you go to a designated area of the parking lot, call a number on a sign and wait for a clerk to bring you groceries to your car. You don’t even have to get out. They load them for you. The whole thing took me less than 10 minutes, and now Laundry Detergent Lady can take as long as she wants to shop for Tide.
Of course, this pick-up service isn’t perfect. I still have to deal with Fire Lane Parker.
