Visiting the supermarket should be fun or at least not such a bother. Everything is so colorful in the supermarket. There are bold and bright signs inviting customers to sales on every isle. There are balloons floating high with soft music whispering from the ceiling. The staff is dressed in nicely polished uniforms and they are clad with warm, welcoming smiles. At first glance (and with a teaspoon of optimism) it is almost easy to forget that there are slow moving customers, people with obnoxious children, long lines and other annoying things that impede the pleasure of shopping. Most certainly, visiting the supermarket is not as simple as it looks on television. It seems as if something always bothers me, takes up my time, frightens and confuses or humiliates me.

The worst day ever was just recently when the rain was unrelenting. It wasn’t so bad that the wind blew my umbrella inside out, but I was stuck in the rain even longer because of slow idiots in front of me inching into the store. Their dumb cancer treatments were not so important that they had to discuss it in front of me. These two old ladies in particular were moving so slowly, a snail could have carried salt across marbles without getting burned faster than they were walking! Their silly wigs were too high to see over them. I grunted loudly until they moved out of the way. Once I got inside, I could smell the fresh baked cinnamon rolls at the free sample counter. The lady would not let me taste a sample because they were too warm. I told her that I was an adult and I could just blow it to cool down. She mentioned something about, liability and insisted that I had to wait. I waited and walked to get my spaghetti sauce. It was so hard to choose a simple sauce. They all had promising labels but the ingredients were insane. There were four rows of sauce that had mushrooms, meat and four different cheese. I tried to pick the sauce that had the least amount of sodium. That sauce had higher amounts of sugar and preservatives. It was so hard to deal with all the variety. They were all over priced too. I returned five minutes later and all the free samples were gone. How was that possible!? I can tell you why. That stupid fat kid ate all the free samples. His father (a smelly bearded guy) looked at him with such pride. Truthfully, this gluttonous greedy pig was a massive heart attack just waiting to happen. He had the nerve to get loud and grumpy when his father told him to wait until the potato chips were paid for before busting the bag open. I wanted to smack that boy. He threw himself on the floor in a silly tantrum and blocked the whole isle. I had to go around the opposite way to get to the other side and guess who was in front of me again? Those two, snail-like old ladies were there. There was no relief in sight.

The most annoying thing about going to the supermarket is that some things take up too much time. I was so polite when I asked how long it would take to cook more free samples. The woman smiled and told me 25 minutes. I asked, “Really? Why does it take 25 minutes to re-heat defrosted cinnamon buns?” She replied, “I am going on a break.” Why does she need a break? She wasn’t doing any real work. I only came to the store for three simple things: spaghetti sauce, spinach and sausage. I was forced to go down a different isle to get away from some obese twins who had full baskets. When I took the alternate isle, there was a sale. The offer was for a two dollar discount for the purchase of milk along with two boxes of General Mills cereal. I felt compelled to get milk and cereal to take advantage of that deal. The crowd navigation from one end of the store to the other was overwhelming. It was as if everyone went straight there after church. If they had stayed in church longer for a few extra songs, the store would not have been so crowded. The line took the most of my time. The girl at the register had long nails curled over and she kept making mistakes with the buttons. She kept flipping her fake hair away from her face and popping gum. She said that my coupon wasn’t valid because it was wet from sitting on the milk. She made me look for another coupon because the barcode was not readable. Prior to that, the smelly bearded man with the fat kid was in front of me and he ate half the bag of chips. He complained that they were stale and refused to pay for them. The manager came over, caved in like a wimp and let the man send his insolent child back to the snack isle to pick the potato chips of his choice. Of course, he could not reach it and someone had to help him. These people wasted my time so terribly. I was furious.

Maneuvering in the store was especially hard. There was some rope or string wrapped around the wheel of my card and that made it hard to push. It seemed like people cluttered each isle with their simple conversations or product comparisons. For instance, the man who was talking to a lady was deserving of a stiff kick. The lady told him that she was married. That should have been the end of the conversation and he should have moved his cart away from the middle of the isle. However, he didn’t do that. He insisted on asking her to come to his church. He was flirting with her and disobeying every Biblical law known to man. He was coveting another man’s wife and making me gag. Another woman attempted to nurse her baby in the next isle just to stop him from screaming. The child must have been almost two years old! She should have popped open a Welches Grape Drink and kept her cart moving. My back still hurts after leaving that supermarket. I was on my way to the deli counter to inquire about their catering rates. Just as the lady asked if I had been helped, a man with a cane was knocked to the floor by a child who was chasing his balloon. When he fell over, I was struck from the side and my knee buckled. I hit the floor because my cart simply rolled forward as I began to fall. My cart hit the pile of oranges and they all tumbled down. My back and knee were in so much pain. Screaming was all I could do. That old man blamed me for his fall because if I had not been there, he would have hit the counter and it would have broken his fall. The dumb little girl didn’t stop running until she tripped over the oranges. When her absent-minded parent came over to see why she was crying, I was blamed for the oranges falling. The parent gave me a dirty look and told the manager that I am the careless idiot who should not be allowed to shop there. I could not get my catering question answered because the old man ordered four pounds of sliced ham. I was livid and scared that my back would never feel the same again. I was confused about how all of this was my fault.

It seemed impossible to escape being humiliated by something. The sink in the filthy bathroom splattered my pants so it looked as if I didn’t make it to the toilet in time. My debit card was rejected twice and had to keep getting charges reversed. I ended up with 15 items when I only intended to by three. The lady I snarled at for moving too slowly laughed at me while in line. The cash register girl went on the speaker system to ask for a price check for adult diapers because it would not scan on her primitive machine. I will never buy those for my grandparents again. On the way back to my car, the eggs broke and I still forgot to get ice cream. I tried to pull out of my parking spot and who was in my way while driving too slowly?? It was the smelly bearded guy. He was struggling to pull the seat belt around his obese son while letting him eat the same ice cream bars that I was going to buy.

In conclusion, getting angry and snapping rude remarks at people only created more misery. I guess that being so negative just brought every possible bad event towards me. I felt that I would have a horrible time in the store and indeed I did. The more I tried to punish others for their perceived stupidity, the more I was hurt. The lines took too much time, the children in the store bothered me, I was embarrassed by insufficient funds announcements at the register and nothing went right. I picked too many things in my cart and had to remove most of it. I left the store with none of the things that I went there to buy. Next time, I will try to think positively. I will smile like everyone else and be nice to the old folks.