I'm pretty capable. I can schlop a 25 lb bag of sugar in and out of a cart without too much lower back pain. BUT...if I DON'T have to do it...its all the better right? So lately I've been stocking up on some food storage items. 45 lbs of wheat in a giant tub x 4 (well not so much giant as comfortably huge) takes some muscles. So I'm checking out, there is no bagger but the checker, and HE asks if I would like help out to the car. Sure I say...so he calls for a bagger to come help me. How come all the baggers assigned to help customers to the car are maybe 18...maybe weigh 100 lbs and maybe look like they could heft a box of Wheaties?
At that point I have 1 of two choices...let the poor wispy girl try to heft my 1 month (for 7 people) supply of wheat while I look like a lazy middle-aged prissy woman. OR...help her heft the grains into my trunk. Then she is left wondering...why am I here again? Good question.
Then there is the awkward moment where we decide if the bagger or I should push the cart to the parking lot. The dance begins as I reach for the handle to start pushing at the same time the bagger does. What would Miss Manners say? So if the bagger DOES push the cart I'm left wandering around with my receipt and nothing to hold on to. I have to play tourist guide to point out my car and hope that the 3 yr old in the child seat doesn't decide to start his power kicks...again. For as you know there is no more lovely a sound to a 3 yr old then the banging of metal against metal when applied with pressure from a 3 year old's shoe. 'Watch out...he may get you in the gut'
The one...good...and nice thing about having the bagger accompany you is SHE will take the cart back. It's against my 'religion' to leave a cart in the parking lot. I admit I have 'sinned' before...but only in Wal-Mart's parking lot where the cart returns are about as close as the equator to the north pole.
Is this why they invented online shopping?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
12 comments:
TOTALLY LOL. I had one of those moments last night too-- same deal, except my bagger was female and older than me. I didn't want to let her bust up her back while I, the younger and healthier gal, sat there watching.
I feel the same guilt about the Grandpa baggers. Some of them look like they may fall down and break a hip shortly, so why would I want to hasten their decline by insisting they huff my stuff out to my trunk?
So, how's this for a protocol for deciding when to accept or reject a bagger's offer to assist:
Wispy females: Nope.
Teenage boys, wispy or not: Yep.
Non-elderly men: Yep.
Old people: Nope, unless it's just bread in the sack and they have nothing better to do than carry it out.
Middle-aged women: Yep, if I'm in a hurry.
All bets are off if my child is having a melt down in the store.
Kat & Bren, FUNNY!
It is against my religion not to return the cart too.
I never ask for help and I hate when they try! It is just to darn awkward.
LOL, I could totally see you in this.
I hardly ever opt for the bagger's help. Same awkward reasons, tour guide to the car, mother bear about them pushing my child around, and... I always half wonder if some people tip them, so then they think I should be tipping them. ?? But yah, hefting a 45 lb. bucket of wheat (they only had one left), I wondered myself the other day if I should have asked for help. Wanna feel my muscles? :)
Hee-hee! I don't ever ask for help - I walk way faster than they do to the car, and then I feel stupid waiting for them to catch up.
On the other hand, what do you do when you can't stand the way the bagger is bagging your groceries? Do you stand and cringe? Offer to help? Berate the poor bagger once you've got to your car? Instruct them where to put each item? I'm often at this dilemma. I actually love it when there isn't a bagger, because then I start bagging my own groceries (with the bags I brought) while the checker is ringing everything up. Does this make me OCD? I can't wait to get back to Oregon to WINCO, where I'm expected to bag my own food . . . and carry my own items to my car ;)
Brenda: Oh yeah, I didn't even touch the Grandpa baggers...They usually have a hard time opening the back of my car...can't seem to find the lever. They are ALWAYS happy though...makes me happy.
Jana: I always feel guilty and look around to make sure no one is watching if I have to ditch a cart in Wal-Mart's lot...Then I tell myself if I DID walk half way across the lot to put the car back, someone would have probably alaready called the police for leaving my kids unattended in my car. It makes me feel better.
Marni: You got serious muscles girl!
Sharon:The grocery store baggers do a fair job at bagging...we are home to the national championship bagging title a few years in a row after all. However, Wal-Mart baggers TERRIBLE. I swear its there duty to see how many bags they can use on each customer. I once got 4 seperate bags with only one small item in each. I left them on the turnabout thingy because I thought she was going to fill them up...eventually and she finally said, can you take the bags so I can finish. HUH?
OH my heavens...I'm so embarassed by all the typos in the above comment. My fingers must have lock-jaw. And how do you spell embarrased???
Shoot, here in Idaho we’s have ta bag our own darn groceries if we mosey on down ta Winco. Heck, any other store this here clerk has ta do all the work. Shucks…
Last time I went to WallyMart the gal put so many canned goods into each bag that I thought they'd bust.
No matter how well I calculate, I always get behind someone who a)wants to price match, b) has a billion coupons, c) wants to argue about a price problem, etc.
I'm guilty of cart ditching occasionally.
One last whine on this matter: I can't stand how Sam's club makes you dig out your receipt before you leave the store. They don't actually LOOK at each item, so what are they doing?? Pretending to monitor you so you don't steal a couch or something?
Brenda - I'm with you - I have yet to figure out why you have to show your receipt at Sam's Club/Costco.
THAT is FUNNY!
I always used to leave my carts out. My husbnand shamed into breaking the habit a year or two ago. My defense was hey I don't want someone snatching the girls while I 'm miles away returning a cart.
Wal-mart is HORRIBLE for cart holders. I figure if I can't stand at my car and see one within a reasonable distance, I'm not hiking to take it back. If they want it in the cart holder, they can put in more convenient ones.
Besides, why feel bad? Is it a law that you have to put your cart away when you're done? :) They hire people to drag those things back you know.
I guess it just bugs me when I go to pull in a stall and its blocked by a cart...or worse I make it in, but can't open the door.
Post a Comment