Adventures in Retail

It never fails. Every time I go grocery shopping, especially with the kids, it is an adventure. Sometimes it is a fun adventure, but mostly it is a testing of my patience. Today it was cold. Coooold cold. And as usual it took forever for everyone to be dressed, fed, watered, pottied and readied for a lengthy trip to town. Since Chris has been on the day shift, it has fallen on me to do the shopping with both kids. Since Erin is still prone to snoozing during the longer trips, we keep her in the carseat and prop it onto the front of the cart and Ian sits, lolls, jumps, rolls and does various acrobatics in the big part of the cart. Those who are thinking about grocery trips (we only go twice a month) are wondering where the groceries are going to go. Well, they go in the second cart that gets dragged behind me.

Come a little closer and feel my biceps of steel.

Today wasn't as bad as other days because I was shopping for mostly food. Sometimes there's a big list of drug items and other stuff that you get from the one half of Walmart while the grocery stuff is on the other half. After a quick zoom through the dry goods half (and the clearance clothing. I got the cutest little warm soft boots for Erin today and she needed them!) we started on the grocery, with Ian dramatically exclaiming, "but I don't WANT gwoshwies today, Mommy!" He got a little perkier after I let him choose orange juice. But you can't let him get too involved, because the boy is picky. "I want the green one! I don't yike that one," he'll say as I put generic noodles into the cart. Of course, he wants the ones that are twice as expensive and supposedly do everything but clear up all your wrinkles. And we're not even halfway done. But we only had a handful of near death experiences with the bouncing kid cart and the full grocery cart dragged behind us. Of course, it's always frustrating when they have those big posts in the middle of the aisle, but I can't complain since the roof is still intact. And how dare they restock when I'm shopping? Don't they know that I can't maneuver around all those boxes? I'm short and can't see over the baby in the cart. People run screaming and dive for cover behind those very boxes when I laboriously turn the corner. And the elderly should be grateful for those little battery operated shopping scooters. Otherwise, they would be toast from my train. It's harder to knock over a 500 pound scooter after all.
But the absolute fun part comes after the meat section (where Ian touches all of the meat packets and informs everyone around us that they are cold) and the produce (where Ian decides to do a circus act in his part of the cart by trying to stand on the canteloupe and cycle it around) to when it is time for check out.

Which poor unsuspecting Walmart checker will we heckle today? Ah! There she is. By now, everyone is testy and frustrated and has been ready to leave for half an hour. Ian has suddenly gotten hungry and wants everything in sight. Erin is grunting and growling, starting to sound like a cross between a hungry hen and a boat motor. She is ready to get out of her carseat. Mommy's ankles are sore from being run over by the cart she is pulling behind her, where it is so full that things fall off when she turns sharp corners. Now she has to juggle the children, one of whom is riding on the side to reach all the tempting loose things on the side aisles and trying to push all the buttons on the debit machine before telling the checker that it doesn't work and it's broken. She looks baffled and a little scared at his pronouncement.
Things start going onto the belt while I keep a sharp eye on Ian, who is known for sneaking interesting things like denture cream and earplugs on while I'm not looking (why DO they put those type of things on these aisles? Am I ever really going to say "Oh, I'm so glad those were here! I almost forgot the earplugs!"). I am still putting things on the belt when the bag revolver is full and the checker starts stacking things on top. I push my buggies down farther, before Ian types in something irreparable into the debit machine or decides to spit on it to make it work.

We continue. Someone stops to talk to the checker but gets sidetracked when Ian tells them that their artificial bouquet of roses has bugs in it. The woman studies the flowers carefully, doesn't see any bugs, then smiles at Ian and asks him if he likes flowers. Ian replies that "kids don't want flowers." He then redirects her attention to a balloon that has escaped to rest against the ceiling. She remarks that it's too bad that no one has a bow and arrows to get it down. Or rocks. "Rocks! That's right!" Ian says. "Don't give him any ideas," I warn her, only half joking. She laughs. Ian gets distracted again with the glue on her roses that are supposed to resemble dew. He picks at it some and then tells her that it's stuck. Then he tells her that it's weird. She laughs. I laugh some too, but mostly because of the look on her face. Anyway, I was very grateful for the general distraction as I paid and started wheeling everyone toward the doors. I made a quick stop to put Erin's new booties on her, since it was 26 degrees outside. I go out and it's snowing. Naturally. I get the kids into the car, get rid of the one cart and try to start loading the groceries when our Jeep pulls its very own Bad Weather Tantrum.
Every time there is bad weather, something doesn't work on the Jeep. As soon as the bad weather is over, the broken part is miraculously repaired. There is no logical reasoning for this vehicular behavior. The response to cold/snowy/rainy-thundery weather is for the back hatch to not stay open. You can open it and hold it up, but as soon as you let go it will shut on your head/body/groceries/grocery cart, whatever else is in the way, you get it. And if you decide to be sly and decide to shut the hatch and just open the hatch window, the hatch window will get the same mindset. Either way, you will end up holding up something with one hand and shovelling in groceries with the other hand, one bag at a time. And you can just visualize what happens when I have a cube of soda or a flat of water bottles or other heavy stuff to put in. I balance the hatch on my head while trying to maneuver the heavy article into the back. It does not help at all that the tandem stroller takes up so much space already.
Anyway, to make it a little shorter, it takes me twice as long to load the groceries because of the hatch tantrum and Ian has long since started complaining that he's cold. Erin has gone back to sleep.
Finally, we get out of the parking lot only to repeat the ordeal backwards when we get home, only now Ian is loose in the house and Erin is awake and loudly protesting her confinement in the carseat while I shuffle one or two bags at a time into the house and constantly reopening the back hatch. It will be another half an hour until I can put the groceries away. It will be another hour after that until I can sit down (think collapse) in a chair and breathe for a minute before someone needs something. So there, a page out of my book. Boy am I glad that it's only twice a month.