I have just returned from that weekly chore known as grocery shopping. In our fair city you have basically two choices: Wal-Mart or H.E.B. The latter is a Texas chain, established in 1905 that reaches north to about Waco and all the way south even into Mexico. Any other major chain that tries to encroach upon their territory soon leaves. Kroger was here for a while and Albertsons finally succumbed in 2002. We have Whole Foods Market and Sun Harvest that does well but any other independent grocer is up that famous creek without the proverbial paddle. So much for the history lesson!
When did manufacturers decide to shrink the size of their products and still charge the same price or higher? My particular gripe is with Hellmann’s or for those of you west of the Rockies, Best Foods, Inc. Hellmann’s mayo is the ONLY one for me and I purchase the quart (32 oz.) size. Well, lo and behold it is now a 30 oz. jar! I thought it looked a bit different and the price was a few cents higher. Many years ago, tuna used to come in 7.5 oz cans packed with TUNA. Have you opened a can lately? What is that stuff floating in the can?
Next on my list: children’s decorum in stores. Shopping is no longer the enjoyable pastime for me. There are some children who operate under the mistaken idea that the stores are now indoor playgrounds. They bounce basketballs incessantly or worse, play hide and seek among the clothes racks. Yikes, I need combat gear to maneuver the aisles. If they happen to run into me, no apology is forthcoming. Don’t even try to correct them with the infamous *teacher stare* ~ it is a lost cause. Parents seem to have abdicated their responsibility, sending them on to my classroom instead of parenting.
My solution is to hit the stores @ 6:00 am when the little ‘darlings’ aren’t up and the shelves are somewhat stocked. My question to you is: What frosts your cookies?
~butterfly angel~
6 comments:
I'm with you on going to the stores early in the morning! It's the only way I can avoid the inevitable traffic crunches here in Southern California (on the weekends, anyway). Oh, and there are no children playing hide-and-seek among the clothes and cookies at 7 a.m. either!
Okay, I'll bite. Speaking of which...a gripe with Wal-Mart. Or two. I hate it when they are stocking in the middle of the afternoon on a weekend. More than that I hate how they pretend to be a grocery store when they act like a discount store. Where's the selection? Why can I buy things in only certain sizes? Why are they suddenly not carrying the local bread I've been buying from there? Plus, it's LOCAL! Everyone has it. Why do they carry Smart (fake meat) products, but not the most obvious one: SmartGround?
Everyone once in a while I have to go and remind myself why it's such a pain to grocery shop there.
It never ceases to amaze me how we as a society put up with horrible guest service at the grocery store / megamarket. We graze from aisle to aisle pushing our carts, dodging stockers and stock alike. We dig around shelves and sometimes place our lives in peril trying to get something off of the top shelf. (Typically something that the stocker blew off restocking)
Then we have to contend with tight aisles and idots who leave their cart on the right side so they can peruse the shelves on the left while their children scream and carry on because they can't have the Chocolate Covered Sugar Bomb cereal.
Then, after spending a good portion of your life trying to figure out their shelving system, you go to check out only to find that out of the fifty registers, only two are open since every other cashier is sitting in the McDonalds attached to the store. Greetings are rare and "Have a Great Day" is now something you only see on television.
Walmart and their ilk are determined to corner the market and make us buy whatever cheap piece of poop they decide to put on their shelves. The competition such as Piggly Wiggly, Kroger, Albertsons, and Handy Andy have become extinct in this area of Texas.
-WTS
I usually go shopping around midnight when all the other zombies, er, night owls such as myself go. :)
I avoid our Walmart like the plague...Daughter Dear and I just returned from the local mall and it will be the last time I go after school on a Friday. OMG, it is really an eyeopener to really see some of the folk who obviously live in your vicinity. What gets me is the large of number of parents with little children....basically toddlers who just let them manuever through a parking lot at will. I never let mine step one foot onto the pavement unless I had a firm latch onto their hand, arm, leg, etc.
I hate clothes shopping - there always seem to be a couple of kids playing hide and seek in the racks while their mother totally ignores them.
I too avoid WalMart at all costs.
My part of Texas has a few more options when it comes to grocery shopping - HEB hasn't managed to push Kroger off the #1 slot.
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