Because sometimes you just want to write a judgy letter
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| English strawberries I ate at Chatsworth back when I used to go there |
Dear Lady Who Was Also Choosing Strawberries at Sunflower Farmers Market Yesterday,
I'm really glad you love Sunflower. I do too.
I love that it is the closest thing we have to a Trader Joe's. I love how inexpensive and nice the produce is, and how once they get me in the door with the dirt-cheap produce I then buy things like coconut milk and bottled curries and nitrate-free lunch meat and yogurt sweetened with fruit juice.
I love grabbing a chocolate croissant when I first walk in so that I can eat it while I shop and sprinkle buttery croissant flakes all over my shirt. (They say you shouldn't shop for groceries while hungry. I am just following sound principles, here.)
I love the boxes of sushi they have in the deli department and how they actually taste like fresh, real sushi instead of tiny little rubber tires. (Am looking at you, here, Costco. But no worries, I'll never quit you. Call me.)
I love all the huge bulk bins. I love that there are about 12 different kinds of sugar in those bins. I love the great deals I can get on spices and olive oil without having to buy massive amounts of either.
I love that they have a machine where you can make your own nut butters. I have not done this yet, but I heartily approve of the idea.
I love the beautiful bottles that they put their fizzy lemonades in, but I have to stop myself from buying them because I know I will never want to throw the bottles away but I will also never do anything with them and it will lead to hundreds of exchanges where an exasperated GH wants to throw away all the useless kitchen clutter and I threaten him with his life should he touch my precious empty lemonade bottle with the label half ripped off.
I like the wacky music selection they play. It turns out that the Dark Lord is a big fan of Huey Lewis and will just bop all over in his seat when he comes on over the speaker system. This entertains us both.
I generally enjoy the people who work there and the people who shop there. They tend to be a friendly bunch, like the fellow customer who gave me instructions on how to freeze the cartons of blackberries that were on sale for practically nothing. (Note: I did not freeze them. I just ate them all--mostly in cobblers. But I appreciated her advice.)
So it was kind of a surprise to look over and see you nonchalantly dumping out entire clamshells of strawberries so that you could pick through them and assemble your own box of perfect Super Strawberries. I found this kind of weird and rude. What are we, six? Not only were you pawing through all the strawberries, but you were likely bruising them while you sloshed them and dumped them around, which then kind of ruins it for the rest of us. And gives us your germs.
I now wonder if maybe you do that all the time, for all the different fruits. It's kind of a gross thought.
Best wishes,
The Girl Who Was Staring at You with Her Mouth Open
So, friends. What's the weirdest thing you ever saw someone doing at the grocery store? Or, perhaps, what was the weirdest thing YOU'VE ever done?
I'm Steph, a librarian and mom of 3 (not sure how that happened). Let's chat books, food, Sumptuous Literary Adaptations, poop, knitting and maybe some crazy Mormon Feminism.
17 comments:
Ok, this not weird, just plain gross, but I was walking behind a woman at a grocery store once, and she casually reached her hand down the back of her pants (and into her underwear) and SCRATCHED HER BUM, and not the cheeks.... like RIGHT where you don't want to see people touch themselves and then put their hand right back on the shopping cart and push it to the produce aisle. I kid you not. Have some e-coli with those strawberries, won't you?! Every time I come in the door from the grocery store I book it to the sink and scrub my hands, and wash my produce just as thoroughly. Strange this is... the woman looked like a normal, clean cut business woman, not the hobo whose habits she was exhibiting. Head shaker...
That is WRONG on so many levels.
And I think judgement is acceptable here, I mean Pres Uchtdorf's admonition to STOP IT certainly applies to this crazy lady.
Wow--my mouth is hanging open too about the strawberry abuse. I'm pretty much only shop at Sunflower and Costco these days. Costco for basics like bread, milk, and cheese and Sunflower for produce. I always get excited about eating more fruits and veggies when I shop there because everything is so fresh and so cheap.
One weird grocery store moment I had was while I was on my mission in Spain. We were in a funky little grocery store and they started playing Beastie Boy's on the radio. Nothing like doing your shopping to the strains of "No Sleep Till Brooklyn". The other grocery store we shopped at spent about two months playing the Tom Jones song "Sex Bomb" That's some awesome shopping music.
