TODAY' SUPERMARKETS CAN CAUSE SUPER HEADACHES - comparing shopping days.... the way it was... the way it is..
Remember the days when grocery shopping was a simple trip to the corner market and everything we needed could be found on two or three store aisles? Stores such as The Food Basket on Curtner and Lincoln, Andy's on Lincoln, the Red and White store on Malone and Lincoln, the Trio Market, A&T Market on Lincoln and Minnesota and the Glen Center Market on Lincoln Avenue.
I miss those old-fashioned stores, the kind where a bell hung over the doorway announcing each arriving customer, its shelves stocked with all we needed to run a household, everything from freshly ground coffee to sliced mutton at the butcher counter, to perfumed soap and fading romance novels.
Shoppers got more than just groceries at these stores, they got to hear the butcher's version of a funny story going around that week. Customers were treated with the utmost care and respect. When a new customer in the community left the store, he left with the feeling he'd just made a new friend.
Shopping day was pleasant and leisurely. At the A&T, in Willow Glen, you were sure to get some good conversation from butchers Leo Heinemann and Rocky Bengeavino along with that prime cut of beef.. Today, our shopping day has changed a bit. When taking myself to the super market for my shopping needs, I also have to take along a good supply of patience, dexterity, stamina and skill with me.
What once was an enjoyable arena has now evolved into a combat zone where shoppers must adopt a "bump or be bumped" attitude in order to survive. As super sized markets get even more super sized, so do the shopping carts. It's becoming a challenge to make it through a shopping day without colliding with other carts as they blindly zoom through store intersections. Poked ribs, bumped heels bruised toes and pinched fingers are standard battle scars generated by an uncooperating grocery cart.
Getting out of the store without a cart driven into the back of my heels would be refreshing change. Six-year- olds on up are allowed to operate these huge baskets on wheels; it’s no wonder some drivers haven't developed the skills to negotiate these carts down an aisle without bumping a few fellow shoppers along the way. Perhaps what we need at these supermarkets are posted arterial stops at all frozen food intersections and blind corners.
Of course, the blame for this reckless driving can't be placed solely on the shopper. Nine times out of 10, it's an uncooperative shopping cart. For me, the trouble begins out in the parking lot when I try to disengage one of these iron baskets from a long line of cohesive carts seemingly welded together. This in itself is a challenge to my nervous system. I kick, I pull, I rattle, I jiggle, I beseech, and I mumble incoherent profanities.
Finally, in frustration, I give up and repeat the whole relentless process on another line of carts. By the time I'm finished, I've suffered a pinched finger and several damaged toes. (The worse time for toe damage is in the summer when wearing sandals makes them more vulnerable). But the battle is eventually over, and I am finally in control of a shopping cart... or am I? You can bet your proverbial "Bippy" that the cart I've drawn will have a mind of its own.
The wheel on the left will automatically want to turn right, or the wheel on the right will lock into the left-turn position. Either way, I head for the store while my basket and three of its wheels head back to the parking lot! Maybe, as our modern supermarkets grow more sophisticated and shopping carts get more and more difficult to operate, we'll see the day when stores will employ their own "on duty" service mechanic, sort of an in store "Jiffy Lube" for shopping carts. Carts will probably come fully equipped for safety with rear view mirrors, brakes, turn signals and bumper-guards.
And anyone operating one will have to possess a valid automobile driver’s license; store traffic cops will give out tickets to drivers who run arterial signs or make illegal U-turns in the middle of an aisle. After three tickets, the offending shopper would have to use a hand basket. And, oh yes, these new-age carts will have horns we can lean on while waiting in those long checkout lines.
Recently, after I'd been waiting in a long checkout line for what seemed like an eternity, an additional checker was finally called in and I breathed a sigh of relief. But to my dismay the young checker took the customer behind me who had just two seconds ago got in line.
Perhaps if this checker was trained to look into the faces of his customers, he'd have known instinctively by the beads of perspiration that were gathering on my upper lip that I'd been standing in that line far too long, Another shopping day pet peeve: Having been tall all of my life has had its perks and its problems. In recent years, with store shelves getting higher and higher, at least once per shopping day I'm asked to retrieve some canned goods from the store's highest shelf.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm more than happy to help a little old lady who barely stands higher than a third shelf. It's just that a lot of these shoppers just don't want to put forth the extra effort. Most of them approach me with the same tired line: “You're tall", they'll say, as if I wasn't aware of the fact. “You're a lot closer to that top shelf than I am. Reach up there and get me a can of beans".
With a silent grown, I oblige. But sometimes I wonder just how these same shoppers would react if I walked up to one of them and said, Excuse me, you are short, and a lot closer to that bottom shelf than I am, would you stoop down and haul me up a can of green peas? Housewives like me don't need a workout at the gym to keep in shape, not when we have "shopping day" to build up our biceps.
I lift, carry, lug, and stretch all in the process of filling my shopping cart. Then I unload my groceries onto a conveyer belt where another shopper's items invariably cascade onto my tab. After I bag and pay for my groceries, I haul them out to the trunk of my car where again I unload them from my cart and finally drive them all home. Once I'm home I open the trunk and hang at least five of the plastic grocery filled bags on each arm, grab a 10 lb. sack of kitty-litter, and with a free hand I tuck a TV Guide between my teeth and - here's the tricky part - manage to find my house keys and open the front door. (Don't attempt this without years of practice.)
Once I'm in my kitchen, I empty out the bags, restock cupboards and shelves, and refrigerator. I then collapse, exhausted, into a chair. About this time my husband comes home from work and asks how my day has gone. I answer, "I did the grocery shopping". To which he replies, "That's nice, dear". Wanna'-bet?
10631 Vinedale Street, Sun Valley, CA 91352 - Phone (818) 767-3413 - Fax: (818) 767-1410
