Fort's Cancer Sux!!

Welcome to your 1st installment of:

"OH.MY.GOD.DidthatJUSTHAPPEN?????":

Kroger Edition

This was inspired by my recent visit to the Finneytown Kroger, where I figured would be a good place to spend a Friday evening. Pick up some Firewood, some tea, a bottle of wine and a six pack of Miller Lite. Just a relaxing trip to what I found out was only one crazy person short of an ASYLUM.

Where, Oh God, where....do...I....start.

Lets start out with the fact that I was Soooorely mistaken (think Dean Rooney on Ferris Bueller) that this place wouldn't be busy. I probably spent ten extra dollars on the simple fact that 8 lanes were packed and I kept rolling back into the asiles to let things "settle down".

While things were "Settling down", I encountered my first crazy person. I was checking out the Air freshners at the end of the aisle when a woman stopped to look at the same thing. I was tucked in the aisle with my cart free from the insanity of the open end. The other poor woman was on her cell phone, with her cart behind her. She had just gotten there, so her cart was empty.

Just then, a woman comes barreling around the corner, crashing into this woman's cart like a 15-year old employee in the parking lot on a -5 degree day. But she doesnt just crash into the cart....SHE KEEPS GOING!!!

Had the startled, confused, cartless woman not turned around and quietly said, "Um, Ma'am...Ma'am!", THIS CRAZY BITCH WOULD HAVE PUSHED THAT CART TEN AISLES DOWN!!! No joke! What's funny is that the culprit then stops, turns around, and with this innocent Betty White voice, says "Oh...Oh....I didnt realize"....

Didn't Realize what??!!!???! That you didnt have a license to bulldoze other peoples carts twenty feet through the store? Or that a simple "Excuse me" would have worked? Or that you shouldnt grocery shop on meth??? WHAT EXACTLY DIDNT YOU REALIZE???

Ugh.

So I finally decide to pick a check out line and suck it up with an issue of Star magazine. As you already know, I am a sucker for celebrity smut, so getting 17 minutes of reading for free actually feels like stealing, so I all good with it.

I was in the hole. A guy in front of me was on deck with two bottles of Merlot. At bat was a chick checking out. I wasnt sure what the hold up was, but there was a money issue going on. I am a magnet for these people. If you go to the store with $20, buy $30 worth of shit, and dont have the brains to realize this until you check out, I will ALWAYS be in line behind you. It never fails. So she finally gets taken care of.

ENTER CRAZY PERSON NUMERO DOS:

So Im standing there behind Merlot guy, and I turn around to let the person behind me know that Im moving my cart up. I guess I hogged some real estate getting caught up reading about how The Hills might bring Kristin back and L.C. is ALLLLL pissed. I am so into this story and its pathetic. But anyway, Im moving my cart up, and there's this middle aged woman standing behind me and a young couple behind her.

As I turn around, the young guy looks at the woman. And quitely and politely poses a question:

"Um, ma'am, did...you see us standing here?"

OH MY GOD!!! THIS WOMAN TOTALLY PULLED CUTSIES!!! This crazy wench just cut right in front of these people!!!! Good for the guy to actually say something. If someone cut in front of me, I TOTALLY would have let them, because I have NO spine and I hatehatehate confrontation. But you bet your ass I would have badmouthed them on my blog.

(and I will tell you that the young couple was black and the middle aged woman was white - not that it matters, being shitty is being shitty, BUT....Ill get to that.)

SO ANYWAY, after this young man boldly, but politely tells this woman the error of her ways, she, I-SHIT-YOU-NOT, turns around, looks at the man, and says something to the effect of, "Oh....Oh.....no.....I....didnt realize, that. Oh, heh.".......

AND TURNS BACK AROUND!!!!!

What? What? What? Are you serious? Now, I can be friendly to the point of straight annoyance, and I can see where this woman may have had her mind else where, or maybe these folks were in the peref, WHATEVER. But AKNOWLEDGE YOUR MISTAKE!!!