Oh, and the grocery stores in Spain all have a nasty-smelling section with whole hams (i.e. pig legs) and sausages hanging from the ceiling. Ew.
It's ALSO wrong because those are packed by weight, and she could easily be overpacking her containers. Jerk.
BUT also on a happier note, strawberries at Sunflower were 4 for $5 this week! What the what?!
I work at a grocery store. You don't want to know the real answer.
Okay, not gross or really weird but funny:
We had eggs on sale for 79 cents a carton a few months ago (limit: 4), and an couple went through the self check-out with an entire cart full of cartons, which they proceeded to buy in groups of four. Apparently that was their second trip back of the day. I didn't stop them because I think if you're willing to have everyone in a busy store to see you buy that many eggs, go for it, crazy people.
whoa. that is so bizarre and completely inappropriate. I am torn between being horrified and kind of amused. Wow. Just wow.
And there is no way I could ever top that story, though I'm trying to think of something, so just...okay.
I always thought grocery store strawberries were tasteless and now I know why.
Actually I've had bad luck with Trader Joes produce. It's actually better at the local (I'm not making this name up) Harris Teeter.
On the bad music front, I was on hold with a database company today and Ordinary World by Duran Duran came on the line. That is one song that should not get musak treatment. I usually love the music in Nordstrom Rack. They played Arcade Fire while I was there once and I couldn't leave the store until the song was over.
I wish I could shop at Sunflower! It sounds pretty splendid.
The weirdest behavior I've witnessed had nothing to do with people and their interaction with food, but just so happened to be at the grocery store. This was probably four or five years ago.
There was a couple on the same aisle as me, which also just so happened to house baby products. There was a couple there and as I walked by, I could tell the girl was upset while the guy seemed to be very intense about something. I was literally about three feet away from both of them when he practically yelled, "So and so, how do you expect us to be part of the righteous generation if you keep making us wait to have children?"
...
She looked at me in horror. I tried to give her my best "Oh, sister, so sorry" vibe and took off. It was so awkward. And strange.
Whoa. Em's takes the cake. That's awful.
My germophobe husband disagrees that Em's story takes the cake.
"Are you kidding me??? Somebody's BUTT JUICES on my strawberries, THAT takes the cake. That should be jail-worthy."
He is really, really upset about Amber's story, as you can see.
I'm still wheezing from "butt juices," so I need to stop writing.
Except I laughed out loud at Em's story, and am going to start saying that line randomly to people.
Oh, man, this is my favorite post. It contains so many things I love: bad behavior, hilarious writing about bad behavior, and comments that make me cringe/burst out laughing.
I wish I had something disgustingly hilarious to share, but I can't pick my jaw up off the ground right now. Maybe later...
Funny you should mention beautiful Sunflower lemonade bottles. My husband bought a ton and we lined them up on a windowsill planning to fill them with colored water eventually.
I took them down when they got too sticky-kitchen-dusty, but I can't seem to throw them away. So, best of you not to buy them in the first place. That is probably the best solution.
Nothing can top the BUM story. I will never tell my husband about that. But my germophobic hubbie saw a boy in the produce section licking tomatoes and putting them back while his mother stood right there and said nothing. Lick. Replace. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
"That caviar is a garnish!"
I don't know why this applies, but it does. People who don't follow rules are annoying/
after that butt story and the strawberry thing, i might never go into a grocery store again. or sleep. ever. i have two grocery store tales though. first, i was in line at the walmart customer service desk. there was a couple behind us chatting. the she-half said to the he-half, "what should we do tonight?" he said, "i want to watch that movie we rented." then she said, "oh...i was thinking we could do....other stuff..." LIKE WE DON'T ALL KNOW WHAT YOU MEAN, LADY.
second, i was at target once, and a large black woman pushed her cart by me eating fried chicken. i almost guffawed. holy stereotypes, batman!
Ew. That's so rude and inconsiderate that I almost can't believe it. Especially having taken place in Utah. I would've gotten the produce manager over there RIGHT NOW and hoped she'd get a good reprimand!
Once I was in line at Wegman's (an East Coast chain--the Disneyland of grocery stores, I kid you not), and the woman in the next checkout line was clipping her nails! the next time I was there I noticed that there was a little bin with nail clippers for sale in each checkout...
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