Grocery Store Etiquette (and other things my neighbors need to know about shopping correctly)
The closest grocery store (the one in between my house and work - otherwise known as -the grocery store I can CONVENIENTLY stop off en route home from work) is Kroger on Lombardy. The area, formerly known as the area perfect for a late-night rendevous with a transvestite prostitute, has been revamped into a bustling late night grocery store slash Starbuck's slash Lowe's Home Improvement Store area. It is very nice to the nearly naked eye - its once you go INSIDE that you realize what an armpit this place is.
I have already called the #1-800 Kroger number and complained about this place and its "service". Bad attitudes of the "*sigh* I can't be bothered" type run rampent in here. Just picture girls in their late teens/early twenties snapping gum and looking up at the ceiling so all you see are the whites of their eyes. Their faces all frozen in the "I-Hate-This-Freaking-Job" glare. We all hate our jobs to some degree, but don't make me suffer while I buy 1 case of beer to celebrate that my work day is over. I can't help that your late shift just began or you are questioning why you can't call people on your cell phone while stocking shelves.
I had to stop here last week for some post-work dinner pick-up. I hate this place. I have tried my darndest to avoid it, but I keep slipping into the pattern of picking up last minute items which require me to stop here (yes, I can drive past my house 3 miles to go to the other Kroger but when you really want to get home - you really want to get home and somehow... this place always seems like the faster option... which, it never is).
Walk past the cop (always there) and just try and find a cart. Nope, they have all been taken by the guys who turn in aluminum for cash or they are outside slamming into my driver side door. Okay,... I'll take a hand basket. After I pick out the old banana peel, its off we go!
Find an apple with no teeth marks, grab some lettuce that isn't completely wilted and then wait in line for 12 minutes at the deli. Did I mention that there is NO ONE in front of me at the deli?
Its off to the meat dept. I just love how Kroger has discovered a completely disgusting way to package my ground beef - in a tube. Its really made me want to look into being a vegetarian...
Walk past the guy in a wife beater reading labels on the salad dressings (Kroger loves a wide variety of salad dressings. They also have a pretty outstanding Mexican and Asian foods section, which, is really its only highlight.) Find a block of cheese that didn't expire last month (I never had to read expiration dates on Kraft cheese before this place) and then attempt to find one box of eggs that doesn't have at least one cracked egg (or isn't stuck to the surrounding boxes of eggs from the aforementioned broken eggs).
Walking down the frozen food aisle I begin to slow down as a woman, who is almost as wide as the aisle itself pushing a fake NASCAR grocery cart stuffed with 3 kids, peruses the aisles while yelling at the kids, "I am serious. I will take you outside and beat your ass if you don't quit yer crying!" (You can tell that this threat has been said a million times since she is reading labels and the kids are still horseplaying. Its become almost conversational.)
"Excuse me..." I'm passed her!
I get to the frozen veggies where I cannot read the items behind the glass window cause some idiot woman has decided to HOLD THE DOOR OPEN while reading through what she wants. Do people NOT understand that the doors are made of GLASS for a reason?!. If we were meant to hold open the doors, block the aisles, frost up the windows for the next guy and to let all the cold out - they'd be doors of metal. Without fail, this completely irks me.
Up to the check-out. Ah yes, its 5:30PM and everyone is out post-work shopping... just like last time I came I here. Customers are backed up into the food aisles due to only 2 lanes being open at this rush-hour time. I choose to wait in the self-serve section where people are still learning for the first time how to ring up their items and other people waiting are shoving to get ahead.
I finally get a register and start checking myself out. I consider myself a master at this by now and I have begun to memorize short-hand codes to things (including how to punch in my VIP card which, I have since thrown away). I show the lady my ID when I ring up some beer and then ask for a pack of cigarretes (its a rough week, ok?). You would have thought I forced her into excerising against her will.
"*sigh*, " She non-chalantly (and by non-chalantly I mean SLOWLY MOSEYS) up to the main customer service desk where... and you'd think she'd be happy that I offered her the chance to lean against the counter to gab with her gal-pal up at the main counter for 5 minutes... she gets what I need. She then bounces on back to her spot and hands them over without even looking at me.
"Thank you!" I say borderline frantic that I have held up this line behind me (I'm embarrassed out of my mind).
No response. She looks straight ahead.
[Insert explative thought here] as I look at her... glaringly.
I finish my transaction and leave.