I would have spent ten minutes apologizing while giving them their spot back, telling them all about the crazy day I had at work, all the laundry I had to do, about how im partially deaf because of the chemo, all that shit. I would have MADE them understand WHY I accidentally did that and pray to God that they would have the heart to forgive me. I would have exchanged emails with them and sent them funny forwards for a few months to let them know I was still thinking about them. I would have told them about my blog and that I would write about it and they should read it and post a comment to let all my readers know that everything was ok. Really. "Please, Post a comment.", I would say.

But no. I had one of those awkward moments where I got nervous. I continued my checkout just thinking, "Oh my God. That didnt just happen did it? No way. That woman did NOT just blow that guy off!!!" Thats becuase I am a total Pee-You-Ess-Ess-Why. Thats why.

In my fantasy world, I would have turned around and been all, "Hey, not all of my people are like that, seriously. Why dont you cut in front of me so I can make up for her complete absent-mindedness."

And then Id let the couple cut in front of me so the lady would have to wait for BOTH of us (both pushing about 14 items in the 15 item express lane thank you very much) and Id smugly look at her, shaking my head, laughing. "You got yours, didnt you, crazy lady???"

Guy with the Merlot. In. Out. Easy. I think to myself about my bottle of Shiraz. I feel mature with my bottle of Shiraz. I only just recently found out that White Zinfandel = WHITE TRASH. Really? Ive been bringing white zin around for years, and Stacy, and others now come to think of it, wouldnt touch it. I dont know if I saw it on tv or what, so the weekend before thanksmas I show up with Shiraz and say something like, "Hey, Is White Zin trashy?" And I got a resounding "HELL YES". Really? I dont get it. Id never heard that before.

Merlot is way too bitter for me but I do enjoy Shiraz. So thats my new thing. Shiraz. Am I not white trash any more? I cant take the wedding reception keg toss back. I just cant.

Oh yeah....so Im checking out and my bottle of Shiraz DOES NOT SCAN. My cashier yells to our neighbor line, "UH PATTY? This wine ain't scanning".....Patty responds, "Um, you'll need to take that to the counter and call another store for the total"

As if on cue, Crazy-cut-lady and the pissed off couple behind her let out a resounding, "AAAGGGHHH"....I say, "dont do that, I get another bottle".

The theme song to Benny Hill is racing through my head as I run back to the wine section. "Damn this new fancy Kroger and your overstocked section of spirits!!!! Arrrgh!!!" I finally settle on a bottle of Yellow tail Shiraz.

By the time I get back to the aisle, 76 customers had exited the Kroger since I had first entered the line, and the cut-ter and the cut-tees had become best friends. I left and came home to John watching Lord of the Rings with the cat.

Now, I promised Angie I wouldnt turn the blog into my own version of Cat Fancy, but this was just TOO CUTE. I dont care. Its cute. And it involves a cat. There. I said it. Here are my my boys!!!!! 1,2,3, awwwww:

This was my original post...the "pre-Kroger" post:

Wow! Christmas came early in a number of ways! For starters, I found out today that my tumor markers were down again. Thats awesome news! And secondly, John and I have agreed to a Christmas gift finally. You see, our paychecks are dumped into the same checking account. Thats it for us. No secret stash, no credit cards for special presents. The last few years, we've just agreed on something nice we can both do together - Maybe Bengals tickets or something like that. We seriously dont even exchange gifts. I asked him the other day what he thought we could do for our Christmas gift to each other and he said he hadnt really given it much thought.

Until today!!! I came home from work and he says, "I think I know what we could do for Christmas"....yikes! What could it be? A romantic weekend away? New furniture?

"That leak in the tub has turned into a steady stream." We saw this coming. The local whiz plumber who temporarily stopped the leak in the summer did warn us his remedy probably was going to need a serious upgrade. He had a new faceplate and valve he could get for our old school set up, includes a new shower head too....for the bargain basement price of $400....WOW!!! I wasnt expecting to spend so much on each other! This is a real treat. Merry Christmas.

QUESTION OF THE WEEK:

DID YOU KNOW THAT WHITE ZINFANDEL = WHITE TRASH? IS THIS COMMON KNOWLEDGE? Have you ever found out you were doing something that was socially unacceptable and nobody told you? I want to hear about it.