The Curse

Yesterday I faced the quandary of what to do with 2.5hours of my time since I needed to be back in Hometown (where I work) for a show choir concert at 7:30pm…not really worth the drive home and back, but a lot of time to kill in a town of 2000 people. So, to make the best use of my time, I decided to knock a few things off my growing Walmart list by going to Sx C with my mom after work.

My mom claims that she is the magnet for bad luck when it comes to faulty products, cock-eyed shopping cart wheels, and slow moving checkout lanes and I’m beginning to believe it’s an inherited trait aka "the curse."  I get more than my fair share of products with dings, missing parts, or “drawers that don’t fit no matter how long you try to convince your husband that they HAVE to fit-you’re just not putting them in right”. It can’t be random.  You may have heard me tell a few Walmart stories before, mostly involving Wo-town Walmart, but let me just assure you the woes of visiting Walmarts are not limited to our neighbors to the North. Oh no, these stories are free for the taking right here in Sioux County.

I gathered everything on my list in a fair amount of time. Notice I said “everything on my list” not “everything I needed”. Somehow the very thing that triggered the idea of making a trip to Wm-Kleenex-failed to make it on the list. So typical. By the time I cruised to the checkouts, my mom was already through and waiting on a bench for me. I thought I’d breeze through, we’d be on our way, no problem, right? Well, that wouldn’t make much of a story, would it?

Besides the 4 “20 or less” lines-which I don’t think I’ve ever legitimately used since I tend to buy things in multiples of 2 or 5-there were 3 registers open. Three out of about 16, at 5:30 on a weekday. I chose the line that only had 2 people in it and the first person almost finished. I failed to look at what the remaining person in line had in her cart. Which was approximately 128 jars of baby food. To her credit, she was super organized and was lining all the jars up in squares of 16 and had the patience of an angel, but the cashier was taking forever to finish up the first person. I scanned the aisle to my right and after a few minutes, actually switched to that lane. Until there was a problem at that drawer which necessitated the manager being called over to assist. So I was back in the baby food line. The cashier was taking her sweet time unfolding all the “green” canvas bags baby food lady brought with her and then started ringing through the jars. One.At.A.Time. With breaks between every 2 to carefully place them in the bag, look around, evaluate the state of the economy and the unfortunate comeback of leggings at a time when the American obesity rate is at a its all time highest level (or whatever she was thinking about because it wasn’t about how to quickly scan and bag baby food), and then move on to the next 2 jars.  After what felt like at least 10 minutes DRUG by, my mom finally got my attention and signaled that the lone remaining lane that I hadn’t tried, 6 rows down, might be our only shot of getting out of that store before suppertime. I quickly became the 3^rdperson in Lane 5 and guess what…STILL made it out of the store before baby food lady.

So here’s to you, teenage Aisle 5 girl: you are a super-star compared to basically everyone else I’ve ever met who works the Walmart registers and you even figured out my coupon without calling over a manager. You didn’t waste my time or anyone else’s, and you worked with 3x the efficiency of the women 4x your age. You are my new hero.

Then the handle of my bag broke on the way to the parking lot.