I really have no outstanding poignent way to end this post other than to say... I'll probably do it all again someday this week, too.
I have already called the #1-800 Kroger number and complained about this place and its "service". Bad attitudes of the "*sigh* I can't be bothered" type run rampent in here. Just picture girls in their late teens/early twenties snapping gum and looking up at the ceiling so all you see are the whites of their eyes. Their faces all frozen in the "I-Hate-This-Freaking-Job" glare. We all hate our jobs to some degree, but don't make me suffer while I buy 1 case of beer to celebrate that my work day is over. I can't help that your late shift just began or you are questioning why you can't call people on your cell phone while stocking shelves.
I had to stop here last week for some post-work dinner pick-up. I hate this place. I have tried my darndest to avoid it, but I keep slipping into the pattern of picking up last minute items which require me to stop here (yes, I can drive past my house 3 miles to go to the other Kroger but when you really want to get home - you really want to get home and somehow... this place always seems like the faster option... which, it never is).
Walk past the cop (always there) and just try and find a cart. Nope, they have all been taken by the guys who turn in aluminum for cash or they are outside slamming into my driver side door. Okay,... I'll take a hand basket. After I pick out the old banana peel, its off we go!
Find an apple with no teeth marks, grab some lettuce that isn't completely wilted and then wait in line for 12 minutes at the deli. Did I mention that there is NO ONE in front of me at the deli?
Its off to the meat dept. I just love how Kroger has discovered a completely disgusting way to package my ground beef - in a tube. Its really made me want to look into being a vegetarian...
Walk past the guy in a wife beater reading labels on the salad dressings (Kroger loves a wide variety of salad dressings. They also have a pretty outstanding Mexican and Asian foods section, which, is really its only highlight.) Find a block of cheese that didn't expire last month (I never had to read expiration dates on Kraft cheese before this place) and then attempt to find one box of eggs that doesn't have at least one cracked egg (or isn't stuck to the surrounding boxes of eggs from the aforementioned broken eggs).
Walking down the frozen food aisle I begin to slow down as a woman, who is almost as wide as the aisle itself pushing a fake NASCAR grocery cart stuffed with 3 kids, peruses the aisles while yelling at the kids, "I am serious. I will take you outside and beat your ass if you don't quit yer crying!" (You can tell that this threat has been said a million times since she is reading labels and the kids are still horseplaying. Its become almost conversational.)
"Excuse me..." I'm passed her!
I get to the frozen veggies where I cannot read the items behind the glass window cause some idiot woman has decided to HOLD THE DOOR OPEN while reading through what she wants. Do people NOT understand that the doors are made of GLASS for a reason?!. If we were meant to hold open the doors, block the aisles, frost up the windows for the next guy and to let all the cold out - they'd be doors of metal. Without fail, this completely irks me.
Up to the check-out. Ah yes, its 5:30PM and everyone is out post-work shopping... just like last time I came I here. Customers are backed up into the food aisles due to only 2 lanes being open at this rush-hour time. I choose to wait in the self-serve section where people are still learning for the first time how to ring up their items and other people waiting are shoving to get ahead.
I finally get a register and start checking myself out. I consider myself a master at this by now and I have begun to memorize short-hand codes to things (including how to punch in my VIP card which, I have since thrown away). I show the lady my ID when I ring up some beer and then ask for a pack of cigarretes (its a rough week, ok?). You would have thought I forced her into excerising against her will.
"*sigh*, " She non-chalantly (and by non-chalantly I mean SLOWLY MOSEYS) up to the main customer service desk where... and you'd think she'd be happy that I offered her the chance to lean against the counter to gab with her gal-pal up at the main counter for 5 minutes... she gets what I need. She then bounces on back to her spot and hands them over without even looking at me.
"Thank you!" I say borderline frantic that I have held up this line behind me (I'm embarrassed out of my mind).
No response. She looks straight ahead.
[Insert explative thought here] as I look at her... glaringly.
I finish my transaction and leave.
I really have no outstanding poignent way to end this post other than to say... I'll probably do it all again someday this week, too.
posted by Brooke Ullman at 7:49 PM
2 Comments:
C'mon,... Russia? I mean - its not like the cold days of waiting in a bread line. You have tons of Vodka (probably cheaper than tap water) and Chicken Kiev. What more could you want?
;-)
I say just order your groceries online and have them delivered. Takes the pain out of it all.
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